中尉一边穿过安静的街道，朝托萨门走去，一边读着这些诗句：

亲爱的朋友，我很高兴你让我想起了我们昔日的感情，因为这让我确信你的感情还没有消亡。我还不能同意见你。我宁愿我们不要见面。

“我想我会在这里签上我的名字，然后说：‘上帝保佑你，威尔弗里德；去！”

'哦！你为什么要做这种事！我必须写下去。我的前世似乎在嘲笑我，我的老朋友应该来到意大利，穿着那件令人厌恶的制服。当我们必须充当敌人时，我们如何能成为朋友呢？我们很快就会拿起武器，互相对抗。我可怜你，因为你选择了失败的一方；当你被击退时，你就不会像我们意大利人那样对自己的国家感到自豪；没有喜悦，没有爱。他们会称你为雇佣兵。我记得当我们在英国时，我曾经很害怕你加入我们的敌人，但这对我来说似乎太过分了。

“你和一群屠夫在一起。如果我能见到你，告诉你贾科莫·皮亚韦尼的故事，以及其他一些事情，我相信你会立即折断你的剑。

'还有时间。十五号来米兰。到时候你就会看到我。我出现在斯卡拉歌剧院。答应我，如果你听到我的话，你会完全按照我让你觉得正确的方式去做。啊，你不会，尽管成千上万的人会！但是，当幕布落下时，请退到我身边，留下来——哦，亲爱的朋友！我写信给你表示敬意；我们发誓要解放这座城市和这个国家——留在我们中间：折断你的剑，撕下你的制服；我们是如此强大，以至于无法抗拒。我知道你在战场上可以成为怎样的英雄：那么，为什么不在真正的事业中呢？我不明白你应该在那面丑陋的旗帜下浪费你的勇气，血腥和过去的宽恕。

“我很高兴收到你们所有人以及英格兰的消息。此信的持有者是一位值得信赖的信使，并将继续致电酒店。 A. 因为我不允许我的使者提供我的地址而感到生气；但我不仅必须隐藏起来，我还必须保持平静，忘记你们所有人，直到我完成我的任务。另外。我们都改了名字。我也一样。我可以认为你是吗？阿迪奥，亲爱的朋友。

“维多利亚。”

皮尔森中尉一遍又一遍地读着他在英国所爱的她的信，从中获得新的启发，就像恋人失去单一印象的能力时所做的那样。他是米兰司令官向维罗纳元帅发出的口头信件的持有者。当时在奥地利服役的英国人受到极大的青睐，中尉的叔叔是一位杰出的将军，他对元帅的参谋部有一种半依恋的感觉，而且匆忙地来来往往，目的是为了留住他正如他许多友好的战友所猜测的那样，他是因为决斗而受伤。当然，只有通过在奥地利军队中的激烈竞争才能获得履行参谋职责的特权。但即使是在严格的军校里，对一个年轻人来说，恩惠也可能会有所帮助。他必须在途中转向布雷西亚，并计算出如果运气好的话，他将在日落时进入维罗纳城门。与此同时;一路上，维多利亚的信让他心烦意乱。

我们将让他在桑葚和葡萄丛中，以及九月平原的白色、黄色和干旱色调中进行他的古铜色骑马，并结识他那支骄傲的军队的一些战友，维多利亚认为这支军队在倾盆大雨中无力抵抗。意大利的爱国主义精神。

平原上最美丽的城市长期以来一直是外国士兵的巢穴。其美丽的生命力在当时并不比现在更明显。在墙内可以瞥见它，与其说是生活，不如说是属于萦绕心头的灵魂。军事科学使维罗纳成为了一位披甲的巨人，但除了偶尔的情况外，它还是一位沉默的巨人。它的脸上露出战争般的笑容，就像一具死亡的骷髅；头骨和聚集的蠕虫的显着形象是意大利七弦琴演奏者自然地运用到维罗纳的形象。

老陆军元帅兼奥地利驻伦巴第军队的总司令，在他睿智的总参谋长阿德拉图斯的建议下，当时正致力于在维罗纳增加一些丑陋的圆墙和侧翼堡垒。当奥地利因第一次起义和皮埃蒙特人的进攻而被击退时，她得以站稳脚跟，像坚石一样向敌人发起挑战。

一群骑兵军官，身着几套步兵制服，坐在布拉广场一家咖啡馆外，靠近维罗纳大圆形剧场的影子，沐浴在凉爽的傍晚空气中，被清新的春风吹拂着。 。他们抽着淡味的长吸管雪茄，喝着冰镇柠檬水或咖啡，谈论着驻军军官的日常谈话，也许还带有维也纳社会教育可能赋予的强烈不道德的味道。九月的圆月依然高悬，照亮了深不可测的天空和美丽的大地。它把坚固的黑色从古老的野蛮墙壁上投射到几乎与他们懒洋洋地伸展的脚的交汇处。广场上流动着街头音乐。军官们手挽手地走着；时而在明亮如白昼的月光下，时而在漆黑如夜的阴影中：远处的人影交替闪烁。光芒就像刀片的锋利边缘一样围绕着这个巨大的圆圈。维罗纳没有派出任何高级意大利人到这个度假胜地。就连卖瓜的也停在了新门大街尽头的拱门下，仿佛他的受欢迎顾客已经达到了明显的极限。

伦巴第统治者的这种孤立始于米兰，但由于特殊原因，并没有像维罗纳那样得到明确的定义。维罗纳贵妇和奥地利军官之间的战争已经爆发。根据高卢特普西科瑞安法典，一位女士允许自己选择自己的舞伴，并在舞蹈中以她的手为荣而拒绝应聘者，当她的手松开时，如果手套打到了她，她就没有正当理由抱怨脸颊。奥地利人不得不忍受舞厅里的这种拒绝。在海滨长廊上，他们的容貌被遗忘了。他们向雕像鞠躬。现在，不属于克罗地亚军团或从帝国最东部任何地方抽调出来的奥地利军官通常都是绅士。尽管他们在受到极大的刺激后可能会怀恨在心，但他们在被征服的国家至少可以像我们在印度的军官一样享有克制的良好声誉。他们不会脾气暴躁，也不会暴躁傲慢，除非受到挑衅。温柔的意大利贵妇们的行为令人恼火。这些沉睡的剑骑士们听到他们家乡的华尔兹奏响着精致的维也纳的华尔兹声，而他们的双腿在广场人行道上忧郁地一动不动地伸展，他们的手臂环绕着没有弹性的腰部，这让这些沉睡的剑骑士们感到恼怒。他们试图更多地鄙视它，而不是不喜欢它，称他们的女性敌人为亚马逊，并用一个不那么恭维的头衔来称呼他们的男性敌人，因此等待爱国主义流行病过去。

某团的韦斯普里斯上尉以一位睿智的君主的名字命名，他的王冠是外交上唯一盛开的花朵，他因坚持要求一位女士在公共场所记住他而特别出名。他以武器技巧而闻名。他跳华尔兹的样子令人赞叹。笔直挺立，就像在元帅的眼前一样。用他的军官兄弟的话来说，他是成功的。也就是说，即使贝罗娜身为战神时也不会狂暴。韦斯普里斯上尉（约翰·内波穆克饰，Freiherr von Scheppenhausen 饰）在外貌上与皇家军中的一位军官相似，是一名赌博将军，名气尚未吹响。有传言说他们可能是亲戚；一个稍有顾忌的社会毫不犹豫地提及如何。船长的胡子是稻草色的。他把它穿得超出了规定的长度，并无限地爱抚着它。一双火热的眼睛在他们的方向上摇摆不定，这大胡子是一个很难忘记的特征，韦斯普里斯毫无疑问是正确的，他的脸经受了相当于一顿暴击的轻微伤害。他身材高大，肩膀方正。胡子的火焰在他脸的两侧流淌，形成一道绚丽的曲线。他警惕的头高高地抬起来，以发现他选择解释为侮辱的东西，或者聚集赞同的微笑，由于对性别的准确判断，他更习惯于这种微笑。无论英俊与否，他都享有阳刚之美的特权。

这位即将到来的著名船长假装布兰恰尼家族的一位出色的威尼斯女士一定会公开回应他的私人信号，并公开回应他的问候。他拒绝在她无敌的面容面前像太空中的一个粒子一样飘浮。一天晚上，在甜蜜的意大利将自己放逐出广场之前，他遇见了她，他鞠了一躬，走到她面前，尖锐地鞠了一躬。她交叉双臂，凝视着他。他用洪亮的话语唤起了她的回忆。可耻的谎言，或者可耻的真相，这是在他的许多兄弟军官、三名意大利女士和一位参加他们的意大利绅士布朗西尼伯爵的耳中说出的。老太太平静地听着。布隆奇尼伯爵打了他的脸。那天晚上，这位女士的兄弟从威尼斯赶来，并声称他有权保护她。韦斯普里斯上尉将他的身体贯穿，并在他的尸体上贴上了邪恶的标签。他这样做并不是出于残暴，而是出于残忍。这个人感到，从此以后，只要他保住性命，他就将与每一位有勇气的意大利绅士交战。布朗西尼伯爵是他的下一个受害者。船长的屠宰工作一度停止了。他的兄弟军官们在另一个赛季不会原谅他，但他的愤怒的复仇者和奥地利钢铁优点的优秀维护者，受到了真正热烈的欢迎，当他的第二次决斗结束时，他大步走向混乱。 ，或者是奥地利军团混乱的地方。

自然而然地，在维罗纳各地，各阶层的意大利人和他们的征服者之间都存在着尖锐的分歧。巨大的绿皮瓜从来没有被推到白大褂的附近。少女们不再在军人的目光下撒娇，而是成双成对地匆匆而过；整个城市充满了皱眉和嘲笑的奴性，如果没有敌对的精神状态是很难忍受的，而这种精神状态是军人在这种情况下的避难所。流动的音乐家，除了这些鱼苗，没有人继续关注士兵的分配者。

奥地利军队以兄弟情谊而自豪。纪律十分严格，但所有军官下班后，都像大男孩一样交往自由。将军接过中尉递来的一支雪茄，作为回报，他向他举起酒杯。将军对他的中尉的风流韵事很感兴趣：当他觉得自己有责任谦虚地赞扬他的上级军官最近的一次征服时，他也不害羞。军官之间和队伍中确实存在良好的友谊，并且得到系统性的鼓励。

奥地利军队当时就是奥地利帝国。在军队之外，帝国是一个充满嫉妒、心存不满的民族的大杂烩。同样的政策使各个州相互对抗，以便使所有州都屈服于中央元首，建立了一支特权力量，其中培养了联合情绪，直到它成为一个刀剑民族。对于一个国家来说，没有什么比这更致命的了。但对于一支军队来说，这是衡量智慧的一个简单标准。如果密码是“MARCH”而不是“DEVELOP”，一群人要想成为一个可用的工具，就必须同意作为一个整体行事。汉尼拔是一个历史性的例子，说明了一位将军可以与那些因此获得新公民身份的部落取得成就。而且（据我们对他和他的命运的了解），他似乎是一个例子，说明有必要向聚集在一起的外国人开火。当奥地利年复一年地征战，在一场又一场的战役中惨遭失败时，她一步步失败，但她却顽强地团结在一起。而比洗礼更重要的是，争斗的气氛始终需要让她作为一个中央集权帝国拥有健康的活力。她知道这一点；她知道。这（除了哈布斯堡王朝著名的敏捷之外）是她无畏地准备战斗的秘密之一。战争就像铁匠铺里的钢铁一样，将她维系在一起。如果战争要花钱，她就会成为一个以侵略性着称的帝国。仅次于战争的第二个最佳药方是对叛乱省份的军事占领。当士兵们因对最轻微的道德罪行的严重误解而受到嘲笑、叫喊、殴打、刺伤，因以体贴的方式履行职责而受到可耻的辱骂时，他们很快就会感觉到自己的家在哪里，并感受到原子团在团结力量中的自豪感。的感觉，并且与他们所拥有的土地上的居民过于准确地分开。在意大利，德国人、捷克人、马扎尔人、克罗夫特人，甚至一般情况下的意大利人，都坚持安全、报酬、荣耀的标准，所有人都成为了杰出的奥地利士兵；除此之外还很少。

正是为了对抗这样一个被铁箍束缚的强权，意大利被肢解、嫉妒、腐败，其组织主要是由激情推动的，准备崛起。最终，一个忠于自己并决心向勇敢者索取上帝恩赐的国家将战胜一支单纯的军队，无论其力量多么强大。但它需要一种受启发的信仰能量。中间的章节将表现出可怜的弱点，这种灾难性的教育使人们从表面上看，认为斗争是愚蠢的。他们也可能会说，让那些在维罗纳小街上扭打的流浪汉像一个人一样扑向正在行进的巡逻队，并希望能够战胜他们！在维也纳，人们常常感到绝望，但在奥地利阵营中却从未出现过这种情况。维也纳经常两面派，而且她的武力就像一个训练有素的人在感受自己的肌肉。因此，当政府考虑临时处理时，他们向将军们发出命令，将军们的想法就是用木槌敲击。

在此期间，没有人怀疑任何大叛乱正在酝酿之中。大量的不满被视为只不过是意大利疾病到处表现出来的症状，维也纳建议采取温和的镇压措施——她很高兴地称这些措施为“安抚”。她最近对动荡的威尼斯发出的命令受到了失态广场外圈子的批评。军队的被迫不活动似乎会加速军队的智慧，因为一些年轻军官对他们统治威尼斯的方法的看法很激烈。有人吩咐他的将军“看这里”，而他则伸出手宣称意大利人就像女人一样，想要——是的，想要——（他们的本能要求如此）挨打，真正的挨打；正如用我们的白话强调的那样，每月一次雷鸣般的殴打：——“或者是这样，”将军默许地补充道。对这些不守规矩的意大利人进行一次雷鸣般的殴打，大约每月一次，因为他们就像女人一样！说话的是一位年轻人，但没有人怀疑他与女性的熟识，也没有人愿意暗示他在这方面的知识教育并不足以保证他适合统治威尼斯。在激烈的谈话中，两名年轻的龙骑兵军官走过来，向他们的上级敬礼后，抓起椅子并将其踩倒，随后要求借用任何人的雪茄盒。一位奥地利军官通常会保留这种工具，这对于他的舒适来说是必要的，但人们会认为，对于他匀称的服装的严格正确性来说，这是令人讨厌的，我们无法轻易猜测。甚至没有人知道他把口袋手帕或钱包藏在哪里。然而，这些东西是按需出现的。几个细长的雪茄盒被推了过来，然后就看到英姿飒爽的少年衣着凌乱。

“你把她追到地球了吗？”他们被问到。

回答深入探讨了哲学。包括询问谁照顾整篮子——暗示着对少女的类似描述。他们周围爆发出无节制而喧闹的笑声。两人似乎都受到了公正的对待。他们紧身的外套在胸部鼓起或在腰部敞开，仿佛缺少纽扣，那件衣服的白色大声呼唤着管道粘土的净化。问题四起。被追捕的少女是一位漂亮的女孩，是一位铁匠的女儿，预计她的阶级不会有长期的抵抗。但事实证明，一周前她曾说过，“如果有人看见我和你说话，我就会被刺伤”；因此，奇怪的事情并不在于，当她和她来自米兰的眼神凶恶的表弟一起在广场上绊倒时，她把目光移开，拒绝了所有让她放慢脚步和交谈的邀请，而是在加倍努力并在孤独的街道上行走之后，她跑得尽可能快，在科隆巴大街的一个拐角处，她让自己被抓住了——毫无疑问，她是故意的，因为她没有一点呼吸——让她快速尝到了她的嘴唇，然后像一只被网住的鸟一样自然地尖叫，并在那个特定的时刻吸引了一群拥挤的人群来营救她：不少于五十人，而且都是男人。 “其中没有女人！”兴奋的年轻军官重复道。

一个处理过类似事务的老手看得出来，他对这位少女的行为感到困惑，但他并不想受到干扰。他对她对他的偏爱深信不疑，这让他最近的经历相当令人困惑。事实上，在这个时代，奥地利军队的信条是，除了对男性的恐惧之外，没有什么可以阻止甜美的意大利女性表达她们对宽肩膀、粗四肢、黄头发的战士的偏爱——这与他们自己，这应该会极大地激发和蔼可亲的丘比特从他的箭袋中进行选择。

“她怎么了？你让她走了吗？随之而来的是纠缠不休的言论，如果不是他们如此坚持，就太荒谬了。

'让她走？看在魔鬼的份上，我怎么能在五十个家伙的人群中抓住她，所有人都在割草、推挤、推搡——每个流氓都在我鼻子底下像坑一样臭气熏天？

“哼！”将军走了。 ‘只要你不画画！拔出鞘，等一下。

他示意看一下他们裸露的剑。

年轻军官夫妇脸红了。

“将军先生！赦免！'他们抗议道。

'不，不。我知道男孩子怎么说话；我自己也曾是其中之一。啧！当然，你说的是实话；但生意是让我知道的！多远！你们的剑，先生们。

“但是，将军！”

'出色地？我只是想检查一下刀片。

“你怀疑我们的话吗？”

'听他们说！字？你们是律师吗？士兵从事的是行动。我不想知道你们的言语，而是你们的事迹，我勇敢的小伙子们。我想看看你们的剑刃，我的孩子们。最后的订单是什么？我们决不能挑衅，或者，如果可能避免的话，接受碰撞，等等。和平中的士兵是公民，等等。无论出于何种原因，或以任何借口，都不能拔出剑等等，你们都听到了吗？超好的！我的孩子们，我收到了你们的否认。另外，我只是想满足一下好奇心。警卫给你开路了吗？

答案是肯定的。

“你的剑！”

其中一人拉了拉，递出了把手。

另一个愤怒地抓住了剑柄，坚决地一拍，将它收进了剑鞘。

“我是囚犯吗，将军？”

'一点也不！'

“那么我拒绝交出我的剑。”

另一位将军恰好闲逛着。他一边鼓掌，一边选择意大利语作为表达讽刺性最高级的语言，说道：

'太棒了！最令人钦佩！道德崇高的崇高：“那么我拒绝”等等：你知道你在引用吗？ “正如鼓手对拿破仑所说的那样。”我想你忘了添加这一点？正是这位年轻的士兵说出了这些让我们难以启齿的宏大言论。所以小家伙们塔了！他的道德伟大就像他的鼓一样喧闹。怎么了？'

“皮尔森将军，没什么问题。”几个声音回答道。一些人解释说，舍内克将军要求珍娜中尉展示他的剑，但珍娜中尉拒绝了。

英勇的剑卫向皮尔森将军正在交谈的军官喊道：“这里！维斯普里斯！

'这是什么，我亲爱的朋友？说吧，我的好珍娜！”

解释一出，韦斯普里斯上尉深表同情，两位将军同样低声点头。

“你画画了吗？”船长打着哈欠问道。 “如果你愿意的话，你不必说那么多话。将军马上就会问我；由于他知道你和他的侄子之间即将进行的决斗，他可能会对你的热情做出不好的解释。

“魔鬼把他的侄子叫来了！”愤怒的詹娜中尉回答道。 “他今晚从米兰回来，如果他明天不与我战斗，我就会把他视为胆小鬼。好吧，关于那件事！我的好韦斯普里斯，那些家伙已经挤进了周围的一大群人中，并开始揉捏我。你了解我吗？我感觉到了他们的指关节。

“啊，好，好！”船长说。 “那么，当然，你没有画画。在类似的情况下，哪个帝国军官会这么做！如果有人问我的话，这就是我对皇帝的答复。画画将表明奥地利军官在敌人最激烈的情况下依靠他的好剑；正如你所知，我的珍娜，政府已针对这一点发布了明确的禁令按钮。亲爱的，你卖掉了吗？

“一个人为此掏出了耳朵。”

珍娜中尉展示了他手腕转动时的一个特殊切口。

“那不应该发出声音吗？”他有些焦急地问道。

“无论如何，它再也听不到任何声音了，”韦斯普里斯船长说道。两位军官很高兴地理解了这句话的意义。

与此同时，皮尔森将军与他的兄弟将军结束了一场明显幽默的对话，后者现在对詹娜中尉说：“既然你更愿意交出自己的人而不是你的剑，那就太好了！”今晚十点到我房间门口报到。我怀疑你已经在烧钢了，先生。他们说，“就像你的脾气一样，随时都会爆发。”

几个声音插嘴道：“将军！”如果他真的画了怎么办！

'安静。您已阅读最近的订单。奥兰多可能没有他的杜林达达；但你可能不会。抓住这个事实。我的孩子们，政府希望让你们成为基督徒。脸颊被打肿了，你该怎么办？

“我可以给你看吗，将军？”一个小中尉急忙喊道。

“我的孩子们，两周前从我们的老维也纳收到的命令是，命令你们把另一边脸给打者。”

皮尔森将军补充道：“这样面部两侧就能恢复适当的平衡。”

“并标记我，”他继续说道。 “任何事情的政策都可能存在疑问，尽管我不应该建议你珍惜它们：但对这件事的惩罚是毫无疑问的。”将军严厉地说道；然后他缓和了语气，说道：“政府的愿望是建立一支基督徒军队。”

“而且是一种宝贵的方式！”两三个年轻军官插话道。他们完全理解维也纳的统治对他们的首领是多么可恨，只要他们表现出服从的倾向，他们就会对任何极端的讽刺表示同情和容忍。因为官僚命令，无论是什么，都必须遵守。军队也许——当然也确实——最了解情况：然而，它只不过是维也纳那些迟钝的、未出柜的人手中的一台机器，他们通过数字的计算来判断困难和行动计划，或者通过外国期刊——天知道是什么！

舍内克将军和皮尔森将军笑着走开，留下年轻的军官们独自一人。他们六人挽着手，大步朝新门走去，在新门附近，在三一街的拐角处，他们兴奋地看到一匹没有骑手的马突然在奔腾中跪倒在地，翻了个身。一群人蜂拥而至，中间传来一个同志向他们欢呼的声音。 “是皮尔森，”詹娜中尉喊道。军官们拔出刀剑，向门口的卫兵招呼。皮尔森中尉倒在他们肩上，因呼吸困难而死了。他们把他举起来，发现他没事，就捶打他的背。他的剑刃是红色的。他随着他们的重击声咳嗽起来，并大声喊叫让他们停止。守卫还没来得及追上他们，那些一直追随他的闲散的暴民就撤退了。皮尔森中尉没有给出任何解释，只是说他在前往舍内克将军住所的途中在朱丽叶墓附近遭到袭击。费洛斯刺伤了他的马，把他摔倒在地，并撕下了他背上的外套。在他愤怒的最初时刻，他痛苦地嘟哝着丢失了其中的一封信：而且，由于众所周知他与莱娜·冯·伦肯斯坦伯爵夫人订婚，他的同志们推测这位女士可能有与这封信的迷惑有关。巨大的笑声围绕着他，他看着一个又一个的人。自然要考虑到一位从敌人手中支离破碎的兄弟军官的暴躁情绪，否则詹娜中尉会当场解释他眼睛里的挑战。事实上，他喊道：“这封信！”信！为了军队的荣誉，冲锋吧，救出那封信！”其他人附和他：“这封信！”信！英文字母！军队中的外国人可以随心所欲地挑衅；如果他受到上级的喜爱，他的同事们就会责怪他的忍耐力。威尔弗里德·皮尔森看了一眼自己的剑刃，缓缓将其收鞘。 “珍娜中尉在暴徒面前是一位好演员，”他说。 “先生们，我希望你们不要对那封信发出任何声音；这是私人问题。大约一个小时后，如果任何官员选择就此询问我，我会回答他。

最后一批残余的暴民已经撤退。门口的指挥官把一件斗篷披在威尔弗里德的肩上。他挽着朋友威尔弗里德的胳膊匆匆赶回军营，很快就向他的将军报告了自己的情况，将军的第一句话是：“那匹死马已经移走了吗？”他不再像往常那样模棱两可。 “如果你必须像冬天城墙北侧的一棵无花果树一样来到这里，那么当你是口头派遣的传达者时，请直接前往营区，”舍内克将军说道，皮尔森将军很快也加入了他的行列。

“我听说你在全城都在议论这封信，这是什么？”后者向侄子行了值班行礼后问道。

威尔弗里德回答说，这是他姐姐处理家庭事务的一封信。

两位将军是亲密的朋友，他们讨论了他所遭受的袭击。威尔弗里德必须结合当时的情况来叙述：当他以军步快跑接近舍内克将军的住处时，六名男子在一名领头人的带领下从一条狭窄的小巷冲向他，经过一番搏斗后将他打倒，并抢走了马鞍包，他撕下了他背上的外套，留下了他剑的痕迹，聚集的人群在一旁观看，并发出叫喊声。他的马逃跑了，他承认他跟踪了他的马。舍内克将军暗示性地叫出了莉娜伯爵夫人的名字。 “一点也不，”皮尔森将军回答道。 “这家伙对她求爱太热烈了。”这里的恶棍想要轰炸；这就是它所在的地方。一剂铁丸将使维罗纳成为一个健康的地方。她一定有它。

舍内克将军说：“我希望不会”，并嘲笑爱尔兰人的热血。他带领威尔弗里德去见元帅，之后威尔弗里德可以自由地寻找詹娜中尉，詹娜中尉通过承诺在规定的时间内不参加战斗而获得了类似的自由权利。第二天早上，威尔弗里德被他叔叔的勤务兵吵醒，叔叔把维多利亚的信的副本放在他手里：在信的末尾，他叔叔写道：“相当令人惊讶。”做得相当好；但是是外国人做的。 “Affection”拼成一个“f”。意大利人：你会看到“丑陋的旗帜”上的字母是强调的；还有“血腥和过去的宽恕”非常大；抄写员有一点评论员的感情，并尽力在其中添加了誓言。先生，这个自称维多利亚的歌剧女孩到底是谁？我有一个讲座要给你讲。德国女性不会原谅求爱期间的消遣；如果你让莉娜伯爵夫人溜走，你的机会就消失了。我称赞你撒谎的能力；但你必须学会​​向我展示你的右脸，否则你的鼻子这个非常英俊的特征，以及你的头骨这个有用的盒子都会遭到破坏。整个事情都是一个谜。这封信（副本）是写给你的，带给我的，以一种抽象的方式打开，对于指挥那些试图推动假装与他们有关系的年轻面条的命运的叔叔来说是必要的。去找莉娜伯爵夫人。来自博洛尼亚的保罗伯爵和她在一起。与她交谈，观察她和他。他懂英语——曾在伦敦大使馆任职；但是，呸！这只手是意大利人的。我承认自己很困惑。我们可能必须根据第十五次的暗示采取行动，并自称比其他人更聪明。一些事情正在酝酿之中。大胆地去见莉娜伯爵夫人，然后跟我一起吃早餐。”

威尔弗里德读着维多利亚那封悲惨的信，完全无法解决他心中的任何问题，除了他想知道袭击他的一千人中的首领是谁，以及谁带有他的剑的痕迹。

巴托·里佐已经做了他发誓要做的事。 他没有发现超过中尉（中尉必须在途中访问布雷西亚）并先于他到达维罗纳的大门，在那里他进入了一群葡萄采集者和其他从山上下来迎接的人，这并不困难。秋季平原上的劳作压力。 他希望第二天早上能和他们一起顺利出境。但威尔弗里德的剑发挥了强劲的作用。就像在下令保全一个人的生命和肢体的情况一样，巴托和他的袭击者同伴们努力让他仅半分钟无能为力。 他的头部受到了精明的割伤，并在巴蒂斯塔的酒馆里昏迷了几个小时。巴蒂斯塔是伦巴第各地众多宣誓效忠大猫的人之一，他们认为他并不脆弱。 他读了这封信，痛苦得头晕目眩，他坦率地承认，这作为一个奖品并没有多大价值。 尝试去获得它是值得的，因为任何事情都是值得的，只要它只是作为一种决心、精力和奉献精神的教育：——后悔是对无果而终的事业的唯一承认；他们展示了那棵坏树；——所以，根据他的行动原则，他深思熟虑；但他不得不承认，维多利亚的信只不过是重复她在莫特罗内时缺乏谨慎的态度。 他愤怒地承认了这一点：他努力给这个女人定罪，告诉他她应该受到一些惩罚；他的怀疑并没有得到满足，他决定让他们对她如饥似渴，然后立即返回米兰。 至于这封信本身，既然其中的危害已经造成，他打算将其光荣地送还给中尉，直到发现它沾满血迹为止，他拒绝向任何奥地利剑提供这种景象的满足。 出于这个原因，他抄了这封信，而巴蒂斯塔的妻子则用双层绷带紧紧地缠着他的头：他相信这封信是由完全相同的手抄写的，因此他将其转发给皮尔森中尉，然后沉下去并昏倒了。 两天来，他无力地躺着，任由思绪飞舞。 他得到消息说城门受到严密监视，军队正出发前往米兰。 这是黎明前的沉闷时刻。 “她是个叛徒！”他大叫一声，从床上一跃而起，就像脑子着了火一样，尖叫道：“叛徒！” 叛徒！巴蒂斯塔和他的妻子不得不扑向他并堵住他的嘴，猜想他疯了。 他说话很浮夸、很戏剧化。自称“意大利之眼”，并说他必须在米兰，否则米兰就会因为这个叛徒而灭亡：所有的人都表现出一种沉着的沉着神情，眼睑奇怪地张开。 当他们释放他时，他微笑着感谢他们，尽管他们知道，如果他选择的话，他可以甩掉十几个人，这就是他的力量。 那个女人向他跪下，征求他的同意，让她重新给他穿衣服并包扎他的头。

日出前，炮兵和步兵从城市的各个地点出发，向派力奥门和芝诺门进发，人们都出来观看他们，因为这是一场看起来像是事情开始的行军。士兵们帽子上插着绿树枝，幽默地向注视着的人群亲吻他们的双手，高喊着诗句：

'我走了！我走了！再见，玛丽安德尔！如果我以军士长或陆军元帅的身份回来，请不要对我嗤之以鼻：发誓你将永远忠诚；因为，当女人说脏话时，不知怎的，这是一种安慰：再见！挤压牛的乳房：我会够渴的：你这个漂亮的蠕动者！难道你不知道，第一杯酒和最后一杯酒，我都会把你的名字浮在上面吗？祝我们留下的小伙子们好运！再见，玛丽安德尔！

好心人摆摆手，不肯拒绝。奥地利士兵比大多数士兵都友善，直到他们的热血沸腾为止。一支蒂罗尔军团经过，合唱着优美的歌声。伤感的歌曲盛行，但士兵性经历的传统让他的歌谣充满了奇怪的讽刺意味，这帮助他实现了他的（可以这么说）哲学，即鲁莽。蒂罗尔人的“卡钦”在这里是一个阴沉的朱莉娅，她没有给他任何反应，无论是眼睛还是嘴唇。

‘小妈妈，小妹妹，小甜心，阿德！阿德！我的小甜心，你的草地就在半山腰；这是流浪男孩眼珠上的一个绿点！以及它上面的小教堂，我将看到它，就像我已经看过它一千次一样；云彩悬挂在它附近，移动到门口并进入，因为它是天使，而不是云彩；一位白色天使进来为卡特琳和我祈祷：小妈妈，小妹妹，小甜心，阿德！阿德！保持单身，凯特琳，只要你可以：只要你能坚持，保持单身：“ade！”

当他们向一扇大门行进时，有一千五百人和六门枪。

巴托·里佐（Barto Rizzo）和巴蒂斯塔（Battista）及其妻子在他两侧，也是观众之一。蒂罗尔人的黑色公鸡羽毛仍在科尔索河上飘扬，这时女人说：“我知道一个团的尾部不需要出示证件就可以穿过大门。”

巴蒂斯塔随即询问巴托是否愿意尝试这个机会。回答是空洞地摇摇头，脸上带着难以言喻的哀伤。 “没有其他办法，”巴蒂斯塔继续说道，“除非你跳进阿迪杰河，在水下游下半英里；猫讨厌水——呃，我的漫画？

他认为剑伤使巴托变得低能，于是把帽子拉到额头上，拍拍他的肩膀，居高临下地请他欢呼：但女人不会轻易失去对一个著名男人的印象。他的妻子检查了他。巴托闭上了眼睛，在两眼之间摇摇晃晃，就像是睡着了或者喝醉了一样。就像他的身体一样，他的信仰也在他的内心摇摆。他感觉到它落在了晕眩的大脑上，并拼命地抓住它，呼唤机会来帮助他。因为他很虚弱，无法在身体或精神上进行竞争，而他坚定的信条中的这一部分，即人类作为工具，独自失败了爱国事业，而环境却不断地对爱国事业有利——对当前发生的事件感到震惊。叛徒维多利亚的形象飘浮在因她的背叛而向米兰进军的士兵们上空。在他看来，奥地利军队从未如此可怕。他必须屈服于内心的斗争，让他的信仰沉沦并被熏黑，这样他的思想才能按照他记忆中的系统安然无恙。因为指向正确道路的灵感不会在精神斗争期间出现，而是在精神斗争之后，当信仰不受干扰地召唤其力量时——只要人们有信仰，并教导自己知道灵感必须到来，并会提供建议就好了。他们公正地。这是巴托·里佐 (Barto Rizzo) 的一贯信条的一部分。他在痛苦和黑暗的处境中也没有失去对这一点的把握。

他听到英语的声音。一辆马车几乎停在了他的面前。一位将军拿着帽子，和一位女士交谈，女士称他为叔叔，并说她不得不决定离开维罗纳，因为她的丈夫无法忍受酷热。她的丈夫异口同声地抗议说，高温害死了他。他用各种家庭和地下的意象来装饰声明，并微微一笑，说十五号之后——那天晚上他的妻子坚持要去米兰歌剧院听一位新歌手和老朋友的表演——他应该尝试一个星期在博尔米奥浴场，只有当温度适当时才从山上掉下来，他有点病了。

“叔叔，你十五号会去米兰吗？”那位女士说； “还有威尔弗里德吗？”

“威尔弗里德将和你一样尽快到达米兰，毫无疑问我将在十五号到达那里，”将军说。

“我无法向你表达我认为你的军队看起来有多漂亮，”这位女士说。

“好人，皮尔森将军，非常好的人。我从来没有见过这样的行军——和我们的卫兵一样，”她的丈夫说道。

这位女士将她的米兰酒店命名为将军挥舞着羽毛，点点头，然后骑马离开。

马车还没开动，巴托·里佐就冲了上去。 “亲爱的英国女士，”他对她说，“我是路易吉的兄弟，他在米兰为你送信——小路易吉！——我的母亲在米兰去世了；而我现在在维罗纳，生病了，无法去见她，可怜的灵魂！您能否允许我像老鼠一样安静地坐在后面，靠近一位可爱的英国女士，她对不幸的人如此友善，而且从不对慈善事业充耳不闻？我的母亲快要死了，可怜的灵魂！

那位女士看了看她丈夫的脸，脸上一片空白，一副拒绝对敌对慈善主张的观点负责的态度，而他不可能陷入与外国的熟悉习惯，并同意非凡的请愿书。巴托跳了起来。 “我将成为您的信使，亲爱的女士，”他说，然后通过喊叫维图里诺继续前进，开始了为她服务的职业生涯。威尔弗里德从派力奥门小跑下来时遇到了他们，他的妹妹向他吐露了她的新麻烦，因为她有一个陌生的男人依附于她，这个男人可能是什么。 “我们不认识这个人，”她的丈夫说。阿黛拉为他恳求：“威尔弗里德，请不要对他说严厉的话。他说他的母亲在米兰去世了。巴托把头埋在手臂上，呻吟着。阿黛拉做了个悲伤的小鬼脸。 “哦，带上那个可怜的乞丐吧，”威尔弗里德说。用意大利语对他唱道：“你是谁——你是什么，我的好朋友？”巴托呻吟得更大声，用瑞士法语从令人窒息的深处回答道：“一个可怜的男人，在我们到达米兰之前，是那位亲切的女士的仆人。”

“我等不及了，”威尔弗里德说。 “我半小时后开始。没关系;现在你已经抓住了他，你必须抓住他，否则就把他排除在外——两者之一。如果事情进展顺利，一周后我们将进行秋季演习，然后你可能会看到一些军队的情况。他骑车走了。巴托作为获得许可的英国家族之一跨入大门。

米兰的防守比他退出时更加严密。他早料到会是这样，于是驯服了自己的精神，顺从了马车缓慢的阶段，在布雷西亚度过了一个火热的夜晚，并于十四日中午进入了行动之城。在安全的墙内，他向这位英国女士表示感谢，并向她保证她的慈善行为将被高处铭记。然后他转身走向革命邮局的方向。这个地方只不过是一栋长期在维修的街角房屋的空白基台，底部有一大堆砖和砂浆垃圾。一个固定的瓜商和一些黑色无花果和蔬菜摊占据了它前面的三角形空间。拆除一块方形水泥后，会发现一个凹处，主要是在夜间，信件和公告纸被存放在那里，供认可的邮递员驱散它们。到了这里，正当人们去咖啡馆听新闻的时候，巴托·里佐在正午的耀眼光芒中走了进来，像一个疲惫的人一样倒在了树荫下，一只手在身后干活，拿出几张折叠起来的报纸。 ，其中一封是用他姓名首字母写的。他打开它，读到：

“你的房子被监视了。

“今天早上，有人看到 P…ka 团的一名下士在第二声军号吹响之前离开了这里。

'回复：——在哪里见面。

“间谍加倍，军队来了。

“维罗纳的数字；谁领导他们。

'看看你的妻子。

“每隔三个小时就会有人来信。”

巴托懒洋洋地嘲笑了这个新证据，证明他从别人那里学到的智力太少了。他一边用铅笔打量着空白处，一边回答道：——“V。”等待M.，但在一个盒子里”（即米兰的维罗纳）。 “我们拿走了她的钥匙。

“我没有妻子，只有一个小学生。

“龙骑兵中的皮尔森中尉；捷克白大衣，没有羽毛的头盔；一个英国人，皮尔森将军的侄子：说着蹩脚的意大利语；今天从 V. 返回。留意他；——什么房子，什么时间。

巴托沉思了一会儿，写下了维多利亚的名字，并用一个粗黑的圆环圈起来。

他在下面写道

“所有的演出账单都一样。

“十五号被取消了。

'我们后天见面。

“今晚在 M 伯爵家里。”

他秘密地保密了这封信，并在寄往不同地址的多张纸条上写下了维多利亚的名字，标题为“来自教皇之口”，这是革命邮局的名称，可以谨慎地转移到任何地方。这个称号完全是对尊者的赞扬。当时，圣彼得的继任者口中期待着有形的自由和空中的祝福，这并非没有根据。教皇之口将发出意大利自由的清晰声音。这一时期的这种情绪是自然而愉快的，它赋予了民众一种团结感和正义感，这是抽象的自由观念在殉难之前所无法保证的。在经历了苦难之后，在死亡和绝望的阴影中行走之后，有价值和勇敢的人不再将高级人物作为崇拜的代表对象，即使这些人（正如善良的教皇当时所做的那样）仁慈地祝福国家并吩咐它有很大的希望，有权威的声音。但是，对于一场长期的民众运动来说，一个伟大的名字就像一面神圣的旗帜。从教皇嘴里发出的公告需要敬畏，而鄙视教皇的巴托·里佐（毫无疑问，因为他是教皇）却毫不犹豫地利用他的职位。

巴托躺在垃圾堆上，等待着他训练有素的小伙子切科的到来，切科是一个瘦长的傻瓜，狡猾得像个纯粹的白痴，他正在履行邮递员的职责，这时后面那个年轻人踢了一脚，把他踢得跳了起来。愤怒，如鱼在空中。集市上响起一片掌声；因为凯科每天都来这里吃无花果，众所周知，“povero”这种可爱的傻瓜生物不会容忍有人闯入他伸展四肢剥皮和吮吸无花果的地方。每天两次或三次。巴托抓住他并摇晃他。凯科（Checco）敲掉了他的帽子；伤口上的绷带断裂、掉落，巴托把手放在额头上，低声说道：“我到底是怎么了，竟然对一个男孩——一只动物发脾气？”

整个三角形空间的兴奋被一声威严的喉音叫声压得安静下来，驱散了人群。两名奥地利军官并排骑马，后面跟着军人。灰尘使他们的小胡子变白了，炎热的天气使他们的脸上涂上了棕红色的清漆。为他们开了路，巴托站在那里，抚平额头，盯着凯科。

“我看到了那个人！”一名军官急忙喊道。 “韦斯普里斯，那天在维罗纳带头袭击我的就是那个流氓。一样的！

“希梅尔！” ”他的同伴回答道，仔细观察剑痕，“如果这是你在他头上所做的工作，那么你做得很好，我的皮尔森！他的得分确实非常整齐。显然，这是一记干净的笔画！

“但是当我离开米兰的时候！在维罗纳，当我进入那里的西北门时；当我回来时看到的第一个人就是这个非常野蛮的人。他到处跟踪我！顺便说一句，可能有两个。

皮尔森中尉靠在马脖子上，眯起眼睛看着巴托·里佐这个人。他自己的目光似乎在反驳，而且更加专注。起初，巴托的手在距额头一指长的地方扫过，就像一个为了稳定视线而与头晕作斗争的人。他脑中的迷雾在敌人的注视下散去，他的眼球一动不动，变成一副被动恶意的奇特景象，他的眼神仿佛在说：“我知道你的面貌就足够了，我也了解它们。”平民的这种表情令人恼火：意大利平民几乎无法忍受这种表情。

“在我看来，你还想要更多。”中尉大声自言自语道。他用蹩脚的德语向他的同伴重复了同样的话。

'呃？你会提升他再获得一枚肩章吗？韦斯普莱斯船长笑道。 '剥离。命令是直接针对它的。我们在米兰——与在维罗纳不同！还有我的好伙伴！记住你的赌注；一打冰镇鲁德斯海默啤酒。我想喝我的那一份，梦想着我能在美因茨驻扎——这是奥地利人离开维也纳后唯一的地方。来。'

'不;但如果这个恶棍袭击了我，把我的外套从我背上撕下来，”威尔弗里德一边喊一边拧紧马鞍。

'并拿走了你的信，拿走了你的信；一封特定的信件；我们听说过，”韦斯普里斯说。

中尉喊道，他应该彻底检查一下这个人，看看他是否认为适合将他拘留。韦斯普莱斯把手放在他的缰绳上。

“听听我的建议，不要在街上挑起骚乱。”事实是，你们英国人和爱尔兰人在这些当地人中给我们带来了坏名声。如果就是这个人，把你打下马，虐待你，强暴了你的信，从他的表情来看，你恐怕不会从他身上得到满足。真怕不行。如果你喜欢就试试吧。无论如何，如果你停下来，我就被迫退出你们的社会，这有时是无限有趣的。让我提醒您，您需要携带快件。前几天他们是口头的。你现在拿着纸。

“你急于教导我我的职责吗，韦斯普里斯船长？”

'如果你不知道的话。我说我会“提醒你”。如果你需要的话，我也可以教你。”

“只要你愿意接受付款，我就可以向你支付指导费用。”

“解决你的未决索赔，我的好皮尔森！”

“当我和珍娜战斗时？”

'哦！你是普鲁士人——普鲁士人！”韦斯普莱斯船长笑了。 “我是说，一个普鲁士人，以你那种粗俗的方式脱口而出一切。我曾与普鲁士人行军并与牛打过交道。

“正如你所知，我是一个英国人，韦斯普里斯船长。我现在该到詹娜中尉那里去。之后你或任何人都可以命令我。

“随你便吧，”韦斯普里斯说着，拔出了一小撮小胡子。 “与此同时，感谢我引诱你远离街头争吵的机会。”

巴托·里佐（Barto Rizzo）被抛在后面，他们骑马前往大教堂。韦斯普里斯抬头看了一眼它的顶峰，说道：

“现在，如果这些狗在城市的这个地区制造麻烦，弗拉施曼的猎犬会从那里把它们抓走，这是多么出色啊！”

他们对在米兰这样的城市的街道上应对革命运动的方式方法进行了专业讨论，然后前往斯卡拉广场。韦斯普里斯在剧单前停了下来。 “明天是十五号，”他说。 “我要告诉你一个秘密吗，皮尔森？”今晚我要私下一睹这位新首席女主角的风采。他们说她很有魅力，而且非常活泼。 “我不与德国人交换信件。”本洛米克给她寄了一张整洁的小纸条给音乐学院——他没有见过她，只是听说过她，这就是我们爱国的答复。她想要驯服。我相信我被要求承担这项职责。至少，我的朋友安东尼奥-伯里克利（Antonio-Pericles）偶尔会帮我提供物资，他也向我暗示了这一点。你已经订婚了，否则，以我的名誉担保，我不会信任你；但我们私底下，这个希腊人——他说得很对——正试图让她远离那群臭气熏天的流浪汉，他们怂恿她恶作剧，而且不知道如何对待她。

说话的时候，巴托·里佐粗鲁地从他们中间推开，用黑色画笔在维多利亚的名字周围画了一个圆圈。

“你看到了吗？”韦斯普里斯说。

“我明白了，”威尔弗里德反驳道，“你已经准备好干涉任何可能被谈论的女人的名誉了。别当着我的面这样做。

韦斯普里斯船长对这种爆发以及随之而来的威尔弗里德嘴唇的颤抖表示惊讶是很自然的。

“皮尔森中尉，奥地利的军事礼仪，”他说，“排除了帝国军队军官在公开场合发生争执的嫌疑。我们根据不同的原则处理这些事务。但我会告诉你什么。那家伙的行为可能会被理解为一种非常不文明的行为。我来为你服务吧我会逮捕他，然后你就可以听到你那封珍贵的信的消息了。我们将公布他的供词。

韦斯普里斯拔出剑，命令在场的士兵对巴托下手。但士兵们呼叫了，军官发现他们被包围了。韦斯普莱斯沮丧地耸耸肩。 “我想，这个畜生必须离开，”他说。这种情况是伦巴第城镇时不时发生的情况之一，偶然的挑衅引发了骚乱，骚乱是否会成为叛乱，取决于统治者的胆怯或不满者的准备程度。人群的规模和明显的管制对帝国军官来说是一个警告。韦斯普里斯将剑收鞘，喊道：“好啦，那里！”道路已为他开辟；但威尔弗里德却犹豫不决地打量着这个人，因为某种无法解释的原因，这个人似乎是他特有的敌人。巴托漫不经心地穿过人群，威尔弗里德发现追赶他毫无用处，喊道：“他是谁？”告诉我那个人的名字？这个问题在他周围引起了一阵大笑，并惊呼“英国人！”英国人！'他在他兄弟军官的踪迹中找到了一条清晰的道路，然后转身。

关于这场小骚乱的评论一直在斯卡拉咖啡馆流传，那里坐着阿戈斯蒂诺·巴尔代里尼、梅多莱伯爵和其他人，如果逮捕他们的命令已经下达，那么他们在那个地方就和在他们的地方一样安全。自己的家。事实上，他们的政策是在国外公开展示自己。阿戈斯蒂诺正在享受纸烟的烟雾，谨慎地考虑着易燃胡须的健康状况。看到威尔弗里德走过，他说：“一个英国人！”我仍然对他的同胞抱有很大希望。我没有权利这样做，只是他们坚持这样做。他们不止一次地承诺，将派遣一支舰队穿越伦巴第平原来援助我们，我相信他们会的——可能是在梅特涅之后的水时代。看我的卡罗走近了。那小伙子的心让他的大脑沸腾了，他几乎无法把盖子盖上。现在是什么情况？说吧，我的儿子。

卡洛·阿米亚尼必须表示，他刚刚在两份公共节目单上看到维多利亚的名字上有一个黑色圆圈。他在讲述这个故事时故意表现得严肃，这引起了阿戈斯蒂诺幽默的愤怒。

“把她的名字四舍五入？”阿戈斯蒂诺说。

'是的;在每一份账单中。

“这意味着她被怀疑了！”

“意思是你喜欢的任何该死的东西。”

“这是敌人的装置。”

阿戈斯蒂诺很高兴能有借口再次进行他惯常的奢华讽刺，他向后退了一步，重复道：“这是敌人的诡计。”我的儿子，计算一下，敌人总是知道你打算做什么：决定用你所做的事情让他感到惊讶。卡洛，意图有肺，并且取决于周围的空气，即使不是故意危险的，它也是可以交流的。不用我说，行为是一个不同的身体。好几代人以来，我们意大利人一直错误地认为意图和行为之间存在着积极的血缘关系——更不用说母性本身了。根本不是这样的！目的只是将他们联系起来。你察觉到了吗？因善意而出名是很重要的，所以我们不会抱怨。事实上，抱怨不是我们的事，而是后代的事；因为美好的愿望确实是丰富的财产，但它们不会留下伟大的遗产；就这些。他们想要拥有未来：他们只是现在的性感之子。卡利诺，根据我的观察、理解和其他感官天赋，我相信我们的父权政府并非不了解我们在某部歌剧中演唱歌曲的意图。它可能已经学会了我们在未指定的检察官的命令下公开附上名字的笨拙方法，以便孤立或消灭他们。谁能说一下？哦，哎呀！是的！罪魁祸首是那些很容易摇摇欲坠的机器。我们承认；但如果你有像日内瓦表这样的阴谋，你必须预料到，对管辖它的法律的任何轻微干扰都会完全扰乱整个机制。啊啊！看看那边，但不要着急，我的卡洛。凯科正在接近我们，他知道有人在追捕他。如果我猜对了，他有一个负担要交给我们中的一个人。”

切科以他平常的节奏走过来，很明显他认为自己处于间谍活动之中。广场两侧，一个可疑的人影在他身后不远处的阴影中蜿蜒而行。凯科经过咖啡馆时，除了他一遍又一遍地摩擦的大手之外，什么也没看到。当凯科跑回来时，警察的明显特工正在接近，他开始用口型来反驳他在咖啡馆里所说的话。他对双方都发出了喋喋不休的呼吁，并对那对明显的穆查德说话，如果可以理解的话，应该是真诚恳求的语言。咖啡馆的第一句话让他感到内疚，一阵恼怒抓住了他，这个兴奋的家伙拉扯他的帽子，把它从门口的露天桌子上飞过。然后，他哀嚎着恳求他的追随者帮他拿回帽子。他们答应了。

“我们只叫了“Illustrissimo！”，当其中一名男子从手里拿着咖啡帽的内部回来时，阿戈斯蒂诺说道。

“先生应该更清楚——他是个白痴，”那人回答道。他是个新手：敢于斥责他就背叛了他的办公室。

切科笑着从他细心的朋友手中夺过帽子，然后一闪而走。于是，咖啡店里的人大笑起来，笑声中的笑声令人羞愧，让探子们都惊慌失措。他们在是否跟随凯科的选择上犹豫不决；一个人前进一步，一个人后退；游荡者急忙回到他的同伴那里，他的同伴现在正准备进行倒退运动，他们站在一起摇摇晃晃，就像两个不太快乐的家伙，或者芭蕾舞强盗，互相拉扯对方，直到最后那令人发狂的笑声让他们崩溃了，相互猫——就像辱骂的嘶嘶声一样，然后尽其所能地逃跑——可悲的人物。

阿戈斯蒂诺说：“对于米兰来说，这很好，因为特德斯基从阴沟里捞到的东西，莫过于那些为他们服务的流氓。” “呃，孔特先生？”

“账单上关于拉维多利亚名字的附注是正确的，”该人士低声说道。他转身指了指从咖啡馆内部跟着来的一个人。

“如果巴托值得信任，她并不安全，”后者说道。他拿出了一份藏在凯科帽子里的文件。在日期和教皇口中的题词下，“LA VITTORIA”在不祥的粗铅笔环中脱颖而出：巴托·里佐（Barto Rizzo）名字的首字母位于角落里。阿戈斯蒂诺开始抚平胡子。

“他发现她不值得信任，”梅多尔伯爵说，他是一位过早严肃、部分秃顶的年轻人，说话时习惯性地用食指压在长而尖的下巴上。

“梅多莱伯爵，您是想告诉我您重视这种交流吗？”卡罗说，强行用惊讶的表情掩饰自己的愤怒。

“我愿意，阿米亚尼伯爵，”这位贵族阴谋家回答道。

“你真的听你鄙视的人的话吗？”

“我并不鄙视他，我的朋友。”

“你肯定不能告诉我们，你允许这样一个人，凭着他的唯一权力，来抹黑夫人的品格吗？”

“我相信他没有。”

'相信？相信他？那么我们就都在他的手里了。你这是什么意思？立即亲自到夫人身边。阿戈斯蒂诺，你现在把梅多莱伯爵带到她面前，让他免于遭受可怕诽谤的耻辱。我求你和我们的阿戈斯蒂诺一起去，梅多莱伯爵。现在是你的时候了——我为你所扮演的角色而向你致敬；但现在是根据你自己更好的判断采取行动的时候了。”

梅多莱伯爵鞠了一躬。

“肮脏的老鼠！”阿米亚尼气喘吁吁地喊道，以发泄他的愤怒。

“一只有用的狗，”阿戈斯蒂诺正确地说。 “忠于动物的形态，卡洛。他在他的时代提供了很好的服务。

“你听那个人的话吗？”卡洛说道，现在彻底惊讶了。

“女人可能会做出轻率的事，我的小伙子。她可能在某些方面表现得不检点，我不得不承认可能性的存在。

“在所有男人中，你，阿戈斯蒂诺！你称她为女儿，并声称爱她。

“你忘了，”阿戈斯蒂诺尖锐地说。 “问题涉及国家，而不是女孩。”他低声补充道，“我认为你声称你爱她有点太强烈了，而且很少给她作为辩护人太多帮助。”必须调查此事。如果发现巴托的行为没有正当理由，我确信梅多尔伯爵”——他温文尔雅地转向贵族——“会收回对他的信任；这对巴托来说就相当于绳子断了。今晚我们会在你家见到他吗？

“他会在那里，”梅多尔说。

“但是伤害已经造成了；恶作剧已经完成了！如果你选择认为这个卑鄙的白痴是正当的，接下来该怎么办？阿米亚尼问道。

“她唱歌，但没有起立，”梅多尔说。

阿戈斯蒂诺说：“目前，她已经脱离了爱国炮台：对她来说，最好不要唱歌。” “事实上，巴托只是警告我们——事情看起来确实如此——十五日很可能是奥地利的节日。你的手臂，我的儿子。今晚我们将与您会合，亲爱的伯爵。现在，卡洛，我观察到，在我看来，奥地利人不会对我们感到惊讶，这给了我极大的安慰。做好准备的研究员只不过是为一天又一天做好准备。在经历了第一次和第二次失望之后，他们肯定会处于准备松懈的状态。相反，感到惊讶的人——阿戈斯蒂诺又恢复了他以前的笑容——“感到惊讶的人可能会利用与天才有关的灵感。你没看到吗？

噢，残酷！我厌倦了你们所有人！卡洛惊呼道。 '看着她;想想她，带着她对意大利的纯洁梦想和她崇高的奉献精神。你还允许对她产生怀疑！

“现在，你是不是觉得这个国家配不上她？”阿戈斯蒂诺狡猾地说。 “我认为，当酋长辩称阴谋者是阴谋者的总和和完成时，他并没有将某些事实纳入他的计算中。今晚你会来梅多勒家，卡洛。你不必对他太甜，但要注意爆发力。尽管如此，我作为一名共和党人，仍然是团结所必需的牺牲的实际倡导者。我接受梅多尔的当地领导——我每次看到他都会想到一个不加羽毛的馅饼；我愿意接受巴托·里佐 (Barto Rizzo) 的帮助。我的儿子，你也这样做吧。让你迷恋的感觉跟随这份责任，并在两者之间留出轻松的空间。阴谋是人性的缩影，其底下蕴藏着沸腾的力量。你不过是一个机械装置而已——如果它能成功的话你就很高兴了！”

阿戈斯蒂诺表示，他将在晚上拜访维多利亚。阿米亚尼决定在见到巴托·里佐和俱乐部首脑之前，先找出她。当他在广场上看到那个在莫特罗内河上与他交换过卡片的英国人时，他感到很欣慰。甘比尔上尉向前行了一个礼节性的鞠躬，用比他们第一次会见时更加口语化的法语坦率地说，他必须为自己的行为道歉，并请求先生原谅。 “如果，”他继续说道，“那位女士就是我以前在英国认识的贝罗尼小姐，现在是维多利亚·坎帕小姐，请您告诉她，据我所知，她是明天可能会遇到危险吗？甘比尔上尉无法说出危险的确切性质。

阿米亚尼回答说：“她需要她所有的朋友。”然后接受了英国人的手的压力，如果不是意大利人撤回敬礼的庄严礼貌，英国人本来会要求更多。阿米亚尼不再怀疑维多利亚在阴谋中的牵连是众所周知的。

疫情爆发前一天天黑后，维多利亚带着她忠实的贝波，离开母亲跑步，在劳拉·皮亚维尼夫人和她的孩子们的陪伴下度过了一个令人安慰的小时。

一位寄生的意大利贵族有两个女儿，其中一个嫁给了爱国者贾科莫·皮亚维尼，另一个是奥地利外交官冯·伦肯斯坦伯爵伯爵。塞拉比廖内伯爵传统上是寄生型的。他的祖先都搬到了宫廷。家族的孩子们有杰出的赞助人。这座房子本身就是一朵象征性的向日葵，不断转向皇室。对此，我们可以找到一个很好的借口，最后一个男性后裔，他的父亲在年轻时曾是帝国侍从，并且一直被认为意大利（或者至少是伦巴第）是奥地利的天然封地，与奥地利结盟。阿尔卑斯山所有者的本能和兴趣。塞拉比廖内伯爵很少与他的同胞打交道——这种说法可能是相反的——但当他碰巧在他们中间时，他心甘情愿地谈论特德斯基人，并自愿宣称他们是粗鲁、顽固、进攻性的熊。在这种时候，他会在任何热情的耳朵里暗示，在一场技巧游戏中，蛇可能是熊的对手，而蛇的智慧表现在他选择熊作为他的主人，因为，通过任命情况，主人他一定有。伯爵会怜悯地谈论那些承认即将到来的意大利王国统一的可能性的可怜的堕落知识分子：他认为宣扬这一点的疯子是蒂罗尔猎兵指定档案的自选目标。但他对这个被他称为职业教条主义者的人怀有报复心理，并且对这个人起了恶毒的骂名。他承认意大利对她目前的苦难深感哀悼，因此指控这个人犯下了制造这些苦难的罪行：——为什么？他的目的是什么？伯爵在回答中宣称，他是一个天生的阴谋家，一个嗜血的人，为它的气味而疯狂！一群刺客；还有更多——意大利的诅咒！世界各地应该签订引渡条约，将这个大阴谋者绳之以法。他的良心之门被一千个流血的鬼魂敲击着，却什么也没有向他们敞开。他眼中的意大利是什么样的？棋盘；而意大利人就是这位冷酷活生生的棋手的棋子。英国养育了这个可怜虫，她可能会破坏欧洲大陆的和平。

塞拉比廖内伯爵会在谴责的高潮中使自己振作起来，然后坦率地向外看，就像一个精神得到了宽慰的人。他憎恨坏人；对他来说，谴责某人并获得某种救济也是必要的。意大利人渐渐远离了他。他开始感到自己没有祖国。 “年轻意大利”这个令人厌恶的称号让他勃然大怒。 “如果要区别的话，”他说，“我是一位古老的意大利人。”他向听众保证，他是为了他的公社、他的地区，并愉快地表达了他的旧意大利偏见。为米兰和布雷西亚的争吵拍手；佛罗伦萨和锡耶纳——可能是村庄之间的世仇——以及意大利北部对主要城市的普遍嫉妒。他有无数的故事要讲述，讲述了村庄间的争斗、它们的日期和起源、为弥合它们而做出的愚蠢努力，以及随之而来的更广泛的分裂。他说：“我们所有的意大利人都具有纯种希伯来人的坚韧、不饶恕和热血；也许还有一点欢乐；以及对公平事物的热爱。我们可以比征服者的十个种族活得更长久。

他以这种方式进行了哲学思考，或者说强行提出了一种哲学。但他把女儿嫁给了一位奥地利人，这是他的同胞们无法忽视的，他们也让他感受到了这一点。渐渐地，半默许、半抗议，伯爵逐渐被排除在意大利社会之外，除了他非常鄙视的寄生阶级之外。他不是一个快乐的人。在宫廷取得的成功也许会让他感到安慰；但他天性中无情的敏感绊倒了他的脚步。

尽管贾科莫·皮亚韦尼竭力营救女儿的丈夫，但还是不幸身亡，整个伦巴第大区都响起了苦涩的笑声。伯爵受到的打击是前所未有的：这就像公开宣布他的影响力很小一样。屈膝并没有让这位贵族的良心受到折磨，但一想到徒劳无功地屈膝，就让人感到痛苦。

贾科莫·皮亚维尼 (Giacomo Piaveni) 是一位年轻的意大利贵族，是尤金所爱戴的将军的儿子。对他来说，失去意大利是令人悲痛的。二十三岁时，他死于叛逆。这个年轻人的外表如此美丽，对女人的态度如此甜蜜，而且完全如此温柔和英勇，以至于女人认识他时已经是寡妇了：而在他去世时，两个曾经爱过他的女人的心竞争变成了神圣的友谊纽带。他虽然出身并不显赫，但在成年之初就选择了几乎是皇室联盟。他拒绝了这个机会，向塞拉比廖内伯爵恳求原谅，说他爱上了那位贵族的女儿劳拉。伯爵听了很受宠若惊，但此后他对这个年轻人的谨慎态度感到蔑视，并且在贾科莫被枪杀的那天，他耸耸肩，带着先知般的平静悲伤。当时贾科莫手中的皮亚韦尼家族较大的庄园位于著名的奶酪生产区，生产美味的奶酪：“白得像羔羊皮！”伯爵会悲伤地射精。带着狂喜的钦佩，“当你切开它时，你会说，这是一个大理石采石场。”这个主题令人痛苦，因为贾科莫的所有庄园都暂时被没收，而提到奶酪在他的感官中产生的愉快的激动同时提醒他，他必须抚养一个带着两个孩子的寡妇。皮亚韦尼夫人住在米兰，她的父亲在夏季拜访了她两次，并在冬季时在各个首都城市的住所给她写信，报告了收回贾科莫财产的既定计划的进展情况。对于他的遗孀，正如对于他身体的继承人一样。 “这是一种责任，”塞拉比廖内伯爵强调道。 “在她的孩子正式成家之前，我的女儿不能接受任何求婚；或者，年轻、可爱、反复无常的她会继续拒绝米兰贵族最好的提议，住在城市老城区的一套公寓里，而不是住在一条明亮、漂亮、有马车的街道上。 ，并且充满了生活的表演？

伯爵与夫人的某些朋友一起，努力工作以立即归还财产。他得到了年轻的席尔-魏林根公主的巧妙借调，她是德国中部格拉特利公爵夫人福伦多夫伯爵夫人的联姻，她是通过这个头衔获得的，她是一位奥地利公主。她曾爱过贾科莫，愿意为他付出一切，现在又爱着他的遗孀。极端而痛苦的困难是，皮亚韦尼夫人毫不掩饰她对奥地利王室的憎恶，以及对奥地利在意大利统治的仇恨。她死去丈夫的灵魂从坟墓里来到了她身边，温暖了她原本对除了他个人功绩以外的一切都漠不关心的身体。有人秘密地告诉她，如果她向当局表现出应有的服从，并且在良好的合法性，即非爱国气味中生活了六个月，她可能希望拥有这些遗产。公爵夫人为她赢得了这种怜悯，这是很多的。因为贾科莫的叛乱计划是巧妙地构思出来的，其规模足以激怒伦巴第这样光荣的奶牛的任何专制领主。不幸的是，这位女士更多地是出于对丈夫的怀念，而不是出于对孩子的考虑。她接待了心怀不满的人：她为了臭名昭著的爱国目的而大张旗鼓地捐款；在她父亲的科莫别墅里，她曾是一个害羞、无言的女孩，只不过是美丽，但她却因她的公开信和反对外国人的热情而闻名，这是她风格的特点。面对这些事实，这些庄园继续被排除在她的治理之外。奥地利可以做到这一点：她可以对女人发泄怨恨，但即使在被征服的土地上，她也尊重自己的法律：庄园没有被没收，也没有被绝对扣押；事实上，他们的钱已经寄给她，用于她孩子们的教育。它装在未开封的官方信封里，一层一层地堆放着，每季度的汇款，在她眼里就像屠杀的鲜血一样可怕。塞拉比廖内伯爵总是在探望女儿后的前五分钟内清点包裹的数量。他什么也没说，只是小心翼翼地检查存放贵重物品的柜子的锁是否正常，有时他会忘记把钥匙拿走。当他的女儿收回它时，她说道：“请相信我和你一样渴望保存这些文件。”伯爵回答说：“它们代表了庄园，虽然数量很少，但具有法律价值。”它们代表你的抗议，并代表你的主张的承认。它们是无价的。

在某种程度上，他们还补偿了他为维持女儿及其子女的生活而付出的费用。因为无论如何，在他眼前可见的是钱的价值，即使不是所花的钱。他抗议劳拉让事情暴露得过分。她回应，

“我的人民知道这笔钱意味着什么！”当然，这意味着她家里的任何人都不会碰它。然而，它却被保留给了伯爵，直到伯爵发现它不见了。

这一发现是这位震惊的贵族在维多利亚亮相斯卡拉歌剧院的前一天发现的。他的女儿不在，他去柜子里只是为了满足习惯性的好奇心。柜子是开着的，显然被洗劫一空。他打电话给家仆，本想指控他们都对钥匙施暴，但转念一想，他认为这是一种把同性恋绑在一起的方式，他决定把他们一个一个地抓起来，就像耶稣会士穿线一样。他就是这样，所以找一个犹大吧。劳拉的回归使他免于过多地运用他的特殊技能。她，带着酷炫的“Ebbene！”问他预计这笔钱会在那里呆多久。随后，他愤怒地指责她将这笔钱用于可恶的爱国事业。在这里，他们来到了一个奇怪的开放分区。

“满足吧，我的父亲，”她说。 “这些钱是我丈夫的，是替他花的。”

“你把它浪费在那些造成他毁灭的人身上！”她父亲反驳道。

“你认为我可能已经把它归还给政府了吗？”

“我指控你把它扔给你所谓的爱国者。”

“先生，如果我这么做了，那我就做得很好了。”

“听她说！”伯爵对着细心的天花板喊道。他用一个讽刺的“夫人”称呼她，并请求允许询问她是否可能是革命者的雇佣者，即将以维多利亚夫人的名义出现在斯卡拉歌剧院。 “因为你的姿势越来越戏剧化了，我的劳拉，”他补充道，熟悉了他讽刺的冷酷语气。 “你开始轻易地对你自己的父亲采取蔑视的态度。”

“你的意思是，我可以练习如何激怒父权政府，”她回答道，在辩证法上她与他非常匹配。

伯爵偶然进一步提到了维多利亚夫人。

“你对那位女士了解很多吗？”她问。

“据我所知，”他说。

他们面面相觑。伯爵心想：“我愚蠢地给了这个女孩多余的大脑！”

他被迫垂下眼帘，又为默然的失败而懊恼，问道：“你对她抱有很大的期望吗？”

“太好了，”他的女儿说。

“好吧，好吧，”他默许地低声说道，同时在内心深处寻找着自己扮演的角色。 '嗯，是！她可能会做你期望的事。

“她的能力毫无疑问，”他的女儿说，语气中充满了坚定的信念，伯爵立即不可抗拒地想要扮演一位睿智、仁慈、宽容但有先见之明的父亲的角色。在这个恰到好处的角色中，他揭露了她的政党将任何重要的事情托付给女性所面临的风险。并不是说他谴责女性。在他们的范围之外，他不信任他们，当他们在他们的范围之外时，他只是反对他们：最后四个字是断断续续地说出来的。

“但我们相信她会做她承诺做的事情，”劳拉说。

伯爵从怀疑变为确定，脸上的神情大为振奋。当他还在微笑着看着他聪明但不熟练的女儿陷入的令人震惊的陷阱时，他发现自己难以置信地听着她简单的附加句子：“她很容易掌握三个八度。”

由此，典故从政治转向了艺术。如果劳拉把​​这个狡猾的转弯保留得更远一些，屈服于自然的诱惑，增加对立电池的冲击力，她就会背叛自己：但它来得正是时候：伯爵放弃了他的武器。他告诉她，这位维多利亚夫人受到了怀疑。 “他们不会怀疑谁！”劳拉插话道。他向她保证，如果阴谋成熟，它就一定会失败。她相信他厌恶间谍或告密者的角色，但由于她鲁莽，他必须监视他的女儿；他也有义务为她服务，通过为他人服务来赢得他合理希望获得的权力。劳拉表示他辩论得非常好。由于对她的诚意产生了无端的怀疑，他厉声抱怨道：

'你有你自己的想法；你有你自己的想法。你认为我这样那样。必须雇用一个人。

“这是为了解释你的职业吗？”她说。

“我说的是就业！”伯爵焦急地重复道。他毫无目的地揭开面具，感觉自己就像在斜坡上一样，给了对手优势。

“所以你别无选择，是吗？”

伯爵提出了一个令人震惊的肯定，但当他的女儿说：“不支持意大利，你一定会反对她时，它就被它的天敌推翻了：我承认这就是立场！”

'不！'他哭了;不：正如你所知，不存在“支持”或“反对”的问题。 “意大利，而不是革命”：这是我的座右铭。

“或者，换句话说，‘不可能’，”劳拉说。 “完美的座右铭！”

伯爵再次看着她，带着悔恨的想法：“我确实给了你太多的大脑。”

他微笑着说：“如果你相信的话，这并非不可能！”

“你真的认为‘没有革命的意大利’并不意味着‘奥地利’吗？”她询问道。

她已经发现了他以及他的政党的怀疑程度，现在她有理由希望他离开。她不敢表现出不安的症状，而是给了他一个依靠解释来恢复元气的机会。他接受了援助，称赞他的机智敏捷的占卜能力，并冗长地阐述了他对意大利福祉的看法，经常引用他最喜欢的贝尔尼的话，并为这位快乐的诗人强行提供了机会。劳拉安静地关注着所有人，当他在结束时精疲力尽时，沉思地说：“是的。”出色地;你年纪大了。在你看来，当我有类似或相同的经验时，我会像你一样思考。

这个挑衅性的回答让她父亲从椅子上跳起来，转身去拿帽子。她站起来催促他向前走。

“在我看来可能是这样！”他不断地嘀咕着。 “在我看来，当女儿结婚时——另外！她只不过是她的丈夫。

哎呀！哎呀！如果可能的话！夫人嚎啕大哭。

伯爵讨厌眼泪，认为眼泪会堵塞所有有用的机器。他正要离开，这时透过开着的窗户，下面街上传来一阵扭打声，把他吓住了。

“开始了吗？”他说，开始了。

'什么？'夫人冷静地问道；并让他停了下来。

“但是——但是——但是！”他回答了，并饶有兴致地饶过她的耳朵。他内心的想法是：“但如果我对我的妻子有一些信心，并且对魔鬼的钦佩不够，我会直截了当地指责他，因为，巴克斯！”你和他一样聪明。

教育父母的一点是，他们应该学会谦卑地理解被自己的后代愚弄的赞美。

塞拉比廖内伯爵把身子探出窗外，看到他的马匹很安全，车夫也很方便。愤怒扭曲的情侣之间正在进行两场单独的约会。

“意大利有适合居住的城镇吗？”伯爵疯狂地喊道。他先叫车夫开走，然后就如被钉在原地一样等待着。他咒骂革命精神是万恶之母。当他凝视着这场争斗时，身后的门打开了，一股凉风吹过他的太阳穴，他知道这一点。他以为他的女儿正在听从信号而匆匆离去，当劳拉正在向门口的一个女性示意退出时，他转向了她。

'这是谁？'伯爵说道。

这位陌生女士的头上蒙着一块面纱。她很兴奋，呼吸也急促。伯爵给她搬了一把椅子，并表现出他最得体的宫廷举止。劳拉抚摸着她，轻声细语，然后她回答道：“维多利亚·罗马娜女士！——比安科拉！——贝纳里瓦！”以及许多其他富有创意的昵称。但计数太敏锐了，不可能被忽视。 “啊哈！”他说：“我能在任期前一天晚上见到她吗？”并深深鞠了一躬。 “维多利亚夫人！”

她掀起了面纱。

“成功是肯定的，”他一边说一边鼓掌，一只手拿着鼻烟盒，让另一只手的手指敲击。

“孔特先生，您——在听我讲话之前，千万不要称赞我。”

“见到你了！”

“孔特先生，这个声音有更广泛的影响力。”

“夫人的美貌很快就会名声远扬。维纳斯是一位歌唱家吗？

她脸红了，无法继续这种射蜉蝣的对话，但她第一次迷人的准备让这位精通社交的绅士感到非常愉快，他用着迷的眼睛哼着歌，在她周围嗡嗡作响，就像飞蛾扑在灯下一样。突然，他低下了头：“没什么，没什么，夫人，”他一边说，一边轻轻地拂过她的裙子。 “我想这可能是油漆。”他微笑着安抚她，然后又潜入水中，低声说道：“一定是有什么东西粘在裙子上了。”对不起。'说完，他走向了门铃。 “我会打电话给我女儿的女仆。或者劳拉——劳拉在哪里？

皮亚韦尼夫人走到窗前。这位业余小贵族这种过时的大惊小怪令她感到恶心。

“你可能希望在贵妇礼服的线条中发现革命性的象征，”她说。

“革命的象征！——亲爱的！”亲爱的！'伯爵责备了他的女儿。 “我们的女士不是一位纯粹的艺术家吗？轻松完成三个八度音阶？啊哈！三！'他搓了搓手。 “但是，三个好八度！”他严肃而警告地对维多利亚说话。 '这是一笔财富——数百万！这正是最伟大的传承！这是一支军队！

“我相信可能是这样！” “维多利亚说，她的声音如此低沉而诚挚，令伯爵本人感到惊讶，尽管他的言语充满恶意。就在那一刻，劳拉从窗户里喊道：“这些马会发疯的。”

这声感叹达到了预期的效果。

“呃？——请原谅，夫人，”伯爵半走到窗边说道，然后要了他的帽子。马蹄的叮当声让他冲进门口，他的女儿站在门口，帽子伸出来。他感谢并祝福她的善意照顾，并担心夫人会认为他是“急躁的一代人之一”，他说，“除了马之外还有别的什么吗？”除了马什么都可以！一个人的马！——哈！”清晰可闻的马蹄声叫住了他。他吻了吻他的指尖，然后绊倒了。

夫人快步走到窗前，靠在那里，对车夫喊了一句话，车夫表示完全理解，伯爵的马立即站起来，左右拉动，街道上一片喧闹。他们。她甩下车窗，用两只手抓住维多利亚的脸颊，把头按在自己的怀上。 “他不会再打扰我们了，”她用一种全新的语气说道，双手从脸颊滑到肩膀，再沿着手臂滑到手指末端，他们深情地握住手指。 “他是老派的人，我的挚友！”此外，他只有两对马，其中一对他养在维也纳。我们活着，就是希望我们的主人能给我们更好的报酬！告诉我！你身体好吗？和你一起什么都好？明天他们要在她柔软的脸颊上涂油漆吗？很少，如果它们的颜色像现在一样饱满的话？我的桑德拉！阿米卡！如果贾科莫认识你，我应该嫉妒吗？以我的灵魂，我无法猜测！但是，你爱他所爱的。当他们谈论意大利时，他似乎为我而活，而你的目光向前看，仿佛你看到了这个自由的国家。神救救我！在过去的一个半小时里我是多么克制自己啊！”

夫人坐下来，慵懒地笑了笑。

'小孩子们呢？我会打电话给他们。如果他们脱了衣服，阿桑塔将穿着睡衣把他们带下来；我们会把窗户堵住，因为我的小男人会想要他的歌声；难道你没有向他许诺一项伟大的任务，那就是让意大利——他的母亲——死而复生吗？你还记得我们的小家伙试图看这幅画时的眼睛吗？我担心我强迫他太多了，没有必要——一点也没有。

时间很激动，夫人说话也很兴奋。梅辛和雷吉奥武装起来。意大利南部已经发出开放信号。伦巴底大阴谋即将揭晓，而站在那里的维多利亚就是这场阴谋的灯塔。她的出现让劳拉欣喜若狂。她羞于表现出来，羞于表达这个主题本身，她任由自己的舌头继续说下去，并通过抚平勇敢女孩抚摸她下巴的手来满足自己，并充满爱意地轻轻拉扯她的裙子。说到这里，她突然发出一声叫喊，仿佛被刺痛了。

“你带着别针，”她说。更仔细地检查裙子，“贾辛塔这个生物里有一个粗心的女仆;她让纸粘在你的衣服上。这是什么？'

维多利亚转过头，撩起裙子看去。

“被蝴蝶钉住了！”劳拉低声说道。

维多利亚问这是什么意思。

“没什么——没什么。”她的朋友说着站了起来，急切地将她拉向灯。

一只小青铜蝴蝶将一张剪角的方形纸固定在她的衣服上。上面写着两个字：——

“塞斯·索斯佩塔。”

当卡洛·阿米亚尼被宣布为她们时，这两个女人在痛苦的沉默中面对面。他大步走进去，一看到维多利亚就高兴地双手合十。

劳拉举起维多利亚裙子上系着的指责蝴蝶来迎接他的问候。

'是的;我预料到了，”他说，由于最近的劳累而呼吸急促。 “他们很友善——他们给了她个人警告。有时，匕首正指向蝴蝶。我在剧单上看到了签诺娜名字的标记。

'这是什么意思？'劳拉低着头看着青铜虫子，声音沙哑。 “这意味着什么？”她又问了一遍，然后抬起头，看到了隐秘的答案。

“解开它。”维多利亚举起双臂，仿佛感觉到那东西正在包围着她。

夫人松开了别针。但她担心自己会因此而牺牲一些可能的谜团线索，因此犹豫了自己的行动，并通过维多利亚的身体发出了难以忍受的怨恨的颤抖，她以冷酷而残忍的方式凝视着维多利亚，说：“不要颤抖。”又问，“是不是那个‘garritrice magrezza’，你称之为‘la Lazzeruola’的人干的？”说话。你能追踪到她的手吗？谁给你留下了瘟疫印记？

维多利亚的目光坚定地从她身上移开。

“就是这个意思，”卡洛插话道。 '那里！现在已经关闭了；而且，女士们，我恳求您不要多想，这意味着任何在我们玩的游戏中扮演主要角色的人都应该而且必须激起所有傻瓜、无赖和白痴的想法并做出最坏的事情。他们无法想象纯粹的奉献。是的，我明白了——“Sei sospetta”。他们会在圣轮上的圣凯瑟琳身上写上“Sei sospetta”。把它从你的脑海中抛开。交上来。'

“但他们怀疑她；他们为什么怀疑她？劳拉激烈地质问。 “我问，它是音乐学院的竞争对手，还是其中一个俱乐部的品牌？她没有答案。

'观察。'卡罗把纸放在她眼睛下面。

三个角被剪掉，第四个角被折叠起来。他把它翻了回来，露出了缩写BR“正如我所想，这也是我们人魔的杰作。”我开始认为，除非我们首先清除意大利的害虫，否则我们将永远受到挫败。这是一只黄鼠狼，一条蛇，一只老虎，三者合一。他们称他为“伟大的猫”。他自以为是一个爱国者，其实他只是一个阴谋家。我谴责他，但他得到了人们的信任，我相信我们的阿戈斯蒂诺也在其中。这个贱人的能量实在是太强大了。他具有禁食圣人的活力。我自己——我羞愧地向你宣布，女士，我知道害怕这个人是什么感觉。他有撒旦的血统，最糟糕的是，酋长还信任他。

“那么，我也一样，”劳拉说。

“还有我，”维多利亚重复道。

她的手指突然受到挤压。 “我相信你，”劳拉对她说。 '但也出现了一些轻率行为。我的孩子，等等：不要理会我，也不要有任何感情。卡洛，我的朋友——我丈夫的儿子——战友！让她教你要慷慨。她肯定是不检点了。她在奥地利人中有朋友吗？我有一个，这是众所周知的，我没有被怀疑。但是，她有吗？你说过或做过什么可能导致他们怀疑你的事情？说吧，桑德拉米娅。”

维多利亚很难谈论这个主题，这让她看起来像是一个回应指控的罪犯。最后她说：“英语：除了英国人，我没有外国朋友。”我不记得我做过什么。——是的，我说过，如果我被带出去接受枪杀，我想我可能会发抖。

'哎呀！嘘！劳拉检查了她。 “他们鞭打妇女，而不是开枪射杀她们。他们射杀男人。

“这是我们的幸运，”阿米亚尼说。

“但是，桑德拉，我的妹妹，”劳拉用悠扬的哄骗语气继续说道。 ‘你能不能帮我们猜猜？我很烦恼：我被蜇了。我是为了你才这么想​​的。例如，你无法想象是谁干的吗？

“不，夫人，我不能，”维多利亚回答道。

“你猜不出来吗？”

我不能帮你。'

'你不会！'烦躁的女人说道。 “你有没有注意到没有人经过你附近？”

“当我进入这条街时，一个女人从我身边擦肩而过。我不记得还有其他人。正如他所说，我的贝波抓住了一个正在监视我的人。我只记得这些。

维多利亚把脸转向阿米亚尼。

“巴托·里佐住在英国，”他半自言自语地说。 “您在那里遇到过一个叫巴托·里佐的男人吗，女士？我怀疑他就是这本书的作者。

听到巴托·里佐的名字，劳拉睁大了眼睛，唤醒了阿米亚尼的一段记忆；她的脸有一种幽灵般的苍白。

“我必须回我的房间去，”她说。 '一起说吧。我很快就会和你在一起。

她离开了他们。

阿米亚尼俯身靠近维多利亚的耳边。 “正是这个人向夫人的丈夫贾科莫发出了警告，他鄙视贾科莫，但贾科莫本可以拯救他。

这是我所知道的巴托·里佐唯一的优点。请原谅她。

“我愿意，”女孩说，现在哭了。

“她显然对这些革命标志有着根深蒂固的迷信信念。它们对她有传染性。她爱你，相信你，并会逐渐向你下跪寻求宽恕。她的痛苦是一种病。她现在想：“如果我的丈夫留意这个警告就好了！”

“是的，我看到她的心脏是如何运作的，”维多利亚说。 “你认识她的丈夫，卡罗先生？”

'我认识他。我在他手下服役。他是我所爱的兄弟。我不会再有别的了。

维多利亚伸出手让阿米亚尼握住。他也加入了自己的狂热触碰之中。年轻人的心膨胀得难以控制，但他想象着明天的危险，像悲剧性的火焰一样围绕着她，他无法用言语表达他的激情。

门开了，一个高贵的小男孩跳进了房间。后面跟着一个粉白相间的小女孩，就像哥哥脚步中的流光。他们喊叫着，向前张开双臂，扑向维多利亚，男孩占据了她的全部膝盖，而女孩则为争夺王国的份额而奋斗。维多利亚亲吻了他们，哭喊道：“不，不，不，杰克先生，这是一个共和国，而不是一个帝国，你们没有‘先来’的权利；”阿玛莉亚单膝坐着，你也单膝坐着，面对面坐着，握着手，发誓满意。”

“那么我不想被称为英国教名，你就叫我贾科莫吧，”男孩说。

维多利亚用山地音符唱道：“贾科莫！——贾科莫——贾科-贾科-贾科..科莫！”

孩子们听着，对她闪闪发亮，一起跳起来，喊着要更多。

'更多的？'维多利亚说； “但是卡洛先生不是我们的朋友吗？”他是否戴着能让他隐形的魔法戒指？

“让那个德国女孩去找他吧，”贾科莫说，拉紧喉咙想要亲吻。

“我不是德国女孩，”小阿玛莉亚抗议道，她拒绝在这种耻辱下去找卡洛·阿米亚尼，尽管张开双臂和膝盖以及手指的令人愉快的避风港正在邀请她。

“贾科莫先生，她不是德国女孩，”维多利亚用戏剧性的语气说道。

“她有一个德国名字。”

“这不是德国名字！”小女孩尖叫起来。

贾科莫为阿玛莉亚演奏了一首优美的曲子。

“所以，你讨厌格拉特利公爵夫人！”维多利亚说。 '很好。我会记住的。

男孩宣称他并不恨他母亲的朋友和妹妹的教母：他相当喜欢她，他真的很喜欢她，他爱她；他喜欢她。但他讨厌“阿玛莉亚”这个名字，并且无法理解为什么公爵夫人会是德国人。他最后以蔑视的胜利方式嘲笑“阿玛莉亚”。

“猫，走开！” “维多利亚说，立即把他扶起来，而小阿玛莉亚同时意识到，实际的同情只需要按一下门铃就可以表达出来，立即拉扯自己体内的电线，发出一声悲伤的哀号，让她唯一拥有维多利亚的怀抱，在那里她可以非常安慰地止住眼泪。与此同时，贾科莫的身体弯曲成拱形，野蛮而顽皮地拉扯卡洛·阿米亚尼的手腕，接受了一个粗壮男孩的一课，教他如何蔑视自己所渴望的东西。他只得请求原谅。他发现有必要，害羞地走到维多利亚身边，维多利亚把阿玛莉亚挡在了他的面前，吻了她，他自己也被温柔地吻了。

“但是女孩不应该哭！”维多利亚责备了这个小女人。

'你为什么哭啊？'阿玛莉亚简单地问道。

'看！她一直在哭。贾科莫按照他的性别时尚，利用了这一发现，必然是响亮的声音。

“我们的维多利亚为什么哭？”两个孩子都叫了起来。

“因为你们的母亲对她来说是个残忍的妹妹，”劳拉从门口走到他们身边说道。她把维多利亚的头靠在胸前，看着她的眼睛，然后在她的眼睛中间坐下。在他们被打发回床上之前，维多利亚唱了一首低沉柔和的歌曲，就像夜晚的声音。她无法服从贾科莫的军事气派要求，不得不辩称自己累了。

当孩子们离开后，就好像休战结束了。夫人和阿米亚尼迅速地交换了有关维多利亚的神秘怀疑的问题。尽管劳拉很爱她，但她却流露出了一种不可战胜的感觉，即一定有一些特殊的或暂时的不信任的理由。

“挂在上面的生命在这里敲击着我，”她说道，手指抚摸着喉咙下方，手指像落下的箭一样。

但是，阿米亚尼身处阴谋的中心，参加了他们的会议，了解他们的头脑，并经常与他们的计划作斗争，他对他们对隐藏事实和主权智慧的潜在掌控能力并没有同样深刻的认识。他说：“我们对一个人过于信任。我们不得不相信他，但我们对他过于信任。我指的是这个人，这个魔鬼，巴托·里佐。夫人，夫人，必须要提到他。他搞乱了情节。他是革命狂热分子，我们信任他，就好像他完全有理智一样。后果是什么？酋长不在，我相信他现在在热那亚。起义的一切计划都是准确的；工具已经准备好了，我们已经瘫痪了。今晚我去过三所房子，两小时前，那里还举行过工会和音乐会，但所有人都犹豫不决、意见分歧。我已经派了一个信使去见酋长。在收到他的消息之前，我们无能为力。我让乌戈·科尔特对我们米兰人发起猛烈攻击，像往常一样威胁要在没有我们的情况下工作，并建立一个属于他自己的贝尔加马斯克和布雷西亚共和国。梅多莱伯爵要求推迟一周。阿戈斯蒂诺微笑着，轻笑，谈论着他的诗意。

“在你收到酋长的消息之前，什么也不能做吗？”劳拉热情地说。 “我们要保持悬念吗？不可能的！我不能忍受。我们在城里有充足的武器。哦，要是我们有大炮就好了！我崇拜大炮！他们是战神！但如果我们对城堡发动突然袭击——一次真正的惊慌就会变成一支暴民军队。我听我丈夫这么说过。不要有任何延误。这是我的话。

“但是，夫人，您是否看到所有有关信号的音乐会都丢失了？”

“我的朋友，我看到了一些东西”；劳拉对他意味深长地点点头。 '也许也会如此。赶紧走吧。看到另一个信号被决定。哦！因为我们已经准备好了。现在无所作为是最痛苦的——杀死心脏。今晚我们城里有多少白人屠夫？

“他们正在每个大门进军。我看到一队匈牙利人正向博尔戈德拉斯特拉走来。弗朗西斯科大街上有两个新的乌兰中队。炮兵驻扎在阿米广场。

“对布雷西亚、贝加莫、帕多瓦、威尼斯来说更好！”劳拉惊呼道。 “他们的力量是有限度的。我们米兰人可以与他们媲美。日复一日，我心中一直有一个梦想：米兰即将迎来喘息之机。走吧，我的兄弟；去巴托·里佐；让他和梅多莱伯爵、阿戈斯蒂诺和科尔特上校——我亲吻他们的手指——把他们聚集在一起，绞尽脑汁，在这片黑暗中寻找神圣之火的火花，而这片黑暗中一定存在着这样的火花，那里有这么多彻底的人一心致力于一项事业。神圣的事业。还有，卡洛，”——劳拉抑制住了她紧张的声音，“别以为我是在用我的一本《午夜灯》向你朗诵。”（她向意大利人民谈到了她的小册子的标题。）“你觉得在我们这些女人当中，当男孩卡洛在她们面前表现出他的冲动时，阿戈斯蒂诺和科尔特上校的感受就很像。是的，我的热情使你成为一名哲学家。这就是人性。可怜我吧，原谅我吧，听从我的吩咐吧。”

当阿米亚尼在他们中间张开嘴时，他现在的情绪与阴谋中的长老们的情绪相比，是严厉而熟练的，因为年轻人不假思索地立即站了起来。

他说：“我会告诉他们，夫人没有发出信号。”

“告诉他们，她选择的名字仍然是维多利亚；但要说的是，在这样的危机中，她感到一种怀疑的阴影对她发出了指令，她将默默地、谦卑地服务，直到她被正确地认识，她的时刻到来。她愿意出现在他们面前，接受审问。她知道自己是无辜的，也知道他们是为了国家的利益而工作，如果这是他们的意愿，她满足于被抹去所有的参与：——全部！为了共同的福祉，她放弃了一切。比如说。并说，明天晚上一定要起床。哦！明天晚上！这是我的丈夫。

劳拉·皮亚维尼 (Laura Piaveni) 双臂交叉放在胸前。

阿米亚尼正低着头从他们身边走开，这时维多利亚的铃声把他吸引住了。

“留下来，卡罗先生；明天晚上我要唱歌。

寡妇听到了她那浓浓的情感，这种情感刚刚以象征性的感官狂喜结束了她的演讲。她猛烈地预感到反对，就像一个渴求井水时受阻的生物，她用可怕的眼神看了她一眼，然后哄骗地说，只要没有甜蜜可以使音调愉快，“是的，你会唱歌，但你不会唱歌”那首歌。'

“这就是我打算唱的那首歌，夫人。”

“什么时候禁止？”

“只有一个人的禁令我可以承认。”

“你竟然敢唱歌反抗我？”

“当我只是尽我的职责时，我什么都不敢。”

阿米亚尼走到窗前，靠在那里，看着通向拥挤广场的灯光。他希望自己在人群中，不要听到劳拉尖刻刺耳的话语，以及维多利亚坚定不移的回答，虽然次数较少，但更加坚定、严肃。劳拉把精力都花在了嘲讽上，但维多利亚只说出了她的决心，而且一针见血。正如他的军事本能所塑造的那样，就像堡垒前的小规模冲突中步枪发出的有毒的噼啪声一样，它以巨大的声音和扫射的射击缓慢地回应。他想象自己恳求确保她的安全，在她的听力中，在莫特罗内，她看起来是如此简单的一个少女，尽管高贵热情：太公平，太温柔，不能驻扎在眼前冲突的任何角落。部分是因为想起了他当时无脑的求情，以及迎接他们的笑声，而这位女士最近才回忆起这些，但这并不全是自卑（因为对优秀品格的短暂认可通常是男人的事） ）他感知到了维多利亚灵魂的高度。阿米亚尼还记得酋长谈到女性时的说法，心想“也许他认识一个像她这样的人。”年轻人内心的热情放大了她的形象。看到夫人承认自己在这场冲突中处于劣势，他并不感到奇怪。

“她说话就像剑锋一样，”劳拉绝望地喊道，然后跌坐在椅子上。 “带她回家，如果可以的话，在路上说服她，卡罗。今晚我要去格拉特利公爵夫人那里。她有一个接待处。把这个女孩带回家。她说她会唱歌：她服从酋长，除了酋长之外谁也不服从。我们不会认为她渴望发光。她受到怀疑；她被指控；她是有品牌的；人们对她没有普遍的信任；但明天晚上她将举起火炬：——接下来会发生什么？有的行动，有的回头，有的一头奔向背信弃义，有的犹豫不决，一切都是为了烂摊子！血在她的头上。

“我下次再向你道歉，”维多利亚说。 “我爱你，劳拉夫人。”

“你知道，你知道，否则你不会想到向我道歉，”劳拉说。但现在，走吧。你把我切成两半了。卡洛·阿米亚尼可能会在我失败的地方取得成功，而且我已经使用了一切武器；足以让一个卑鄙的生物恨我一生并狂喜地吻我。尽力而为，卡洛，尽你所能。”

阿米亚尼必须向她保证他们的观点不同。

“夫人坚持执行酋长指示的计划，拒绝因下属的错误怀疑而偏离自己的道路。”他本能地使用了一种句子式的措辞，就像人们在紧张时以及为愤世嫉俗者对言语使用的定义辩护时所做的那样。 “我认为，夫人是对的。如果她退缩，她就会公开接受自己名字上的污点。我的言论违背了我自己的感受和意愿。

“桑德拉，你听到了吗？”劳拉惊呼道。 “这是朋友对你不体贴任性的解读。”

维多利亚满意地回答道：“卡罗先生对我的评价不同。”

“那就去吧，让他在这种任性的愚蠢行为中加强自己。”劳拉示意她的手，把它放在脸上。

维多利亚跪下来，用双臂抱住她，亲吻她的膝盖。

“贝波在门口等我，”她说。但卡罗选择不听这个影子一样的贝波。

“你无话可说，除非她发出信号来洗清自己的罪名，”劳拉用他温和的“阿迪奥”大声说道，然后站了起来。 '好吧，就这样吧。又是无果之血！给你们俩一个“rivederla”。今晚我在敌人的营地里。他们玩开放牌。阿玛莉亚通过她的伪装告诉了我她所知道的一切。我可能会学到一些东西。明天来找我吧。我的桑德拉，我会吻你。我的这些颤抖毫无意义。

夫人拥抱了她，并用手指接受了阿米亚尼的敬礼。

“手指发酸！”他说。她把脸颊靠在他身上，低声说道：“我很容易就会被说服背叛你。”

他回答说：“我一定有一些不背叛自己的功德。”

“在每个肘部！”她笑了。 “你在每个肘部展示电池的重击声，并期望你的闪电女神不会看到她移动了你。去。你没有站在我一边，我是对的，我是一个女人。顺便说一句，桑德拉米亚，我想请求借用你的 Beppo 两个小时或更短时间。

维多利亚让贝波听从她的指挥。

“然后你跑回家睡觉，”劳拉继续说道。 “当你在黑暗中独处一段时间时，那些固执的人就会理性起来。”

她几乎没有听维多利亚说新歌剧的主唱们要参加晚上十一点在大师罗科·里奇家里开会。

劳拉请求贝波提供服务的目的是毫不掩饰的。她自己也知道，她显然是想试探、盘问这个男人，但她任性地选择了沉默。她甚至没有脸红地在楼梯上方竖起一只秘密的耳朵，通过维多利亚命令贝波等待的语气来判断她是否同时在暗示她要警惕。但维多利亚一言不发：命令是阿米亚尼下达的。 “我对她一秒钟的不信任都是卑鄙的，”劳拉说。但这并没有减少她立即向贝波提出严厉的质询。她不想被意大利人假装的简单所欺骗，所以她让他像个傻瓜一样回答两三遍，然后突然指责他已经做好了这些回答的准备。贝波内心立即将自己睿智的本能归因于纯粹的反对精神，不喜欢为自己年轻的情妇以外的任何人服务，这导致他激怒了夫人并保持警惕。他坦诚地承认了指控的真实性；并补充说，他同样准备好无限次的发言。 “尊敬的女士，问题总是让我处于守势，似乎急需反击；我之所以能解释这一点，是因为我的母亲——现在是圣徒之中的一位受祝福的小女人！——在她抱着我的关键时刻，她受到了一位面色铁青的老法官的审问。所以，一个问题——我要说明一点；但请我发表声明，然后，啊，夫人！”贝波挥动手臂，表示他的舌头自然流淌。

“我想，”劳拉说，“你曾经是一名士兵，一名服役人员。”

“还有斯卡拉歌剧院的一位场景转换者、最尊贵的女士。”

“梅蒂里奥先生受伤时，你陪他去了英国？”

“我做到了。”

“你在那里看到了维多利亚夫人，她当时的名字是艾米莉亚·贝洛尼？”

“杰出的夫人，她抵达意大利后把名字改成了维多利亚·坎帕——“sull'campo dells gloria”——啊！啊！——她自己的名字对她自己国家的苍蝇很有吸引力。这一切都是真的。

‘这对你来说应该是一种安慰！梅蒂里奥先生……”

贝波在继续询问时扭动着身体，停顿了一下，他急忙发表声明：“梅蒂里奥先生很好，正要访问意大利，离开被海浪包围的雾岛和啤酒岛，湿润的风、大量的金钱和大量的仁慈，伟大的心灵在这里生长。夫人与他通信，而且只与他通信。

“你知道这一点，并且会发誓吗？”劳拉惊呼道。

贝波因此收到了他开始为之奋斗的暗示，深深地发誓其真实性，并立即指示他的陈述证明他的情妇在政治上（或者是多情的，如果怀疑针对的是那些较软的地区）不轻率或应受指责她的任何行为。他说，如果没有她功勋母亲的陪伴和他本人最卑微的陪伴，这位女士从来没有离开过她的住所。他，贝波，有一位主人和一位情妇，梅蒂里奥先生和维多利亚女士。她没有看到外国人：不过——奇怪的是！——当她的邻居说英语时，他就看见了她；但她没有看到任何外国人。她热爱这种语言：它使她的脸上露出微笑，就像婴儿吸吮完奶后的笑容；——就像一个人在做梦和听到音乐时所看到的那种表情。她不跟外国人说话。她不愿意去外国城市，却热爱米兰，像熟杏里的蠼螋一样自由快乐地生活在米兰。米兰的包围给了她足够的活动空间，因为周围没有堡垒——“这在维罗纳敲响了一个有趣的骨头，夫人。”贝波露出纯洁的微笑，简单地鞠了一躬，表示接受。 “米兰的空气，”他继续说道，在劳拉坚定的目光下，他的自信减少了一些，因此他的坦率显得更加强迫——“米兰的甜美空气给了她一个深沉的胸膛，这样她就可以保持音调长达五个小时。”小提琴弓的长度：——圣安布罗吉奥的身体，这是真的！贝波伸出手臂，在肩脊上砍了五下。哎呀，一只鹰可能会从圣卢克的头（在大教堂上）飞到科莫上空圣普里莫的石头上，而女主人则坚持她的笔记！你听着，你喘着气——你想到了一位诗人在他的地牢里，突然，看哪，他的锁链被打断了！——你想到了一只金甲龟正在前往一个幸福的神殿朝圣！——你想——你不知道你怎么想的！

说到这里，贝波陷入了一阵短暂的欣喜若狂的沉默，然后从沉默中醒来，带着一种热烈的活力：“夫人听到她唱歌了吗？”该怎么形容呢！明天晚上将是米兰的一场盛宴。”

“你认为米兰的业余爱好者明天晚上会很高兴吗？”劳拉说；但看到男人敏锐的耳朵已经注意到花下那只讽刺的爬行动物，她不愿再浪费时间，便阻止了他的回答。

“贝波，我的好朋友，你是一个十足的意大利人——你浪费了你的聪明才智。如果你记住我是你的乡下女人，我就会很高兴。我已经帮了你一个类似的忙，让你发挥你最大的聪明才智。反思它毫无意义既不会吓到你，也不会指导你。对此我十分确信。我讲话只是为了适应当前的情况。现在，别想逃避我。如果你是一条蛇，有朋友也有敌人，那么你就只是一条蛇。我问你——你不必回答，但我禁止你撒谎——你的女主人是否见过任何接受特德斯基金币的人，无论是男人还是女人，或与之交谈过或有过书信往来吗？任何人，无论男人还是女人，都可以称她为叛徒吗？

“没有两次！”贝波红着额头怒吼道。

这家伙站着，双腿僵硬，皱着眉头，看上去很高贵——戏剧性的，但也很高贵。部分看起来像费加罗在极端情况下捍卫自己的荣誉，但很像法国帝国元帅的雕像。

“那就行了，”劳拉站起身来说道。她正要离开他，这时格拉特利公爵夫人的猎手进来了，手里拿着她的朋友阿玛莉亚的一封信。她打开它，读到：——

“最亲爱的，——我是否很快就会痛苦地想起，有一个
我和我的心之间有钢铁之河吗？

“今晚一定要来。”你的新鹎正处于危险之中。这
愚蠢的事情一定是读罗马历史。说不不！它
让你们都陶醉。我为了我的劳拉而照顾她：
我给你一千个吻，你是黑暗而美味的灵魂！
你不是我那通向晚星的松林吗？来吧，那个
我们可以商量如何在她危险的季节把她偷走。
我的劳拉，海湾不会封闭那些狂妄的小女人；所以我们必须
不让她迈出这一步。到达后进入销售大厅：通行证
下来一次，然后返回你的脚步；然后到我的闺房。我的
女仆Aennchen将为您带路。另外。告诉这位使者
你来。劳拉我的，我永远是你的

“阿玛利亚。”

劳拉向猎手示意她的答案是肯定的。当他要退休时，他的黑色羽毛帽子撞到了贝波，贝波把他推到一边，灵巧地踢了帽子一脚，同时始终保持着优雅的正面朝向夫人。她站着沉思。愤怒的猎手用蹩脚的意大利语在贝波耳边咕哝了一两句话，然后就走了。然后，贝波开始向门口鞠躬，并试图冲出去，离开视线，离开，最后表现出过度奴性的低垂，但夫人阻止了他，告诉他在早上之前要把自己当作她的仆人；然后，他会继续做她的仆人。对此，他表现出令人惊讶的准备，完全表明了个人的奉献精神，并在她离开房间后停留了两分钟。时间过去了，他蹦蹦跳跳地跑下楼梯，发现大厅的门锁着，在夫人的享乐期间，他成了囚犯。当他发现自己被高超的狡猾所控制时，他非但没有感到不安，反而让他安静下来。于是，他把自己的聪明才智留给了下一个机会，然后偷偷地回到了起点，夫人发现他正在平静地等待着她。这个男人非常害怕，生怕自己可能会因为背叛信任而被判有罪，在这个危机时刻，即使是服从了情妇的命令，也离开了他的情妇一个小时：但他的本性不应该公开向情妇陈述这件事。先生，他知道她是情妇的朋友，或者考虑采取除了精明的逃避以外的做法来完成他的职责并满足他的良心。

劳拉面无笑容地说：“临街的门是用钥匙打开的。”然后她把钥匙放在他手里，还有她随身携带的扇子。走出家门后，她确信他不会放弃手中的扇子：她继续往前走，蒙着厚重的面纱，对他的追随者充满信心。格拉特利公爵夫人的宅邸毗邻弗朗西斯科大街。无数的马车正在卸下载着贵宾的货物，时不时有一位穿着全套制服的奥地利军官跑上台阶，在灯光下闪闪发光。 “我走进他们中间，”劳拉想。她很高兴自己是步行来的。忘记了贝波和她的黑扇子，除了她，没有一个意大利女人会这样做，她在绝望的回忆和绝望的复仇渴望的痛苦中剧烈颤抖地踱步，她让自己在客人中间被引导，浑身发抖。就像一个在执行公爵夫人的指示时发烧感冒一样；她沿着大厅的长度走去，穿过一道对她的感觉来说不属于人类的面孔的光。

与此同时，贝波因保管扇子而感到压抑，并期待着随时派人去取最有用的女士乐器，他站在下面一群奇怪的半封建家臣中间，很快他就被公爵夫人的猎手挑出来了。施蒂里安人以南德人的方式，用玩笑来掩饰自己的愤怒，试图引导他发生争执。但贝波太柔软了，不可能被困住。他为自己可能犯下的任何冒犯表示歉意，并向猎手保证，他认为一顶帽子和另一顶帽子一样好，有些帽子比其他帽子更好：为了表示极度的诚恳，他接受了重复猎手名字的任务，这是“雅各布·鲍姆瓦尔德·费克尔维茨”（Jacob Baumwalder Feckelwitz），对于意大利人来说还算可以接受。贝波非常小心翼翼地设法将这个笨重名字的卑劣发音所带来的全部嘲笑都揽在自己身上。雅各布·鲍姆瓦尔德·费克尔维茨（Jacob Baumwalder Feckelwitz）为他提供了啤酒，让他在努力之后恢复精神。当贝波喝酒时，他抓住了扇子。 '好的;好的;千恩万谢。”贝波说完就放弃了。 “请把它带到高处，我恳求你。”他在摆脱它时表现得如此敏捷和轻盈，以至于雅各布把它塞进了他衬衫前襟的纽扣之间，通过那个缝隙将它归还给了他。贝波的头沉了下来。一把黑色蕾丝和雪松木把他拴在了原地！他恳求穿着制服的人把扇子搬上楼，交给劳拉·皮亚韦尼夫人。但他们在雅各的劝告下拒绝了。 “你自己去吧，”雅各布笑着说，几乎没有准备好见到受害者，他认为在接下来的一个小时里，他至少已经牢牢地握住了他的大爪子，相信他的话。贝波跳进大厅，跑上楼梯。公爵夫人的侍女，象牙色面孔的安辰，正从他身边飞过。她看到一张非常阴沉的脸看着她，害羞地凑近耳朵，假装听懂了那快速的外语所说的一切，按照她唯一听懂的事情的建议行事。贝波提到了皮亚维尼夫人的名字。 “这边走，”她用手指示意，以为他当然非常迫切地想见到夫人。

贝波极力劝她拿扇子，但她没能答应。但她抬起手指，表现出苏珊娜对这一切的极度恐惧，但仍然吩咐他跟着。当然，她并没有快速穿过黑暗的通道，那里再次上演了扇子游戏，并有伴奏。她所反对的伴奏不过是一条鱼在逃离鱼钩时焦躁不安而已。但“不，不！”用她自己的语言，“不，不！”每当他试图把扇子交给她保管时，她就会从她的嘴里爆发出来。 “这些白人女性真是太棒了！”贝波想道，他准备在困惑和不耐烦之间徘徊。

'那里;在那里！'安辰指着从窗帘褶皱中透进来的一束光说道。当贝波不情愿地拉着他的手时，贝波亲吻了她的手指，稍稍停顿了一下，贝波就知道这个案子有望获得更高的特权。该怎么办？他一刻也没有空闲。但他又不敢冒犯女人的虚荣心。他欣喜若狂地用她的手按在他的胸骨上，让她确信她被爱着，尽管没有被拥抱。在这一谨慎的举动之后，他走向幕布，而美丽的奥地利女红娘则飞快地去执行她之前的任务。

贝波发现自己身处黑暗的前厅，这足以让他立即小心翼翼和呼吸。当他触碰窗帘时，室内另一侧的一扇门打开了，一阵清新的女性温柔的叽叽喳喳的声音打破了寂静，像一条小溪从跳跃到水平，然后再次跳跃并发出欢乐的声音。格拉特利公爵夫人紧握着劳拉夫人的两只手，把她拉到一张脚凳上，在亲吻和温暖的拥抱之间，正在询问贾科莫和她的教女阿玛莉亚这两个小家伙。

“我上次见到你是什么时候？”她惊呼道。 '哦！自从那天早上我们见面并在他的坟墓上放了蜡菊以来，我们就没有再见过这样的事了。我灵魂的妹妹！吻我，记住它。我在门口看到了你——在我看来，就像在异象中一样，我们都收到了一个警告，要来找他，敲门，门就会打开，我们所爱的人就会出来！那是很多天前的事了。对我来说，这就像永远锁在珍珠匣里的一天。这难道不是一个纯净的早晨吗？我自己的早晨！如果我哭泣，那是我高兴的事。但是，”她冷静地补充道，“任何形式的哭泣都不会伤害我的眼皮。”她拿出一面金框小镜子，确信那是不行的。

“他们会认为这是因为我丈夫不在，”她说，因为只有一个对这件事不那么感到遗憾的女人才能说出这样的话。

“他什么时候从维也纳回来？”劳拉用低沉的声音询问她的想法。

“我每周收到两个快递；我不再知道了，我的劳拉。我相信他正在法庭上对我提出一些夫妻投诉。我们结婚十七个月了。我屈服于婚姻，因为没有婚姻我就无法获得适当的自由，而现在我却被要求放弃我牺牲自己才得到的东西！他在维也纳能听到吗？她打了个响指。 “如果没有，那就让他来米兰看看吧。”此外，他是无害的。大公夫人全神贯注地倾听着他所嫉妒的那个男人。这是我的答复：你让我结婚：我服从了。我心在土，必有杂念。目前让我分心的是德皮尔蒙特，他是一名优秀的天主教徒，也是一名优秀的奥地利士兵，尽管他是法国人。我悲伤地说——这太可怕了——当我想到德皮尔蒙特热衷于用剑时，有时我会感到很痒。但请记住，劳拉，直到我们结婚后，我丈夫才告诉我，他举手之劳就能拯救贾科莫。滚开这个人！——如果我觉得惩罚他很有趣，我就会这样做。

公爵夫人亲吻了劳拉的脸颊，然后继续说道：“现在我们已经成为敌人了！”我支持奥地利，你支持意大利。好的。但我永远支持劳拉。所以，我们之间有一条河，河上有一座桥。亲爱的，你知道吗，如果你明晚有什么严重的事情的话，我们对你来说太强大了？

'你是？'劳拉平静地说。

“我知道，你看，明天晚上注定会发生一些事情。”

劳拉说：“你愿意吗？”

“我们有确实的证据。不仅如此：你的维多利亚——但你介意让她警告吗？如果她坚持执行自己的设计，肯定会陷入困境。告诉我，你愿意让她受到警告和保护吗？一年的山寨生活并不愉快，对声音也无益。说吧，我的劳拉。”

劳拉用她那双乌黑的大眼睛温和地抬头看着她朋友的脸，回答道：“你想派德·皮尔蒙特少校去见她，警告她吗？”

“你不邪恶吗？”公爵夫人喊道，她觉得自己脸红了，劳拉把她从审讯的正轨上甩了出去。 “但是，亲爱的，今晚张开双手打牌吧。”看：——她有危险。我知道这;你也是。也许在她踏上董事会之前她就会被监禁——谁知道呢？现在，我——我的梦想不就是在一个军团里发誓为我的劳拉服务吗？——我有一个计划。说实话，这几乎不属于我。它属于希腊人安东尼奥·伯里克利·阿格里洛普洛斯先生。这只是——公爵夫人压低了贝波的声音——“一个营救她的计划：加速她前往蒂罗尔州梅兰附近我的城堡。”贝波听到“蒂罗尔”。由于失去了背景，他陷入了疯狂之中，他打了个哈欠，做了个鬼脸，还跳起了厌恶的舞蹈。这同样让他失去了下一句话。 “我们打算把她留在那里，直到一切归于平静，她的革命狂热已经过去。你听说过安东尼奥先生吗？他可以买下希腊王国、整个蒂罗尔、一半伦巴第。这个男人对你的维多利亚充满热情；我相信，只是为了她的声音。毫无疑问，他被认为是一位伟大的鉴赏家。他不可能对其他事情有热情，否则唉！ （公爵夫人悲伤而滑稽地摇摇头）“当他借钱给我时，他会坚持以我的私人财产为书面证券和抵押吗？”这个世界与浪漫故事是多么不同啊，我的劳拉！但对于德皮尔蒙特来说，我可能会认为我的微笑真的无法赎回一个帝国；我说的是皇帝。说话;那人正在等待着到来；我要召唤他吗？

劳拉默许地点点头。

这时贝波已经在地板上扎根了。 “毕竟我处在最好的位置，”他一边说，一边想着自己的服务职责。他对安东尼奥先生的性格非常熟悉。他知道路易吉是安东尼奥先生对维多利亚的间谍，而且他无意伤害他的情妇。但贝波的内心却充满了反抗，维多利亚要发出反抗的信号。因此，贝波没有丝毫敌意，决心挫败他，等待着安东尼奥先生的计划。

希腊语是由Aennchen 引入的。她看了一眼夫人的腿上，见她仍然没有拿扇子，她的眼睛狡猾地抬起闪亮的太阳穴，偷偷地检查着窗帘上的狭窄开口。序幕仪式短暂安静地过去了。

不久，贝波听到他们说话；他惊讶地发现自己完全听不懂他们在说什么。 “哦，该死的法国方言！”他呻吟着；发现谈话是用那种语言进行的。安东尼奥先生的介绍性态度冷淡而礼貌，很快就变得热情起来。要想理解他的意思，就必须精通法语。他按照军团的顺序伸出一只手的手指，用其他手指交替地把他的胡须从自然下垂的地方拧到嘴角上，他一根一根地触摸抬起的手指，在它们上面嗡嗡作响：他的白色眼睛闪烁着光芒。 ，他耸耸肩的方式足以让一个偷偷摸摸的听众发疯，因为他意识到他没有表达出丰富的含义并嘲笑他。安东尼奥先生有时会发出一半是咒骂、一半是哭泣的声音，看起来既可怜又责备，仿佛他呜咽着咒骂，心里有难以言表的痛苦。但有一个补救办法！他用无名指显示了具体内容。它就在那里。做到这一点（手指上的第三个），事情可能仍然会好起来。他那充满活力的法语和手势清楚地表明了这一点。贝波全神贯注地寻找名字，对这些谜语感到绝望。名字是黑暗、难以理解的荒野中的光柱。夫人提出了一个问题。回复以大师罗科·利玛窦（Rocco Ricci）的名字命名。接下来，安东尼奥先生用哑剧般的动作伴随着他的滔滔不绝的讲话，这似乎表明一扇门关上了，马匹瞬间驰骋——飞向空中，无论去往何处。他兴高采烈地鞭打着梦幻般的战马，看上去像一位疯狂的诗人一样飞向天空，当夫人再次提出问题时，他立刻用手捂住嘴，坐在那里，用一个简单的回答回答她所喜欢的问题。礼貌而恼怒的目光。她说话了；他附和着她，公爵夫人也跟着说了同样的话。贝波借助这三个词的三角形重复以及它们与意大利语的部分关系来解释它们：“今晚。”然后夫人又进一步发问。希腊人回答：“伊尔玛·迪·卡尔斯基小姐。”

“拉拉泽罗拉，”她说。

安东尼奥先生露出了一点讽刺的模仿神情，仿佛从高处的角度默许了这个侮辱性术语的正义：但小姐可能会过去，她对公众来说已经足够好了。

贝波再也没有听到，也没有再看到。身后传来的拉力使他回想起自己的处境。他伸出双臂，将黑暗中的安辰抱在怀里：首先，他热烈地吻了她，让她在背叛的边缘颤抖，在她回过神来之前，他把扇子从她美丽的后背上敲下来，在她之间她的肩胛骨，跳开了。他并不是想冲进雅各布·鲍姆瓦尔德·费克尔维茨的怀抱，而是那个四处走动的猎手在半明半暗的阴影中迎接了他，并喊道：“Aennchen！”贝波对他所熟悉的几句德语表达了一种可爱的温柔：“Gottschaf-donner-dummer！”并从惊讶的雅各布手中滑落，从他的腋窝下溜了出来。很快他就到了街上，兴奋不已，但他不知道是出于什么原因，也不知道为了什么目的。他打乱了他记得刚刚听到的名字——“Rocco Ricci”和“la Lazzeruola”。为什么 la Lazzeruola 的名字先于 la Vittoria 的名字？而三人所说的“今晚”是什么意思呢？——哎呀！还有蒂罗尔！蒂罗尔州——今晚——Rocco Ricci la Lazzeruola！

在他对这些迫在眉睫的谜团做出任何心理决定之前，贝波的双腿带着他走向罗科·里奇大师的家。

大师罗科·利玛窦 (Rocco Ricci) 的故居关闭了博尔戈德拉斯特拉 (Borgo della Stella)。卡洛·阿米亚尼领着维多利亚来到了大师的门口。一路上他们很少说话。

“你是一个优秀的剑客？”她突然问他。

“我拥有与武器完美亲密的技巧，”他回答道。

“你的父亲是一名士兵，卡洛先生。”

“他是他认为是意大利军队的一名将军。我们以前每天都会一起击剑两个小时。”

“我爱那些这样做的父亲，”维多利亚说。

说完这些话后，阿米亚尼无法再试图向她宣扬和平与安全。他推迟到下一分钟再下一分钟。

维多利亚的精神处于那些愤怒的结之一中，这些结一半是智力，一半是意志，并且很大程度上受到一种或另一种正在上升的激情的支配。她决心继续前进；她觉得继续前进是合理的；但神圣的热情不再让她振奋，她需要她本性中可能存在的所有准确的洞察力和毫无意义的固执的支持。那种感觉就是她被赋予了举起火炬并树立意大利旗帜的责任，这种感觉像穿过竖琴的琴弦一样席卷了她。劳拉，还有那只可怕的小青铜蝴蝶，还有“Sei sospetta”，现在让她的职责显得枯燥无味，毫无血肉，在她看来，就像一具骷髅被告知要站起来行走：——比如说，那东西服从了，并且男人的眼睑可怕地膨胀了一段距离，然后又躺了下来，男人们喘口气：但是谁比这更红润呢？它的荣耀在哪里呢？有什么好处？这个米兰、维罗纳、帕多瓦、维琴察、布雷西亚、威尼斯、佛罗伦萨，整个威尼斯、托斯卡纳和伦巴底地区，一直到遥远的西西里岛，还有在她的想法中永远躺在死寂的日落皇冠下的罗马——它们也是可能会上涨；但她同样将它们视为骷髅。就连自由意大利的影子也没有绽放，像拉撒路一样站在吹响的复活号角前。

在这些时刻，年轻的心虽然充满了活力和火焰，却无法为那些小小的乳汁和希望、梦想、倦怠和悬挂在它们周围的能量做普通的护理工作。维多利亚的地平线距她不到五英尺。她既没有看到辉煌的大地，也没有看到古老的天堂；除了无视敌人和（更难勇敢的）朋友而跨越的缺口之外，没有什么比这更好的了。一些旧联想的任性活动让她哼起了一首古雅的英国曲子，由此她清醒了过来。

“亲爱的朋友，”她说，意识到阿米亚尼的缺席可能比她自己更令人烦恼。

'是的？'他很快地说，接下来要说一句话。没有人来，他继续说道，“劳拉夫人也是你的朋友。”

她冷冷地回答：“我没有想她。”

维多利亚试图对他说一句安慰的话，但她发现自己没有任何想法或情感。在这一点上，她与劳拉不同，劳拉无论什么季节，只要有心情治愈心爱之人的小伤痛，就会向女人的舌头倾泻出活泼的温柔和所有可能的哄骗。然而，与维多利亚相比，行动的刺激让劳拉更加狭隘。让她发烧，分散了她的同情心。自己当时就是个玩物，很容易为别人扮演角色。维多利亚还没有长大，也许永远不会长大，在舞台下变得如此可塑。她像男人那样拉着手打出一击，而女人这样做的话就不太女性化了。

“街道多么沉闷啊，”她评论道。

“他们，就在现在，”阿米亚尼说，想到了他们在即将到来的冲突中抽搐，想到了她，她可能像一根杂草一样沿着血淋淋的洪流漂流。她的脚步如此坚定，她的表情如此自信，他无法想象她会实现这种前景，这让他充满了怜悯和可怜的胆怯。

如果我现在说话，我就会像个胆小鬼一样说话，他对自己说：幸好他太谨慎了，不会用那种语气跟她说话。所以他只字未提和平与安全。她几乎可以相信他赞同她的明智决定。在大师门口，她感谢他的护送，并在一小时内请求进一步的护送。 “记得给我带点巧克力来。”她咬紧牙关，因极度渴望而咬牙切齿。 “我口袋里没有巧克力，我几乎不认识自己。”

“您的安东尼奥先生会说什么？”

维多利亚用手指蘸满了水。 “他的统治结束了，他是我的奴隶：我不是他的。”我不会吃太多；但有些是我必须拥有的。

阿米亚尼笑了，答应一定会得到它。 “也就是说，如果有的话。”

“打开门给我拿来，”她说，高兴地跺着脚来激励他。

她刚刚独自站起来，另一侧的肘部就被轻轻地拉了一下：一个声音嘶嘶作响：“女士——女士。”她让自己从敞开的门口的光线中消失，没有怀疑，也没有恐惧。 “夫人，这是巧克力。”她看到两只手呈杯状，手里拿着一包包都灵巧克力。

“卢吉，是你吗？”

莫特罗内间谍拧紧了眼睑，露出一种最精明的秘密表情。

‘希斯特！夫人。拿一些。你将拥有一切，但请等待：——很快。啊哈！你看我的眼睛就像看蒙特罗尼一样，因为其中一只采取的是肩视；但事实是，我父亲是一名走私犯，当边防卫兵用子弹射穿他的背部、棉袋和餐具等等时，他的眼睛就在耳朵里！我继承了他的遗产，从那时起我就一直眼花缭乱。女士，这对一个人的诚实有什么影响？一点也不。甚至不要怀疑你很快就不会欣赏路易吉了。所以，女士们，您不会问我一个字，而是向上去找大师：——女士们，我发誓我是您忠实的仆人——向上是大师，然后是先向下。首先下来，而不是最后一个：——首先。让另一个人跟着你下来；你先下来。把她抛在身后，拉泽罗拉；在这里，路易吉展示了黑色面纱，这是米兰妇女常见的头饰，并用手指在额头上一圈一圈地扭动，扮演面纱上的角； “拿着吧，夫人；你知道怎么穿它。路易吉和圣徒们守护着你。”维多利亚发现自己手里拿着面纱和一包巧克力。

“如果我被圣徒和路易吉守护着就好了，”她一边想，一边咬了一口巧克力。

当门在她面前关上时，路易吉又回到了门附近的位置，小心翼翼地扫视着房子的正面，移动着他那双有弹性的小腿，就像石南公鸡发出警报一样。他们把他带到街对面的拐角处，听到有人在众目睽睽之下跑到路中间，径直跑向房子的声音：他在这个愚蠢的人身上认出了贝波，路易吉观察了他的所有行动并在屋檐和星光下安全的黑暗中发表评论，而贝波则在灯光下。 “你在门口打雷，我的贝波。”你是一个火气球：你会用你所携带的东西烧毁自己。你认为你可以做某事，因为你读书并经常去谈话剧院——一个词有十四个音节。天上的母亲啊！你永远不会从自然智慧中学到任何东西吗？你在那里，在门口。现在你会打扰女主人，除了让拉泽罗拉的耳朵兴奋之外，你什么也做不了。弹跳！你在楼梯上。弹跳！你正在着陆。击球！你在门口敲鼓，他们在唱歌；他们听不到你的声音。现在你却温顺得像只老鼠。就是这样——如果你像子弹一样射出去却没有击中目标，那你就傻了。他们称你为聪明人！路易吉的日子即将到来。当所有人都为他付出了代价后，他们就会承认路易吉的价值。你很诚实，我的贝波；但你也可能是一个乡下人。 “你是夫人的仆人，但我知道其中的转折，”老鼠对黄鼠狼骑士说道。

几分钟后，贝波走出了房子，背靠在门楣上。

“这看起来像是停止警惕的决心，”路易吉说。

他知道当一个人粗暴地执行一项任务却没有做任何事情时所表达的确切感觉。

“一只跳蚤，我的羽毛小伙子，会让你再次飞翔。”

由于路易吉的计划必须让贝波再次飞翔，所以他偷偷地溜走了，飞快地冲进了邻近的科尔索，那里有一辆轻型英国封闭式马车，由一对岛上的马拉着，缓慢地行驶着。驾驶座上有两个人，路易吉招呼其中一个下来，然后他在膝盖上放了一张纸条，敲打鼻子一侧以获得英语-意大利语的概念后，用铅笔写了字，一直用单腿跳舞以保持平衡：-

“来吧，贝波，女儿，现在，立刻，立即，
贝波，先生。

“这就是英国小太太会写的极端的方式，”路易吉说。然而，在令人怀疑的一瞬间，他深刻地思考了，在一封仓促的信函中加上一个加急的誓言是否可能不是英国人的习惯。他在那个岛上听到了强调的誓言：但他决定顺其自然。他所召唤的人被指示立即将其交给在大师罗科·利玛窦门口找到的人。

“因此，就像一个醉酒的哨兵一样，”路易吉说，他交叉双臂，交叉双腿，向后靠去。 “前进，马泰奥，我的小天使。”

“一切顺利吗？”车夫对路易吉说道。

‘像蜂蜜，像黄油，像上面有二十条虫子的桑叶！酒、面包和奶油奶酪都在里面，我的美味，是吗？她不能挨饿，我也不能。我们的篮子系在外面了吗？好的。一天一夜后，我们就会进入德国人的行列。我已经掌握了路线，而且我把城堡的名字念得非常完美——“Schloss Sonnenberg”。如果可以的话就这么做吧。

这位缺乏经验的意大利车夫拒绝尝试。他和路易吉用手表比较时间。三刻钟后他就将到达大师的家。路易吉悄悄地回到了那里。

贝波的位置空着。

“这比阿斯蒂的草稿更好，”路易吉说。

大师家的窗户亮着灯，钢琴弹奏着纠正音符，让他确信特别的排练仍在继续。现在他估计还有两三分钟的空闲时间，他把衣领向后一掀，抬起头，挺起胸膛，显然是为了配合歌声，但只是为了听歌声。对他来说，必须付诸行动，才能理解和欣赏它。

一阵急促的脚步声表明他所期待的人即将到来。

“路易吉！”

“在这里，帕德罗恩。”

“你有巧克力吗？”

“安东尼奥先生，我已经把它放在马车里了。”

“她在上面吗？”

“我看到她进来了。”

'好的;这是固定的事实。安东尼奥先生左右开车，刮着他的胡子。 “我给你，看，意大利的钱和德国的钱：德国的纸币；还有我写的一篇解释德国纸币价值的论文。安静，你是引擎，而不是人！我是为了防止愚蠢，是吗？难道我不知道吗，嘿？我的朋友，我需要你的喝彩吗？到索南伯格城堡：——继续开，继续开，谁拦住你，你就从他身上开过去：如果有任何问题，穿白衣的宪兵会仔细阅读这份报纸，并会鞠躬而经过你和笼子；你听？这是一个通行证；当你出示这张纸时，军队就会通过你。我的好朋友、皮尔森将军参谋部的韦斯普莱斯上尉给了它，并签名了，它是有效的。但你不会丢失纸币：把它和纸币放在一起，非常安全。对于你自己来说，这是你工资的一半——我给你拿破仑；十。数数。现在——一旦到了索南伯格城堡，我再说一遍，你让她在门口负责两个人，其中一个是女人，然后再回来——frrrrr……”

安东尼奥-伯里克利敲了敲他的手掌，发出车轮快速行驶的声音。

“回来吧，不要在路上掉任何面包屑。”你有你的地图。它是在罗韦雷多之后，沿着阿迪杰河直上，经过博尔扎诺……说“Botzen”。

“‘博茨’，”路易吉顺从地说。

'“博茨”——“博茨”——混蛋！傻子！双白痴！ “Botzon！”安东尼奥-伯里克利愤怒地纠正他，对着至高无上的天空大声喊道，“虽然我花钱买了大脑，但我能得到它们吗！”不。但要搞一场惨败，路易吉，而不是给你第二个十，我的朋友：走开，离开我的视线，不要再出现了！

路易吉谦虚地说，他不是导致惨败的工具。

安东尼奥-伯里克利半是拒绝了他，咆哮着结束了他的建议，也结束了他对为地球上的大师提供的悲惨工具的预言性厌恶。他来回踱步，用法语低声说：“我的上帝！”这个女孩脑子里有过这样的蠢事吗？这是她的机会：——我可以成为明星吗？我应该成为一个煤渣吗？明天晚上就是她的诞生时刻！不;她宁愿被熄灭。为了什么？为此她称之为她的国家。这是臭名昭著的。是的，可恶的小骗子！但是，你知道安东尼奥-伯里克利吗？还没有。我会滋养你，我会囚禁你：我会让你被爱折磨，被爱的魔鬼，被爱的炽热的钳子折磨，直到你尖叫着音乐，用你的声音融化他而死，然后把你的国家踢到阴沟里，了解你的意大利是宋的诞生地和摇篮，仅此而已，足够了！呸！'

就这样，他摆脱了内心的激动，猛地转身面对路易吉，用军事跺着脚，喊着这个人的名字。

“她想要的是爱，”安东尼奥-伯里克利继续他野蛮的独白。 “她想要被点燃。”政府脑子太多；没有足够的起义之心！就在那里。它就在那里。但是，小傻瓜！你会发现有人拿着武器，拿着枪，大炮在你的身上跑来跑去，一边开枪一边喊着“爱的胜利！”直到你被打败，直到你喘息着“爱！爱！爱！”然后是一种幸福——哦！你的声音既是天堂又是地狱。我会付钱，”兴奋的鉴赏家更加谨慎地追问道：“我将付我一半的财产来实现这一点。我很坚强，因为我知道这样的声音是为了崇高而发出的。他狂喜地喊道：“它打开了天空！”并立即补充道：“这注定要让剧院窒息！”

和之前一样，一个壮丽的景象停顿下来：“金钱——让它像灰尘一样消失吧！”我有一个对象。桑德拉·贝洛尼——你这个愚蠢的维多利亚·坎帕！——我有数百万人和整个奥地利政府支持我，而你却任性，小叛逆者！我可以笑。这只是你想要的爱。你的声音现在在大理石房间里。我会把它放在雪松木的宫殿里。我让这个阿米亚尼来拜访你，希望他能触动你。

呸!他是一个爱国者——而不是一个人！他不能让你畏缩、憔悴、寒冷或炎热，而且——呸！我给一些不爱国的人一个机会。他对易怒的小安娜·冯·伦肯斯坦做了恶作剧——我知道。你们真正的情人，你们这些女人，是广大的、商业的情人，而韦斯普里斯就是你们的男人。

安东尼奥-伯里克利抬头看了一眼大师的窗户。听着！这是她的声音。”他说着，愤怒地举起紧握的拳头，仿佛在抽水。 '像冰一样冷！不是一个缺陷。她是一盏没有光的灯笼——如果你愿意的话，她是水晶。现在请听鹳颈鸟伊尔玛。哎呀！艾尔玛小姐，从你的喉咙到你的头有多远啊！你是靠柠檬长大的。你壁画皇冠上的分叉头发并不比你那声音细。听到你的声音真是一种嘲笑；但你对人民来说已经足够好了，亲爱的，你确实工作，在你的喉咙和你的头之间的电线梯上跑来跑去；——你工作，这是真的，你这个小猫！像猫一样光滑，像猫一样骨感，像猫一样音乐。但你对人民来说已经足够好了。你好！'

这句感叹是对一位骑士说的，他正从马背上走下来，距离街道大约五十码，他把缰绳交给了一名骑着马的仆人，走上前来迎接安东尼奥先生。

“是你，冯·韦斯普里斯上尉先生！”

“当他预约时，你通常会见到他，亲爱的伯里克利，”船长回答道。

“你没穿制服——很好。”我们会上去。请记住，您是一位鉴赏家，来自波恩、来自柏林、来自莱比西克：不是 KK 军队的！放弃它，否则你就无法对付这个疯狂的东西。你将会看到她，听到她的声音，并判断她是否值得你去参观索南贝格宫并进行短暂的围攻。好：我们升到高处。如同在值班时一样，你要恭敬地向大师鞠躬两次；然后是第三次，就像来自你灵魂的低语。瓦尼塔斯，瓦尼塔斯！你说的是“UT de poitrine”。你说：“阿尔布雷希茨伯格说过——”，然后你拍拍头停下来。他们认为，“他很有礼貌，不会向我们引用德国权威”：他们认为，“他不会继续引用；他不会继续引用；”事实上，他轻蔑地认为与我们可怜的意大利人谈论对位法是多余的。”你的教名是约翰？——你是约翰内斯先生。好好看看她。我不会让你接受他们的观察超过十分钟。皱眉沉思；肘部支撑，两根手指放在左脸颊上；然后弯腰走进房间：触碰钢琴上的一个音符，把耳朵凑近它，仿佛能发现十五分之五的不和谐音。烦恼如牙，皱起眉头。所以，当你微笑时，这对他们来说是巨大的赞扬，对你来说也很容易。”

安东尼奥·伯里克利先生和约翰内斯先生的名字被带到了大师那里。

路易吉好奇地看着他们走进屋子。韦斯普莱斯上尉的面容和军事或血腥的声誉对他来说并不陌生。 “他和这件事有什么关系？”路易吉想道，然后悠闲地走向船长的仆人，他从他手中接过一根雪茄，但由于不懂他的语言而显得廉洁。他发现马匹很新鲜，还配备了马鞍袋，就像去探险一样。什么探险？充当马车的护卫？——一个荒谬的想法。但发现一个想法是无意义的并不能令人满意地解决困难。路易吉蹲在门口台阶旁，就在罗科·里奇家的一扇较低的窗户下面。船长和安东尼奥先生比他预想的要早出来了。门在他们身后关上后，船长大声说道：“我把手伸给你，我勇敢的伯里克利。”你为我提供了很多服务，但这是最好的。她太棒了。她是一个值得驯服的野性小女人。我将立即前往索南伯格。我只要告诉皮尔森将军，不要让他的侄子装傻，如果没有积极的工作，我就立即离开。

“他的侄子，皮尔森中尉，还是波尔——hein？”希腊人插嘴道。

'就是那个男人。他是元帅的参谋。他与莉娜·冯·伦肯斯坦伯爵夫人订婚了。她有足够的火力，我的伯里克利。

“你说安娜伯爵夫人？”希腊人向前伸出耳朵，从来没有这么差点被用力地铐过。

“耳聋是不可饶恕的罪行，我亲爱的伯里克利。”

安东尼奥-伯里克利嗤之以鼻，同意道：“这是耳朵的愚蠢。”

“我说的是莉娜伯爵夫人。”

冯·伦肯斯坦；但我选择进一步充耳不闻。

“见鬼去吧，先生。你假装生气吗？韦斯普里斯喊道。

“先生，按照你的建议，魔鬼太黑了，我无法拜访他，”安东尼奥-伯里克利回答道。

“天哪，伯里克利，我已经派人去向他嚎叫了！”

他们面面相觑，拉扯着自己的小胡子。维斯普莱斯笑了。

“你不是一个好斗的人，伯里克利。”

希腊人和蔼地点点头。 “有一个人挡住了我的路，我把他挡在了一边。”这是最简单的。

'啊！最简单，是吗？韦斯普莱斯船长对这一非凡的系统表述“皱起眉头沉思”。 '嗯，这确实省了麻烦。此外，我的好伯里克利，除了驴子，没有人会和你吵架。我注意到皮尔森将军希望他的侄子立即娶莉娜伯爵夫人；如果，正如你告诉我的那样，这个名叫拉维多利亚的女孩贝洛尼——一个珍贵的小女人！——对他有如此大的力量，那么从将军的角度来看，她应该不妨碍他在索南伯格。我在格拉斯公爵夫人家站稳了脚跟。我相信她希望有一天我能挑战并杀死她的丈夫；由于我应该救了德·皮尔蒙特少校的命，所以我也是目前感激的对象。你能想象你那棕色眼睛的小贝洛尼在我身上嗅到了她的敌人之一的味道吗？

“我对想象力一无所知，”安东尼奥先生冷冷地说。

“直到我们见面！”韦斯普莱斯船长吻了吻他的手指，一半朝向窗户，一半朝向希腊人。 “让我免于向你的伊尔玛传授爱！”

他跑去见他的仆人。

路易吉听到了大部分对话，以及最后一句话。

“如果对任何人来说，那就是拉艾尔玛，”路易吉低声说道。

“让韦斯普里斯——他不会唤醒她心中的爱——让他点燃仇恨，就可以了，”安东尼奥先生说。 “她见过他，如果他在去梅兰的路上遇见她，她会认为这是她的魅力。”

他看了看手表，又看了看亮着灯的窗户，向路易吉重复了他的特别禁令。 ‘时间快到了。我睡觉了。我变老了：我变得紧张。如果一切顺利的话，你还可以得到十点二十。您每周的工资将继续发放。二十——你将有三十！额外三十个拿破仑！

十根手指闪了三次。

路易吉跳了起来。 “Padrone，它们是我的。”

“动物啊，动动你的腹袋和脑盒，站起来！”希腊人喊道，他希望看到路易吉坚定地站起来，这样他就能激励自己对自己的正直充满信心。当路易吉的姿势让他满意后，他转身大步走了出去。

“他确实付了钱，”路易吉在他的赞助人身上看到了巨大的美德，反思道。 “是的，他付钱；”但他到底在说什么？对我来说，这就是这个问题——“我服务我的手吗？或者，我服务于我的心吗？我手里拿的是钱，而且不是德国的钱。我的心付出了感情，夫人也得到了我的心。她在 Motterone 上向我递来那支香烟，就像麦当娜一样：它永远不会被忘记！我服务我的心！现在，贝波，你可以来了；快点来找她。我看到马车，里面有三个粗壮的家伙，只要我发出信号，他们就能在你数出你父亲洗礼名字的字母之前绊倒你，给你套上嘴。哦！但如果那位女士不听我的话，最后一个出来！——安东尼奥先生会问大师，大师会说：“是的，拉维多利亚是两个人中最后一个和我一起来的”；我失去了十个、二十个、三十个拿破仑。

路易吉的胸口因一股忧郁的空气而大大膨胀。

与此同时，马车已经出现在街道的尽头，只听见一声汽笛声。不久之后，一辆米兰租用的车辆开到了大师的门口，路易吉咒骂了一番。他对三十个拿破仑的未来最担心的事情得到了证实。门打开了，罗科·里奇大师光着头，穿着黑色丝绸晨衣，领着伊尔玛·迪·卡尔斯基走了出来，有些人称她为拉·维多利亚的竞争对手。一个身材高挑的斯拉夫姑娘，她的笑声并不柔和，脸颊明亮，眼睛深陷在头顶，呆滞。但她的嘴唇和肩膀都充满活力。肩膀骨瘦如柴；嘴唇又尖又红，就像早晨的冬季浆果。她的外表上也不乏新鲜感。批评的反对意见是，它看起来像是一种抹灰的新鲜感，而不是真正的花朵；或者更确切地说，这是一种野蛮而坚硬的新鲜感，而不是一种甜蜜的新鲜感。也许正是因此，她的“la Lazzeruola”（海棠果）这个名字才显得与众不同。这是一种不让人咬一口的新鲜感。意大利口味的酸味。

她显然非常高兴。她说：“明天晚上，布拉格和维也纳将迎来一场完美的洪水，即使我扮演米奇埃拉这样悲惨的角色，也会看到我。” '在这里我应该是一个初学者；我不是那里的初出茅庐的人。

“我可以相信，我可以相信，”罗科回答道，并为她迅速离开而鞠躬。

“你对我唱的米奇埃拉的曲子不满意！”现在，告诉我，善良、善良、严厉的老主人！你认为维多利亚小姐唱得更好。我也是。而且我可以唱更好的另一部分。你不知道我的能力。

“我相信没有什么是你不敢尝试的。”罗科无奈地鞠了一躬。

“我的勇气从来没有受到质疑。”

“是的，但是勇气，勇气！拿走你的勇气吧！罗科受到他对她的个人恩怨的刺激，这让他忘记了摆脱她的愿望。 “你的勇气让你在每一个 fioritura 和 bravura 段落中立即飞翔，去征服，而不是学习：不是去完成，而是去征服它。我要说的是，能力与勇气并不成正比，而勇气可能太大而难以匹敌。但明天晚上你就有机会庆祝你的角色，如果，正如你告诉我的那样，房子里挤满了维也纳人，而且，女士们，你可以放下你的头发。

伊尔玛·迪·卡尔斯基的头发异常美丽，对她来说是如此珍贵，以至于对她胜利的容貌的暗示掩盖了罗科糖中的讽刺。

'阿迪奥！过了几个小时我就会让你大吃一惊，”她说。这次他们一起鞠躬，大师匆匆退了回来，关上了门。

当路易吉看到这位女士从她的位置走开时，他的惊讶盖过了他的懊恼，她命令司机走开，就像他运载货物一样，并在街道尽头为他指明了一个位置，她的手命令式地摇摆和偏转。路易吉听到钥匙从楼上的一扇窗户掉到她身上的清脆声音。她很快就抓住了它；门悄悄地向她打开，她头也不回地消失在视线之外。 “如果可以的话，这就是一个女人将会发现一个秘密，”观察者评论道。这意味着他认为将军的性别是不好的，除非他们有机会保守秘密；然后他们仔细地看着他们身后。这种情况对于一个专业的、天生的间谍来说是一种严峻的折磨。路易吉对这个谜团感到愤怒，数不清有多少分钟，他认为这是对个人的冒犯。明亮的房间里存在着一些怀疑或警惕，因为大师打开了一扇窗户，左右巡视着街道。显然他很满意，他收回了头，窗户也关上了。

过了一会儿，维多利亚的声音从寂静中响起，尽管她克制住了音量。

它对路易吉的影响是让他向她抗议，悲伤地呜咽着，仿佛她听到了并且必须被融化：“夫人！”夫人，最亲爱的！为了慈善事业！我是你们中的一员；我是一个爱国者。每个人都各司其职，但我的心全都和你在一起。”诸如此类的声音，时不时地变得更大声，连绵不断的低语声，就像一个人的良心受到了彻底的洗劫，他被伊尔玛·迪·卡尔斯基（Irma di Karski）的侧念转移了注意力，拉·拉泽罗拉（la Lazzeruola）正在倾听，在她的耳朵里吸食毒药；因为路易吉毫不犹豫地将她的行为归因于嫉妒。 “这封信难道没有穿过你的胸膛吗，优秀的女士？我可以想象你的双腿都在颤抖。你被蜂蜜中毒了。你多么讨厌它！如果你只有一把匕首就好了！

维多利亚唱了一段很短的歌。在她的歌声停止的同时，阿米亚尼走到了门口，但他刚站好，就看到了路易吉，他穿过街道，认出了他，严厉地询问他在大师家对面的生意。路易吉指着一个出现的女性身影。 '看！带她回家，”他说。阿米亚尼松开了他，急忙回去，路易吉拍着额头，绝望地喊道：“三十个拿破仑，我的职业声誉全丢了！”他吹了一声口哨；马车从街头冲下来。当阿米亚尼惊奇地追随那个快步走的人影时（他知道这不可能是维多利亚，但假设一定是，他的智慧没有任何明确的目标），马车停在她前面不远的地方。三个人——身材高大、肌肉发达的人从上面跳了下来。一个人扑向阿米亚尼，其他人抓住了这位受惊的女士，拉紧了她脸上的面纱，马车门在她身上猛地关上。阿米亚尼的袭击者随后倒下：路易吉扑到箱子上喊道：“女士在你身后！”阿米亚尼看到维多利亚惊慌地站着，高兴得不知道是她。在喜悦的痉挛中，他吻了她的手。他们还没来得及进行清楚的交流，马车就离开了他们的视线，沿着城墙的东边马路疾驰而去。

阿米亚尼赶紧让维多利亚离开街道以确保安全。 “回家，”她说，为自己的兴奋感到羞愧，不敢再说更多的话，以免喉咙里的心暴露出来。他看到了恐惧对她造成的影响。或许他也猜到她是想向他隐瞒自己想象中的怯懦。 “我亲吻了她的手，”他想，顺便说一下，这件事的记忆是他血液中一首温柔的歌。

维多利亚的住所靠近大教堂，在一条从大教堂通往斯卡拉广场的狭窄通道上，当地一家著名的糖果店向居民中快乐的人赠送最辛辣的博科尼和馅饼，并通过标语牌提供给如果上述人士愿意冒险尝试一下他的艺术，那么他对米兰的贵族、文人、美食家以及所有外国人都会产生一种情感。与此同时，他出租了住宿。维多利亚和她的母亲离开英国前往意大利后，就住在著名糖果商佐蒂的房子里。当维多利亚来到大教堂焦躁的阴影下时，她看到母亲和佐蒂站在门口，尽管夜色已深。她笑了笑，走得不那么匆忙了。阿米亚尼现在问她是否感到惊慌。 “并不惊慌，”她说，“但比我想象的要紧张一点。”

她告诉他，莫特罗内的间谍路易吉很可能为她提供了帮助，使安东尼奥先生的阴谋落空。 “我的疯子，”她称后者为“我的疯子”。 “他得到了艾尔玛，而不是我。明天我们必须给她补位；她正在快速前进，而且是为了我！我想，卡罗先生，当你离开我时，你最好去见大师，告诉他艾尔玛已经被卷入了天空。你可以说，“嫉妒地球拥有如此令人难以抗拒的美丽”，或者“不由自主​​地被天才与美貌的结合所吸引，除了艾尔玛之外，天国的灵魂们决意要夺走地球的拉泽罗拉（Lazzeruola）。”只是认真地告诉他，因为我亲爱的罗科将不得不与其中一位歌手一起工作一整天，如果我敢于离开的话，我应该在他们身边帮助她。你怎么认为？'

阿米亚尼表示，她出国会很危险。

“事实上，我担心，我很难在不被人看到的情况下到达斯卡拉歌剧院，”她说。 “除了我们家里的人都是狡猾的人。我们不仅练习唱歌、发明美味的糖果，还表演魔术。我们自称能够欺骗任何我们愿意欺骗的人。

“这些骗子会加入军团吗？”阿米亚尼说道，他的语气表明他已经准备好成为一名新兵。他的幽默与她的幽默十分鲜明，他们一起微笑，展现出年轻人在任何季节都可以迷失在一丝幻想中的明亮时尚。

维多利亚听到了母亲哭泣的声音。 “二十只蚊子合而为一，”她说。

阿米亚尼很快低声询问她是否决定明天再去。她点点头，跑到妈妈身边，妈妈哭着说：

‘这个时候！贝波一直在追随你，他告诉我，我用意大利语为他写了一封信，当时我无法在纸上写下一个字：我不会！——而你正受到可怕危险的威胁，他宣称。他的行为很疯狂；我相信，这个国家的人都疯了。我已经给你的衣服缝了最后一针。楼上有一两封信给你。总是字母！

“我亲爱的佐蒂，”维多利亚转向调味品艺术家，“当我出去的时候，你必须坚持让我母亲在适当的时间上床睡觉。”

“夫人，”佐蒂回答道，他是一个胖乎乎的圆头男人，棕色的眼睛充满了活力，“我只要告诉她做一件事——我拉住一只狗的项圈；说得充满敬意。

“不过，我很高兴见到你们都是这么好的朋友。”

“是的，夫人，我们是好朋友，直到我们再次吵架。我很遗憾地告诉你，这位可敬的女士疑心重重，无可救药。我——佐蒂！天上的母亲！

“是你在怀疑我，先生，”夫人反驳道。 “对我来说，对所有人来说！整天和你在一起就是“告诉我这个，告诉我那个”；因为我无法回答，所以你很生气。

‘看哪！夫人说英语；我们又吵架了，”佐蒂说。

“我母亲认为他是一个完美的阴谋网，”维多利亚笑着向阿米亚尼解释了他们之间的情况。 '佐蒂确信她是一个顽固的阴谋家。他们都是无辜的，只是太胆怯了。它由此而生长。

两人立即戏剧化了她的轮廓：

“我难道没有看到他和一位英国女士说话吗？尽管她是我的同胞，他却一句话也不告诉我？”

“今天下午她不是收到了两封信，还装作不知道发生了什么事吗？”

“幸运的是，”维多利亚说，“我的母亲不是寡妇，否则这些争吵有一天可能会以可怕的和解而告终。”

“我的孩子，”她母亲呜咽道，“你知道这个国家的秋夜是什么样子；你知道吗？”艾米莉亚，只要你活着，你肯定会感冒，然后你就像一家为死者关上百叶窗的商店。

与此同时，佐蒂低声说道：“夫人，我已经为您的晚饭准备了热矿井。进来，进来。还有，小东西，小精致的东西！——你住在佐蒂的房子里是免费的吗？最甜美的佳肴，让舌头流淌！——只是味道的概念——味蕾咂咂，然后忘记；灵魂抓住并记住！

“噢，多么诱人啊！”维多利亚惊呼道。

“是的，”佐蒂追寻着他的想法，手指像蜘蛛一样伸展，如画般地旋转着。 “这就像那些被诅咒的人，他们只有一点点进入天堂的机会，圣彼得突然俯冲下来，把他们快速带进了大门！”你值得一个男人为你做的一切，女士。让他学习，让他工作，让他发明——你值得这一切。

“我希望我不会太饿而产生歧视！”佐蒂我看到蒙特罗莎了。

“夫人，你在饥饿的时候还很高兴地说出这样的话。这是因为——”这位热情的糖果商看起来深邃而狡猾，就像一个将非凡的微妙洞察力与深刻的反思结合在一起的人；这是因为你越轻，你爬得越高；像雄鹰一样展翅高飞！但我们会让那个饥饿的家伙摔倒。一盘热明尼斯特拉开枪射杀了他。然后，一个开心果、巧克力和奶油馅饼——还有我的头，他会告诉我调味品！”

“当我早上醒来时，我已经在阿拉伯住了一两个月了，佐蒂。别再告诉我了；我会进来的，”维多利亚说。

“那么，夫人，一点脆榛子饼干——一种组合物！”你破解它，还有惊喜！然后，然后是我的菜；佐蒂的菜，尚未命名。夫人，让意大利先崛起；这道菜的伟大发明者眨了眨眼睛，温和地点点头。 ‘让她起来。一场战斗或者一个条约就可以了。我有两三个原创的构想、作品，只等待一些辉煌的武功或外交胜利，我就把它们送去受洗。

维多利亚睁大眼睛看着阿米亚尼，眼皮幽默地颤抖着。她吻了吻自己的手指：“阿迪奥；”一条河。他正式鞠了一躬：他惊讶地发现他们友谊的金线被如此残酷地突然切断。但它被剪掉了；门已经对她关上了。门一关上，她就进入了他的想象。她到底用什么魅力缓解了他的焦虑呢？她的自然使他确信，和平一定会围绕着一个充满和平的人，想到佐蒂的晚餐和她闪烁的柔和的幽默，他微笑着走开，感到安慰；对于处于危险时期的情人来说，这意味着崇高，就像他的智慧突然燃烧殆尽一样。 “她内心一定有某种伟大的信念，”他想，不再将自己排除在外的原因归咎于情人的竞争，这将表明他内心燃烧的不仅仅是想象。因为当一个年轻人的灵魂可以被加热到高于常人的温度时，激情的恶习就会枯萎并助长更纯洁的火焰。对阿米亚尼来说，幸运的是，他确实察觉到了（尽管只是隐隐约约地察觉到）支持维多利亚的理想主义灵感的力量。他在这一刻看到了这一点，这就像一盏明灯，照亮了他随后的许多困惑。这是他以前从未见过的。他曾在老阿戈斯蒂诺的房间里给她朗读托斯卡纳诗歌。他谈到了叛乱的秘密准备。他曾对意大利大肆宣扬——诗歌很好，尽管演讲可能很糟糕——但她总是反应迟钝，实际转向密码。快速的计算和意大利事业中的数据的清晰展示，让她脸颊发热，屏住了呼吸。阿米亚尼现在明白，她内心深处隐藏着一种不言而喻的深度，与她可见的本性截然不同。

他首先采访了罗科·里奇（Rocco Ricci），他准备接替艾尔玛。

然后他去了他的杂志办公室，在那里他预计会受到两名警察成员的欢迎，他们希望他在中央局前游行，并展示文章和新闻项目的证据以供检查和纠正很可能，并且可能是为了批准。考虑到最后一次屈服于奴役行为，有一种部分的快乐。阿米亚尼带着好斗的欢快走了进来，但他僵硬的目光没有遇到任何敌人。这让他感到惊讶。他转身回到街上沉思起来。他认为，教皇的嘴可能掌握着解开谜题的钥匙。对于同谋者来说，发现自己未被怀疑并不总是最舒服的：他会认真地阅读空白。当局允许在这样的明天印刷任何东西，这看起来很糟糕：如果他们保持警惕的话，那就更糟糕了。教皇口附近的街区在昏暗的星光下显得荒凉。阿米亚尼将手指伸进砖块垃圾后面的开口，用固定在其中的锯子的六个齿将手指撕开。这些牙齿对他来说就像大声的舌头一样。嘴里没有任何纸片。这意味着敌人已经做好了咬人的准备，阴谋已经不再活跃。他发现一根被剥光的常春藤树枝，周围散落着叶子，伸展在他的脚边。这是另一个确凿的迹象，对他来说比印刷的大写字母更清楚。读到它后，叛乱宣告失败。他机械地在手指上缠绕又松开手帕：他的喉咙里咒骂着。 “如果不是为了她，我会在黎明时分出发前往南美！”他说。玻利瓦尔的国家对意大利年轻人仍然具有吸引力。在某个特定的空间里，阿米亚尼的灵魂因激情而变得漆黑。他是那个脾气暴躁的保罗·阿米亚尼的儿子，保罗·阿米亚尼把他的手套扔到了尤金的脚下，并命令总督把它交给他的法国主人。 （将军正准备折断膝盖上的剑，尤金冲到他身边亲吻了他。）卡洛就是这样的血统。英国人很难原谅他眼中含着泪水，但意大利人遵循希腊经典的情感处方，而我们则以罗马人为例。我们没有嘲笑的意思。他抽泣着。似乎有一个国家消失了。

阿米亚尼慢慢地走开了：他无意中目睹了一个奇怪的场景。走进不规则三角形，走到白天摆水果摊的地方，有一个女人和一个男人。该男子是一名奥地利士兵。他身边是一位意大利女人。此时此刻，阿米亚尼看到这对夫妇就像是乱伦的恐惧。她领着士兵径直走到嘴边，引导他的手伸向那里，更奇妙的是，她引导他拿出一包文件，但阿米亚尼却没有找到。阿米亚尼可以看到他手中的光芒。奥地利人一把抓住他就跑了。阿米亚尼正走向她，想要抓住并谴责那个叛徒，这时他看到她身边还有一个像幽灵一样的人影；但这不是一件白大褂。它是从地球升起的吗？它是泥土的，因为周围有一团灰尘，女人发出一声压抑的尖叫。巴托！巴托！她捂着眼皮叫道。他发出一声沙哑的笑声。他用心地拍着她的肩膀，“哈！”哈！'在夜空中响起。

“你从来不相信我，”她因神经颤抖而呜咽道。

他称她为“勇敢的小女人！”罕见的女孩！

“但你从来不相信我！”

“我不是为了夸奖你才设下圈套吗？”

“你让一个女人试图欺骗你。”如果她可以的话！如果她能的话就好了！

阿米亚尼跟他们在一起。

“你是巴托·里佐，”他说道，半靠在那个男人身上，语气急躁。

巴托抢断防守后退一步。黎明的微弱光芒瞬间划破了星空般的黑暗，阿米亚尼认得他的脸，不必再问第二次。这是最近被剑砍伤的。他看了一眼这个女人：发现她很漂亮。这就够了；他知道她一定是巴托的妻子，而且，如果不是比巴托更狡猾的话，她也是他的同谋、他的工具、他的奴隶。

“五分钟前我会发誓你是个叛徒，他对她说。

她面无表情，仿佛什么也没听到；考虑到她非常英俊，这一事实对年轻人来说似乎很了不起。年轻人不会相信愚蠢和美丽可以并存。

“她是卡洛·阿米亚尼先生巴托洛梅奥·里佐最喜欢的学生，”巴托说道，此时已经完全恢复了平静。 “她是我漂亮的爱国傀儡。我没有展示她的习惯；但既然你看到了她，她就在那里。”

巴托已经养成了南方人的习惯，在准修辞句子中表现得轻松自在，但对它们却保持警惕。阿米亚尼试图看清他的容貌，但那奇特的、收缩的、猫头鹰般的闪烁却无济于事。于是他就发怒了，直言不讳。

“她做你的工作吗？”

“大部分，卡洛先生：就像子弹完成了步枪的工作一样。”

'兽！是你的妻子把蝴蝶别在维多利亚夫人的裙子上的吗？

“卡洛·阿米亚尼先生，您是将军保罗的儿子：您称我为野兽？我的小伙子，当乐队演奏“意大利还有一颗心！”时，我把你搂在怀里。你记得吗？'巴托唱了六小节。 ‘你称我为野兽？我是米兰唯一一个能为你唱这首歌的人。”

“无论你是野兽还是人类，魔鬼还是无论你是什么！”阿米亚尼喊道，他感到奇怪地感到不安，“你犯了可耻的罪行：你，或者那个为你服务的女人，你的妻子，据我所知。你挫败了最好的阴谋；你竟敢违抗你的首领——”

“眼睛看着他！”巴托插话道，摸了摸自己的眼球。

“而你却把你该死的愚蠢怀疑抛在了维多利亚夫人身上。你是个疯子。如果我有权力，我会命令今天早上五点枪杀你；那是你应该看到的最后一次升起的光。你为什么要那么做？不要用你那双地狱般的眼睛互相对视，而是立即回答！你为什么要那么做？'

“维多利亚夫人，”巴托回答道——他的发音像蛇一样——“你认为她不是间谍。她去过英国：我也去过英国。她写道；我会读。她是个心血来潮的人。她要把意大利的高脚杯握在手里直到它溢出吗？她给一位英国白大褂写情书。我读过它们。谁叫她写？她的突发奇想！她警告她的朋友不要进入米兰。她——她是谁的傀儡？不是你的;不是我的。她是英国奥地利人的傀儡！

巴托后退了一步，因为阿米亚尼正在前进。

“你这是什么意思？”他哭了。

“我的意思是，”阿米亚尼继续朝他走去，说道，“我的意思是先把你拖到梅多莱伯爵面前，然后拖到夫人面前；你必须在她面前放弃你的诽谤。之后我就来对付你。标记我！我有你：我的脚步更快，我更坚强。安静地来吧。

巴托露出冷酷的蔑视笑容。

“把你的脚牢牢踩在那块石头上，你是一个囚犯，”他回答道，看到阿米亚尼走过来，“把他拉住，我的弹石！”我的蛇！他向他的妻子示意，她像钢丝绳一样曲折地绕着阿米亚尼转了过去。阿米亚尼心中充满了恼怒、耻辱、嘲笑和怜悯，经过一番挣扎后，他不再试图松开她的双臂，而是把她拉到自己身边。当他听到她在绝望中故意数数从大约二十到一百的数字时，他感到非常震惊。一百显然是她必须完成的数字，因为当她达到这个数字时，她张开双臂。巴托不见了踪影。阿米亚尼挥手让她跟着他的脚步走：他厌倦了她的存在，有一种羞愧的男孩被女孩亲吻的感觉。她一言不发地走了。

黎明已经穿过街道，照亮了城市广阔的空间。阿米亚尼发现自己在唱：“意大利还有一颗心！”但这绝不是他内心的歌声。那天晚上，他睡在办公室私人房间的椅子上，不想去他母亲家。 “意大利还有一颗心！”当他醒来时，他的嘴唇上有一些分散的感觉，所有这些感觉都聚集在对这首歌的厌恶中。 “意大利有一颗非常可怜的心！”他一边说，一边让自己的身体恢复正常。 “它就像威尼斯和丽都之间的疯人塔里的钟：它时不时地敲响一顿饭：同时像秃鹰嘴里的腐肉块一样挂着！”

这些和其他一些类似的情绪，以及每当他因巴托所传达的有关英国奥地利人的事情而使他们皱起眉头时，眉毛上的热度，向阿米亚尼保证他没有正确的控制自己：或者是，正如医生会告诉他的那样，胆怯的。在他看来，他一定是梦想着能在一夜之间见到阴郁而狡猾的巴托·里佐。意识到这一事实后，他无法意识到那个人是如何逃离他的，只是当他想到这一点时，他深吸了一口气，摇了摇肩膀。你可能知道，当感觉令人羞耻和惊讶时，头脑有时会拒绝工作。他派了一个信使向他的母亲道一声“早上好”，然后去了梅多莱伯爵家里的一家击剑馆，那里有两三个人耸耸肩谈论着国家崩溃的事情。预计爆发的消息令人心痛。卢西亚诺·罗马拉进来了，阿米亚尼向他挑战小剑和大剑。两人都愤怒到了沸点，疯狂地想要攻击某样东西，尽管他们是亲密的朋友，但他们还是疯狂地互相攻击，头盔的钢丝和衬垫嘎嘎作响，冒着浓烟。他们坚持了半个小时，当他们热血沸腾时，他们突然看到了在场的男人，包括伯爵，为他们让一个女人独自忠实于那天晚上的任务而哭泣。梅多尔伯爵的脸颊上的血迹消失了，留下了死寂的色调，就像吸墨纸沾在墨水上一样。他故意拿了一对箔片，把其中一个的把手交给阿米亚尼，把自己箔片末端的纽扣折断，然后站起来面对对手。阿米亚尼效仿了这个例子：他的衬衫袖子上有一道深红色的条纹，他的眼睛看起来像燧石一样坚硬的黑色，然后罗马拉惊讶地发现这对夫妇是出于纯粹的意图，在深渊的尖锐边缘。他打翻了他们的武器，站在他们中间，悠闲地吸着烟。

“我对你们俩很好，”他说。

他摸了摸阿米亚尼持剑的手臂，发现没有受伤，满意地点点头，然后喊道：“明天早上这个时候，地面上已经有一个奥地利人了。”所以，按照法令！”

“韦斯普里斯船长在城里，”有人说。

“名单上有十几个，”小彼得罗·卡迪抽出一张纸说道。

“如果你明天早上什么都不做，”莱昂·鲁福补充道，“我们不妨把十几个人都带出去。”

这两个都是二十岁以下的男孩。

“这会是韦斯普里斯船长的第一击吗？”梅多莱伯爵一边说着，一边递给阿米亚尼一张崭新的、纽扣完好的箔纸。

罗马拉笑道：“我亲爱的伯爵，你需要围住米兰城的一圈，才能赢得对韦斯普里斯船长的所有权。首先，我不会把他交给任何一个不表现出比我更好的人的人。这就是我不会赞美的一点。

梅多莱伯爵鞠了一躬。

“但是，如果你想要占领的话，”卢西安诺补充道，并以询问的语气结束了他的演讲。

“我几乎不想那样，认识我的人会告诉你，”梅多尔如此谦虚地说，以至于认识他的人都觉得他已经登上了知识分子蔑视的高位。他可以放纵自己，表现出他的勇气。

'当然不是； “如果你正在为那些今晚将被屠杀的人的寡妇和孤儿设计谋生手段，”卢西亚诺说； “这样的话你就有工作了。”

“我会尽力养活他们，”伯爵以谦逊的态度坚持道，“尽管有些人质疑白痴是否应该活下去。”他有效地停了下来，并因这次击球而露出了自我认可的柔和微笑。然后他继续说道：“我们后天见面。”教皇的嘴是闭着的。我们早上九点在这里见面。第二天十一点，在蒙扎的法鲁吉诺理发店。第二天，同样是十一点，在卡梅拉塔。那些参加的人将被告知本周的安排，以及我们将命名的起义日。大家都知道，在不给我们的新首席歌星抹上耻辱的情况下，我们排除她参与这项业务的任何份额。所有首脑都已收到警告，今晚我们将向奥地利人屈服。先生们，我不能说得更明确了。我希望我能更好地取悦你。

“哦，无论如何，”彼得罗·卡尔迪说，“但是耐心是瘟疫；我将漫游，寻求冒险。又一个平静的一周是一次巨大的考验。

他与莱昂·鲁福（Leone Rufo）交锋，但发现钢材的“嗖嗖”声没有停止，他用拉长的表情检查了武器的末端，因为它没有纽扣。看到这对雄心勃勃的小伙子脸上自发的孩子气，阿米亚尼大笑起来。他们都以同等条件向他提供了一把剑。梅多尔伯爵的过度虚荣心正在毁掉他们。

“你知道我的意见，”阿米亚尼对伯爵说。 “我昨晚告诉过你，今天又告诉过你，巴托·里佐犯有严重不当行为，你必须以一种可以原谅的叛国罪为罪名。梅多莱伯爵，你不能像手表一样上紧和松开阴谋。这一位的头儿是谁呢？他就是巴托·里佐这个人。他在让你制裁他们之前就采取了诉讼程序。你可能是一艘船，但他指挥，或者至少，他驾驶它。

伯爵面无表情地等着阿米亚尼说完。 “我的好阿米亚尼，你说话时充满活力，值得你赞扬，”他说，“考虑到这不符合你自己的利益，而是符合另一个人的利益。”请记住，我可以忍受我的行为被称为叛国罪。”

新来的访客或多或少混入了这个阴谋，并且通常愿意将其管理权交给梅多莱伯爵，现在进入了酒吧。这些人包括拉萨蒂伯爵、安吉洛·多维利、一位皮埃蒙特将军、一位托斯卡纳公爵，以及一两个贵族名流和历史上的无名小卒。他们对卢西安诺和卡罗尊敬并服从的酋长怀有敌意。前者点燃一支烟，对他的朋友说：“你和你妈妈一起吃早餐吗？”我也会去，”他把手放在阿米亚尼的手臂上。他们懒洋洋地一起走了出去，对留下的人表现出一丝宽容的蔑视。

“梅多尔有钱、有地位、有影响力，还有一种我不知道是什么的女人味，这让他像一根针一样推动领先，他将取得领先，当他取得领先时，那里这是他的最后一章，”卢西亚诺说。 “他的野心在于风标的栖息处。他为什么要攻击你，我的卡罗？当你面对他时，我看到你额头上有一个大V字。如果你杀了他，也不会有什么大的伤害。”

“昨晚我见到了他一小会儿，并以我父亲的方式与他交谈，”卡洛说。 “原因是，他为巴托·里佐辩护，因为他把戒指戴在维多利亚夫人的名字上，并导致黑蝴蝶被别在她的衣服上。”

卢西安诺的眉毛竖了起来。

“如果她今晚唱歌，相信一定会引起骚乱，”他说。 “尽管梅多莱和这些可怜的火花，他们害怕落下粉末，旋转和跳舞，直到风把它们吹灭，但可能会崛起。”请注意，上升的机会通常是最幸运的。如果我接到命令，我就会向阿尔卑斯山进军。我们必须拥有蒂罗尔河的通行证。在我看来，谁占据了阿尔卑斯山，谁就必须骑着伦巴第母马。你穿上弹簧靴，从阿尔卑斯山冲上马鞍。

卡洛因他的朋友对维多利亚遭受的基地伤害漠不关心而感到受伤。

“我已经告诉梅多尔，不管他如何，她今晚都会唱歌，”他说道，意图对卢西亚诺缺乏高贵的同情心进行一些责备，这时听到奥地利军团乐队的轰鸣声传来。上科尔索。这激起了他全心全意地爱他的朋友。 “无论如何，为了我，卢西安诺，你会尊重并支持她。”

“是的，虽然她说的是真的，”卢西安诺不满意地说。穿着检阅服的团，后面跟着两门火炮，从旁边经过。然后是一个骠骑兵中队和一个乌兰人，还有另一个步兵团，还有更多的炮兵和新鲜的骑兵。

“卡洛，如果我们三代人都用自己的鲜血浇灌意大利的土地，那么追逐那些被钻的野狗付出的代价并不算太多。”卢西安诺语气激烈地说道。

“我们将吃早餐，并在阿米广场看看他们，并表明我们米兰人对他们的力量的正确认识印象深刻，”卡洛说，当他感觉到卢西安诺的病态情人的愤怒得到纠正时，他的心情变得明亮起来。认识到他们作为意大利公民的义务。此刻的炎热和旋转袭击了他的头脑，因为明天他们可能会与那辆驶过的​​活引擎摔跤，当然，他所能聚集的所有仇恨都应该转向外部敌人。他带着更加清晰的感受来到了母亲的住所。

阿米亚尼伯爵夫人是一位威尼斯著名家族的女士，这个家族的名字就像从共和国内页吹响的号角一样。她的脸就像从一本古书中撕下的一片叶子；遗传特征讲述了她那个时代的故事。脸色蜡黄，毫无生气。生命就像不朽的造型上的彩布一样褪色了。她的眼睛里没有火焰，皮肤上也没有颜色。细细密密的大量皱纹从下巴精确地延伸到前额中央，并在更远处轻轻碰触一两次，当你观察到海洋的涟漪在灰色地平线天空的空间中混乱而平滑地流动时。但下巴很坚挺，嘴巴和鼻子也很坚挺，前额平静地坐落在这些腐烂的痕迹之上。这是一张极其高贵的面孔；堡垒的面孔；坚固而庞大，在废墟中依然光荣，尽管每一朵花都被剥夺了。

这位少女时期的女士是家里献给天堂的一只羔羊。保罗，将军，她的情人，把她从这种命运中拉了出来，与他分享了动荡的悲伤生活，直到她看到他坟墓上的血。她和劳拉·菲亚维尼一样，曾低下头看着被屠​​杀的丈夫，但与劳拉不同的是，马塞利娜·阿米亚尼并没有将自己的心埋在他身边。当他活着的时候，她的心和她所有的精力都属于他；它从死亡的面孔转向她的儿子。她从保罗那里接受了对意大利的热情。她与卡洛分享了它。那个时期的意大利女孩没有自己的激情，就像没有阳光照射的花朵没有色彩一样。她带着对母爱的强烈忧虑的远见将她的儿子献给了她的国家，这种母爱像东方的光一样迅速地从奉献的热情到牺牲时刻的遥远实现，将两者融为一体。其他形式的爱，其他怀抱中的奉献，可能会被欺骗，但她的不会。她在黎明的黎明中看到了日落。她的儿子卡洛经常出现在她的视线中。有了这种令人难以忘怀的预言性幻象，只有一位母亲，同时也是一位至高无上的高贵女性，才能让他感受到人性的存在。当卡洛和卢西安诺走进她坐的起居室并依次停下来向她行礼时，她的心跳得又快又重。

'出色地？'她说，既没有表现出焦虑，也没有表现出粗心大意。

卡洛回答说：“我们吃吃喝喝吧，因为明天我们就会死。”我认为这是和平之人的语言。

“明天你们要成为和平的人吗，我的卡洛？”

“东西在梅多莱伯爵手里，”卢西安诺说。 “他完全同意我们阿戈斯蒂诺的观点，即我们必须等待，直到众神让我们采取行动；正如阿戈斯蒂诺所说，梅多莱已经把自己抬到了我们的肩膀上，以便在他们刮大风时更容易满足他们的愿望。

他告诉她阴谋暂时被挫败，并没有说出对维多利亚的怀疑，赢得了卡洛的感激。

“梅多莱，”他说，“正如你所知，伯爵夫人，米兰的业务主要由梅多莱负责。我们的酋长不可能同时出现在所有地方；因此梅多莱承诺在老米兰这里为他做出决定。昨天下午他决定将我们的假期推迟一周。他向他吐露心声的白痴凯科在四点钟给了我那张表明这一事实的报纸。没有提出上诉；因为在 Medole 的谨慎管理下，我们无法获得股东大会的席位。他担心如果我们相遇，我们就会被吞没在一个身体里。

这个消息让她的心在短暂的悸动中沉入了美妙的休息状态。但阿米亚尼伯爵夫人不屑于屈从于享乐，尽管她已经坚强起来，可以忍受痛苦的冲击。她和每一位威尼斯和伦巴第母亲都必须怀有一颗被征服的心。一种按照其本质演奏曲调的音乐，不塑造任何动作，不戴面具。如果你知道“被征服的心”这句话的意思，你至少会尊重那些你称之为弱女子的人，因为她们经历了这个世界可以展示的最严厉的教育。在这样的母亲中，意大利复兴了。痛苦和殉道是他们的。父亲们可以带着孩子们游行到田野或灰色的斜坡上；那些坐在家里看着天平颤抖着升起、落下的人，并没有热血的陶醉，这对他们最亲爱的人来说是生还是死。他们最不模糊的希望可能只是一种隐秘的满足感。一种隐藏在感情中的屈服。当奥地利像一堵铁墙一样屹立不倒，而他们自己的人冲向它时，就像微弱的波浪一样，只留下一道红色的痕迹，再也没有了，那还有什么希望之花呢？但是，对国家的责任已经成为他们的宗教信仰。他们接受牺牲作为自己的一份；当最后一次严重的邪恶降临到他们身上时，他们披上了面纱，走在他们离开的土地上，除了为人服务之外，他们什么目的都没有。意大利在这些母亲身上复兴了。他们的折磨是让她的身体从死亡恍惚状态中恢复活力。

卡罗和卢西亚诺如饥似渴地享用了香草味的炸肉排、那不勒斯通心粉、绿色无花果、绿色和红色的甜瓜片、巧克力和佛罗伦萨干红葡萄酒。伯爵夫人让他们吃饭，然后给了儿子一封信，这封信是一小时前糖果商佐蒂送到她家门口的。事实证明，这是酋长写给维多利亚的一封信的附件。热那亚是它的铭文。从那个地方，它是通过志愿者信使的中继转发的。意大利的某些地点，酋长可以比政府带着所有援助和机械提前四到二十个小时到达。维多利亚只是将她名字的首字母写在信的底部。卡洛如饥似渴地读着它，然后把它扔到一边。它涉及思想和抽象措辞；他不耐烦的牙齿间什么也得不到。他对她为什么把它发给他感到茫然。确实如此——到目前为止，这似乎对她有意义：

'没有后退一步。我们可以承受跌倒；我们不能退缩。

然后再次：

“请记住，这些起义是你们国家心脏的明显脉动，因此没有人会说她是一具尸体，并且知道她还活着，没有人会说她不应该获得自由。这是她不朽的存在对不虔诚的侵犯者的抗议。

显然，酋长没有听到巴托·里佐的反驳，也没有听到梅多尔伯爵的悲惨弱点：但是，卡罗想，像维多利亚这样的人怎么能找到适合她的句子呢？他问自己这个问题，忘记了一段时间过去了，当他远离喧嚣并梦想着它时，这种空灵的语言和每一个象征意义，对他来说都是强大的维持食物，一种充满活力的气氛。他暂时不明白（尽管他逐渐恢复了昨晚对她的看法），在高贵的妇女阶层中，当她们陷入冲突时，她们会渴望理想主义的真理，而男人在炎热的天气下很容易渴望这种真理。他们的精力匆忙，被当作星星一样放在一边，而这些星星只是为了发光。

他的母亲仔细阅读了这封信——把它举到一臂之外——然后把它放在一边。卢西亚诺同样如此。阿米亚尼伯爵夫人是一位贵族：写作的语气和风格令她反感。她让儿子对这位作家的评价代表了她自己的看法，她觉得自己可以放弃一些偏见，去支持一个似乎对奥地利人恨之入骨的人。另一方面，她又为梅多莱伯爵辩护。一想到革命将屈服于理论家和自称人民的人——她的军人丈夫保罗对这一阶层的人一向表现出强烈的厌恶，她的灵魂就畏缩了。对卡洛来说，向她解释自从他父亲密谋并为自由而战以来，时代已经变了，时代的需要也不同了，这是一项古老而令人厌烦的任务。然而，当她极力主张如果贵族们同意领导的话，就应该选举他们来领导时，他却无法反驳她。因为如果他们不领导，他们不是被排除在运动之外吗？

“我想你已经定义了他们的爱国主义，”卡洛说。

'不，我的儿子；但你是他们中的一员。

“确实，我最亲爱的母亲，他们不会告诉你这些。”

“因为你选择将自己投入到对立的行列中。”

“你知道你分裂了我们的阵营，我的母亲夫人。对我来说，阶级之间不存在天然的对立。我们是什么？我们是奴隶：所有人都是奴隶。我身为奴隶，还能夸口自己出身高贵吗？ “为一顶镶有宝石的王冠感到自豪！”有人写道。救我脱离那种骄傲吧！我很高兴能因在革命中表现良好而获得贵族的专利。那么我将成为伯爵、侯爵、公爵；我不是一个纯正的共和党人；——但在那之前。与此同时——”

“卡洛正在为他的报纸作曲，”伯爵夫人对卢西安诺说。

“那些人是能够领导的领导人，”后者回答道。 '给天生的人第一个机会。老阿戈斯蒂诺是对的——人民欠他们有利的地位。但当他们尝试失败后，就将他们斩首。梅多莱将革命视为对魔术的描述。他洗牌，安排庄严的表演，但如果你看起来太严肃，或者我看起来太急切，他就不肯剪牌；因为这让他怀疑你知道会发生什么；他的目标首先是制造惊喜。”

“你们俩都对梅多莱伯爵不公正，”伯爵夫人说道。 “他比你们所有人都更危险。”

“确实是宏伟的庄园； “但头脑或心灵并不像我们中的一些人那么好，”卢西安诺说，抚摸着他浓密的黑色下垂胡子和下巴簇。 '啊，请原谅我；是的！他确实会危及更好的鸡冠。

“当他沉没时，他的虚荣心被切成两半，梅多莱的血将会淹没他的伦巴第公寓。这对他来说比死更糟糕。

卡罗说：“你知道我们的阿戈斯蒂诺如何评价梅多莱伯爵吗？”

“哦，阿戈斯蒂诺永远和你们年轻人在一起！”伯爵夫人惊呼道。 “我相信他在嘲笑你。”

“可以肯定的是，他确实笑了：他真的笑了。但是，他对梅多莱伯爵的评价是事实，也许会让你对伯爵的财产更加放心。他说，Medole 是奥地利人应用于这一代意大利人的疫苗，以使我们免遭可怕的疾病。不久之后，他们会或不会温柔地对待梅多莱。但目前他会受到温和的对待。他很有用。我希望我能说我们也是这么想的。现在，”卡洛向她弯腰握住她的手，“今晚我们可以在斯卡拉歌剧院见吗？

伯爵夫人双手放在他的手里，回答道：“我收到当局的通知，说我的盒子被通缉。”

“所以你声称拥有占领它的权利！”

“这是我对个人自由的非常谦虚的抗议。”

“好：我会在那里，并且非常高兴能认识那位与你争论的绅士。另外，妈妈，如果维多利亚夫人唱歌……”

阿米亚尼伯爵夫人的目光平静地盯着她的儿子。他的声音威胁着不平等。他眼中所有的恳求力量都投入其中，他说道：“她会唱歌：她发出信号；她会唱歌。”这是肯定的。我们可能得救她。如果我能把她交给你照顾，我会觉得她很安全，而且真的受到了保护。”

伯爵夫人看了一眼卢西安诺，回答道：

“是的，卡洛，无论我能做什么。但你知道我没有一点影响力。

“让她躺在你的怀里，我的母亲。”

“这是另一个维奥莱塔吗？”

“她的名字叫维多利亚，”卡洛说道，脸色变深了。某个维奥莱塔是他儿子的挚爱。

进一步分散注意力的奥地利乐队音乐正在过去。这次是一群身着白蓝制服的意大利人。卡洛和卢西亚诺靠在阳台上，抽烟，扫视着身穿奴役制服的同胞行进的样子。

一位人士说道：“他们的步伐并不糟糕。”另一个则带着忧郁嘲讽的微笑说：“我们都是兄弟！”

跟在意大利人后面的是一个匈牙利掷弹兵团，他们身材高大，脸庞肥硕，四肢特别轻盈，在奥地利干净严密的军阵中显得光彩照人。然后是一个蓝色骠骑兵中队和克罗地亚军团；随后，在捷克龙骑兵、德国乌兰骑兵和蓝色马扎尔轻骑兵的中间，周围是将军和助手，这位经验丰富的奥地利陆军元帅骑着马，他轻松的手、挺拔的身材和幽默的微笑掩盖了他的年龄和性格。他在意大利人中的声誉。大炮和东部边境的一些勇敢的马匹（可能是塞尔维亚人）结束了游行队伍。在刺眼的阳光下，它沿着科尔索大道闪闪发光。黄铜头盔和骠骑兵羽毛，白色和紫色外衣，绿色羽毛，栗色斗篷，明亮的钢刀鞘，刺刀尖——这可能是一场英勇的表演，就像一些被风吹动的、被夸张地放大的夏日田野一样；还有奥地利的旗帜——黑色的双头鹰在黄色的土地上猛冲。在这样的田野上，这就是铁意之花。

两个年轻人保持沉默。阿米亚尼伯爵夫人把椅子推回了房间的一个黑暗角落，当他们回头看时，她正坐在那里，就像一个阴沉的黑色大理石人物。

卡洛和卢西安诺跟随军团来到了阿米广场，他们被年轻人不可抗拒的吸引力所吸引，而这些年轻人还没有为他们编织悲伤的裹尸布——渴望观察一个聪明敌人的面貌。

达尔米广场是米兰的战神广场，奥地利人在那里举行的阅兵式曾经是一场热带盛会。这个地方太狭窄，无法进行广泛的演习，或者不仅仅是向将军检查所有武器，并向民众展示（及其意义）。广场上聚集着异常庞大的观众，就像一大片花坛的黑色边框，人们时而点头，时而点头。卡洛和卢西亚诺从人群中走过，展现出时尚年轻人完美光滑的面孔，这是奥林匹斯山上爱发牢骚的凡人流传下来的普遍贵族模式——其秘诀在于表现出内心和大脑的胜利无为，这些都完全服从于肢体的优雅。他们知道自己随时都有可能被捕。米兰贵族的高级成员都不见踪影。人们表情闷闷不乐。卡罗被安东尼奥·伯里克利先生高大的身材所吸引，他看到他在广场上与城堡指挥官交谈，周围还有将军军官们有说有笑。卡洛的肘部传来一阵英语。他听到维多利亚的英文名字充满活力。 “欣赏那些面孔，”他对卢西亚诺说，但后者正在人群中的各个头目之间悄悄地交换着认识；眼睑和眉毛的语言。当他环顾四周时，他以意大利人的热情欣赏着岛上美丽的面孔：“他们的女人太棒了！”他不再推着卡洛的手臂让路。英国人中有两个阳光明媚的头发的女孩和一个蓝眼睛的女士，她留着著名的英国卷发，饱满而圆润。这位女士谈到了她的兄弟，并在他骑着元帅杖沿着前线前进时指出了他。年轻的军官表示，很快就挣脱了出来，跑到她面前，弯下马脖子加入谈话。艾米莉亚·贝罗尼的名字被提及。他凝视着，似乎坚持相反的说法。

卡洛审视着他的面容。正当他这样做的时候，有人搭讪他，并看到了莫特的前对手——他昨天在斯卡拉广场与他握手。仪式再次隆重进行。卢西安诺松开了卡洛的手臂，离开了他。

“看来你对贝罗尼小姐的说法是错误的，”甘比尔上尉说。 “我们从可靠消息中得知，她今晚不会出现在斯卡拉歌剧院。这是一种失望；不过，从你有幸向我暗示的事情来看，我不能让自己后悔。”

卡罗内心充满激情，相信这个英国人会告诉他这个秘密。这是他检查的一个弱点。当一个人真正喜欢外国人时，就会有一种特殊的冲动（我指的是那些容易产生冲动的人），想要与他们结为兄弟。他鞠了一躬，问道：“她没有出现吗？”

“她实际上已经离开了米兰。不甘心。如果我知道这件事，我就会停止这件事了。但她最好别挡道，无论她在哪里，都会受到精心照顾。这时她已经到了蒂罗尔州。

“那去哪儿呢？”卡罗带着友好的兴趣问道。

“在梅拉诺附近的一座城堡里。或者她几个小时后就会到那里。我担心——我可以告诉你，我们在英国是非常好的朋友——我担心当她来到意大利时，她会陷入政治困境。我敢说你同意我的观点，即女性与政治无关。观察：你看到那位正在与奥地利军官说话的女士了吗？——他是她的兄弟。和贝罗尼小姐一样，他也采用了一个新名字；这是他叔叔的名字，他是一位在奥地利服役的皮尔森将军。我在英国认识他：他一直为我们服务。贝罗尼小姐和他的姐妹们一起生活了两三年。正如你可能想象的那样，他们都急于见到她。我给你介绍一下吧？他们会很高兴认识她的一位意大利朋友。”

卡洛犹豫了。他渴望听到那些女士谈论维多利亚。 “他们会说法语吗？”

哦，亲爱的，是的。也就是说，正如我们不幸的英国人所说的那样。也许你会更容易原谅他们的神学院意大利语。看到那里，”甘比尔上尉指着一些小跑的中队； “这些奥地利人当然拥有无与伦比的骑兵。看来火炮不错啊步兵都是优秀的人——非常优秀的人。他们有“木质”的动作；但这就是情况的本质：仅靠严格的纪律就可以使所有这些民族都具有同质性。不知怎的，他们被殴打了。我怀疑是否有任何东西能够击败他们的骑兵。

“他们在巷战中毫无用处，”卡洛说。

“哦，巷战！”甘比尔上尉发泄了一名士兵对这个想法的厌恶。 “他们不在巴黎。”你愿意上前吗？

就在这时，高个子希腊人走近了英国人。介绍被推迟了。

这位美丽的女士用岛上的语言称呼他为“先生”。伯里克利。她感谢他极其屈尊地屈尊注意到他们。但无论他多么居高临下，都没有承认他熟悉雾之国的蹩脚语言。她坚决地表现出痛苦的耳聋，最后她结结巴巴地说：“什么！伯里克利先生，你忘记英语了吗？前几天你也说过这句话。

“这是商业必需品的语言，”他回答道。

“但是，伯里克利先生，你肯定不敢告诉我你愿意随时选择不知道它吗？”

“我不会把磨碎的东西放进牙齿里，夫人；不再。' “但你说得很完美。”

“对于商业交易来说，这可能是完美的。”我希望保留我的牙齿。

'唉！'这位女士迫不及待地说，“我必须努力学会用法语游泳。”

“为您效劳，夫人。”希腊人说道，他的身长立刻加倍。

卡洛听到的和他知道的差不多。但是，对我们所知道的事情的证实有时会像新鲜的情报一样激发我们，而爱人的心很快就会在一个方向上领会到比他所知道的更多的东西。他立刻猜到巴托·里佐所说的英国裔奥地利人就是坐在距他六码范围内的马背上的军官。这个想法的确定性使他的肌肉痉挛。除此之外，他很清楚这位百万富翁鉴赏家夺走维多利亚的企图已经得到了奥地利当局的默许。出于完全可以解释的原因，伯里克利先生（英国女士这样称呼他）明确暗示了这一点，同时强烈地自我吹捧，确认他的计划已经成功地证明了艺术的正当性。

“今晚你将听到的歌剧，”他说，“将会发出嘶嘶声。你会听到猫头鹰在可怜的艾尔玛的每一首歌中合唱，意大利人称之为“海棠”。出色地;她讨好德国人的耳朵，如果他们能支持她，那就太好了。但是拉维多利亚——你的贝洛尼——你不会听到；为什么？她对她的艺术是错误的，错误的！她已经成为政治上的小恶魔了。这是盖伊·福克斯的女人！她犯下了忘恩负义的巨大罪行。她被解雇去学习、忏悔，并与她的老朋友们交往，如果他们愿意来看望她的话。

“我们当然会，”英国女士说。 “在我们访问威尼斯之前或之后——美味的威尼斯！”

“你还没见过——嘿？”伯里克利先生咆哮道。 ’而且还没有闻到。威尼斯没有音乐！但除了街头叮当声，你什么也没有！一个住的地方！天哪！

那位女士笑了。 “我丈夫坚持要尝试博尔米奥的浴场，然后我们要经过一个山口让他去梅拉诺尝试葡萄疗法。如果我能让他答应我在意大利待一整年，我们对威尼斯的访问可能会推迟。先生，我们的医生指示了我们的路线。如果我哥哥能请假，我们就和他一起去博尔米奥和梅兰。他自然对艾米莉亚拒绝见他感到惊讶。她也拒绝见我们！她写了一封信，日期是音乐学院给他的，他把信放在马鞍包里，当维罗纳那些可恶、可恶的人们袭击他时，信和其他珍贵的文件都被抢走了——可怜的男孩！她在信中说，再过几天，十五号后，她就会见到他，也就是今天！

'啊！ “十五号之后几天，也就是今天，”伯里克利先生重复道。 “我是在前天才见到你的，夫人，否则我本可以把你们带到一起的。

她现在已经远离了——看不见了——真是太好了！啊，她是假的；不要谈论她。你记得她在英国。那里有麻烦，麻烦；但在这里，我们和她成了火上浇油的锅；不要谈论她。她利用了我，夫人。我病了。'

他粗暴的手势垂了下来。他暂时放弃了懊恼，擦了擦额头上的湿气，不愿意或不理睬女士们温和讽刺的嘴型，环顾四周。因为卡洛已经做出了退休的决定——他已经听够了让他感到不舒服的事了。

'啊！我亲爱的阿米亚尼，欧洲最年轻的编辑！你怎么样？希腊人又恢复了和蔼可亲的叫声。

甘比尔上尉认为是时候向女士们介绍他这位意大利熟人的名字了，他是贝洛尼小姐的朋友。

“我最亲爱的阿米亚尼，”安东尼奥-伯里克利继续说道。他几乎没有试图掩饰自己的辛辣喜悦，因为他在年轻人身上投下了即将到来的烦恼的神秘阴影。 “恐怕你不会喜欢歌剧《卡米拉》，或者也许这就是你不会喜欢的卡米拉。”但是，肩并肩，行军！ （一个正在行动的步兵团提出了建议的形式）“今天不适合的事情可能适合明天。”让我们等待。我想，我的阿米亚尼，你应该吃柠檬而不是橙子。没关系。让我们等等吧。

卡罗的额头变得光滑，说道：“假设，我亲爱的安东尼奥先生，黑暗事物的先知对自己说，‘让我们等待？’”

“嘿——好深啊。”安东尼奥-伯里克利假装说出判决时，目光注视着大地，就像麻雀探查蠕虫或面包屑一样。 “请允许我，”他迅速补充道。他从他恶意的储备库中突然想到了一个想法——“这是奥地利陆军元帅参谋部的皮尔森中尉，单身，艾米莉亚·贝罗尼小姐的老朋友，——请允许我，——这是奥地利陆军元帅的阿米亚尼伯爵。伦巴第米兰杂志，维多利亚·坎帕夫人的新朋友——坎帕夫人贝罗尼小姐——是同一个人，先生们；请允许我向您介绍一下。

安东尼奥-伯里克利在两个年轻人之间挥舞着手臂。

他们明显的困惑让他高兴地用手指抚摸着小胡子的两侧。

因为皮尔森中尉表现出了一定的鞠躬准备，他看到了阿米亚尼脸上令人厌恶的目光；表情平静、平淡，没有攻击性，但一点也不吸引人；像盾牌一样。

尽管如此，中尉还是僵硬地点了点头。卡洛没有回应；但他还是举起帽子，向女士们谦恭地鞠了一躬。

甘比尔上尉和他一起走到一边。

“通知皮尔森中尉，我请求你，”阿米亚尼说，“如果他认为我侮辱了他，我就听从他的命令。”

“无论如何，”甘比尔说。 “只是，你知道，我不可能猜出发生了什么事；”我认为他不知道。

卢西安诺正好走近。卡洛走到他跟前，站着讲了半分钟。然后他回到甘比尔船长身边，说道：“我把自己交给了一位正直的人。你知道意大利绅士与奥地利军官的关系并不好。如果有人看到我与他们中的任何一个人行礼，我就冒犯了我的同胞；他们已经受够了。

察觉到背景中还有更多的东西，甘比尔只是鞠了一躬。他听说意大利绅士仅仅因为被发现与奥地利军官接近而引起同胞的怀疑。

临别时，卡洛对他说，眼神很直接，“今晚去看歌剧吧。”

“是的，我想是的，”英国人回答道，随后消化了他的眼神和建议。

皮尔森中尉已经骑马离开了。战争机器从头到尾都在运转：花田如洪水般奔腾；一个团又一个团，乐队的喧闹声过去了。从表面上看，意大利人的举止表现得像普通的漫不经心的公民，音乐在他们的心中没有沸腾地狱的汤汁。他们是贵族和平民，主要是男孩。不过，当卡罗和卢西亚诺穿过人群时，时不时就有一个中年工人用聪明的目光看着卡罗和卢西亚诺。众人的脸上浮现出一种压抑的仇恨，随时可能爆发。

武器在城里。带着仇恨的打击，用武器的打击，这么多的耻辱需要复仇，我们不必奇怪这些年轻人看到了被他们强大的迷惑热情所放大的一点点自由的前景，就像雾中的灯笼一样。理性没有行动。当他们只是说“意大利！”时，他们就处于这样的状态。意大利！让他们有勇气与运动员比赛。因此，奥地利这位身材高大的运动员的游行并没有完全完成恐吓的教训，而只是激怒了叛乱分子的表面。这似乎是对那些被践踏的人们的侮辱，事实上也是如此，他们将其视为胆小鬼的一个教训：他们的本能通常会敲响警钟。他们认为，安全的霸权不会自行出现：因此他们隐约地推测敌人的议会中存在弱点。当表演消失后，他们的精神仿佛空荡荡的空气中空荡荡的巨音一样停了下来，然后才做出了反应。奥地利从她的表现中获得的只不过是一位教师的认真的满足感，这位教师举起了棍子，告诉那些想要犯罪的青少年，他们应该得到多么丰厚的回报，而他们未来的抱怨理由将是多么可怜。

但在奥地利自己受到教训之前，她认为她只有一个人和他的微弱的工具，以及偶尔的疯狂，反对她，我们在莫特罗内看到的那个人，这已不再是事实；尽管整个民众运动确实源自那个人。她观察到意大利余烬中的火花，并用脚跟踩碎它们，却没有想到，火点如此迅速地流动，一定正在聚集着至关重要的热量。她相信，如果她能抓住那个被许多年轻贵族和所有人民承认为他们的酋长的人——因为他当时在他的任务中没有对手——她就会愤怒地抓住阴谋的脖子。 。如果她抓住了他，争取意大利自由的阴谋就不会持续很多年了。火炬已经准备好了，但弹匣还没有准备好。他准备好了；正是他向意大利人宣扬，当我们寻求机会被揭示时，机会就是一个嘲笑的魔鬼。或者，换句话说，等待机会；因为当它在我们体内被创造时，它就是上帝的天使，是美德和奉献的成熟果实。他向意大利人呼吁，除了他们自己的灵感之外，不要等待任何灵感。他们决不应该屈服于任何异类的榜样；也不让外国的火城成为他们的灯塔。守护着他的意大利；年复一年，她的手腕在他沉思的扣环中；他像一条神秘的水蛭一样站在一张美丽而绝望的沙发旁，发誓要通过没有人分享的灵感保证来复兴它，因为生活没有抛弃它。一具被死亡和秃鹰折磨的尸体——他在沙漠里站在它旁边。当腐肉翅膀低垂、爪子固定、喙啄食并品尝它的食物时，他举起手臂，敦促半复苏的身体做出某种证明存在的证明，这对你来说是一个奇迹吗？出现！他说，即使是在最致命的黑暗时刻。松弛的四肢活动起来；身体起起落落。这种努力的代价是无数新旧伤口的破裂。收获是展示了意大利创造的奇迹。她尝到了自己的血，她知道自己还活着。

然后她感觉到了身上的锁链。是时候了，她要通过自己内在的美德来证明自己值得活下去，而她的其他儿子们，狡猾而熟练，像蛇一样复杂，像骏马一样勇敢，毫无疑问，应该搏斗并玩得很深为她在世俗纷争的游戏中。现在——在我所说的这个时刻——当奥地利人像欢乐的火焰一样沿着米兰街道行进，而意大利人像炉​​排烧尽的余烬一样站着时，意大利无力的手腕仍然被她那致命的水蛭抓住了。在长时间的停顿中数着她的脉搏，这会让另一个人认为生命已经结束，而不是开始。

阿尔米广场上没有任何闪闪发光的表演。

我们离开了阿米广场。谣言起源于米兰。在去斯卡拉咖啡馆的路上，卢西安诺和卡洛（他们抱在一起，决定如果逮捕到来，就一起被带走）听到有人说酋长在米兰。一个男人路过，说了一声，就走了。他们拦住了他们认识的第二名男子，他证实了谣言。他们再次像阳光一样高兴，宽恕地匆忙走向梅多莱伯爵。伯爵的仆人向他们保证，他的主人已经离开这座城市前往蒙扎。 “梅多莱是个胆小鬼吗？”卢西安诺喊道，声音几乎传到了仆人的耳朵里。现在，他们因新的渴望而变得更加敏锐，如此重要的一个人的逃跑看起来很卑鄙。他们立即前往阿戈斯蒂诺，相信他会知道真相。他们发现他躺在床上。 “嗯，然后呢？”阿戈斯蒂诺回应着他们的笑声。 '我老了;太老了，无法像你们这些青春的巨人那样跨越一个白天和黑夜。我尽可能休息，因为我必须休息。

“但是，你知道，哦，应征入伍的父亲，”卡洛说，他愿意沉浸在自己的情绪中，“你知道今晚什么也做不了。”

“我知道这么多吗？”阿戈斯蒂诺长长地低声说道。

“你知道酋长在城里吗？”卢西亚诺说。

“一个躺在床上的人知道这一点，”阿戈斯蒂诺回答说，“他比那些起床的人知道得少，尽管他所知道的东西也许他消化得更好。我的孩子们，你们就是喷泉，而我就是你们玩耍的池子。说吧。

他们谈到了这个谣言。他对此微笑。他们立即看出谣言是假的，因为酋长信任阿戈斯蒂诺。

“继续去找鼹鼠巴托，”他说，“矿工巴托；他是这座城市的日光之父：你知道，他是知识的日光之父，人们必须为之深挖。继续去找他；——如果你能找到他的话。

但卡洛却让阿戈斯蒂诺的眼中燃起了火焰。

‘该死的野兽！他把黑蝴蝶别在了夫人的裙子上。

阿戈斯蒂诺用手肘站了起来。他凝视着他们。 “我们是盲目鼹鼠的追随者，”他愤怒地凝视着，用内心的声音说道，然后悲伤地爆发出来，“祖国啊我的创造者，祖国啊我的基因！”

“夫人没有接受他的警告，我们也没有。昨晚她逃脱了阴谋，今晚她唱歌了。”

“她不能，”阿戈斯蒂诺专横地说。

“她会的。”

“我必须阻止这一切。”阿戈斯蒂诺从床上跳了起来。

年轻人恳求他把选择权留给她。

“傻瓜！”他叫道，愤怒地将一条腿伸进衣服里。在这里，艾丽丝！汞！飞往木星并说我们都是意大利的老人和男孩，并且准备好接受一些中年凡人为神，如果他们愿意来帮助我们的话。年轻的傻瓜们！你知道吗，当你们密谋时，你们每个人都处于束缚之中，都是同轭的伙伴？

“和巴托·里佐绑在一起！”

'是的;以及两匹马中最差的一匹。听着，你们两个纽伦堡傀儡！如果酋长在这里，我就会躺在床上一动不动。梅多莱已经阻止了疫情的爆发。不管是对是错，他都移动了一大块；我们是从属——粒子。酋长不可能无处不在。米兰对他来说太热了。这里有两个人，隐藏着——里纳尔多和安吉洛·吉达斯卡皮。谣言由此而来。他们杀死了保罗·伦肯斯坦伯爵，带着剑上的鲜血赶往旧米兰工作。哦，悲剧！——当我有时间写它的时候。现在让我去找我的女儿，我的女儿！伦肯斯坦人的血一定会在钢铁上生锈。安杰洛杀了他：里纳尔多把十字架交给他亲吻。不久之后你就会了解整个故事；但这对德国人来说是一个教训，不要去追求我们的意大利少女。你们这些潘诺尼亚窃贼，别掀开那帘子！我们有很多宽恕；但弓和小提琴不相交，除非它们是同一种木头制成的。尤其是当签名者弓来自罗伊蒂亚阿尔卑斯山那边，而唐泽拉维奥尔是温暖的伦巴第大区的植物时。安吉洛·吉达斯卡皮和里纳尔多·吉达斯卡皮就是见证者！太棒了！你们这些男孩——你们站起来就像两个蒂罗尔沙拉勺！我说我的女儿，我的女儿，永远不会帮忙开空弹。昨天晚上我向她发出了父亲的命令。那个肆意忤逆她父亲的人，还仰慕着你们这两个火箭头流氓吗？猿类！如果她今晚唱这首歌，意大利的耳朵将永远对她充耳不闻。今晚没有引擎可以启动；所有的锁都在上面；她将会把六个像你一样的挤奶者送入地狱，在起义的传统中，她的名字周围将会有一圈黑色的血——你听到了吗？我是为了这个目的才珍惜她的吗？让她专门去打架！

阿戈斯蒂诺穿着混乱的衣服，在房间里来回怒气冲冲，一边怒骂一边品味着他的绰号和富有想象力的窥视，试图从某些东西中获得乐趣，这符合诗意的气质。年轻人被他噤声了。卡洛很高兴。

'部队！'老人说着，假装将自己的着装与他们的着装进行了对比。 “两个恩典和一个色狼从来没有在一起过，我们不会吓倒米兰的经典政府。我一个人出去。不，卢西亚诺先生，我没有向梅多莱伯爵宣誓。我看到你的冷笑包含着它。啊!对于像我这样的人来说，这是一件多么匆忙的事啊。它把树木连根拔起，淹没了大地，使我可怜而宁静的宇宙完全陷入黑暗。你进来的时候我正在写一首田园诗。看看你对我的《可爱的黄金时代》做了什么！

阿戈斯蒂诺从淋巴诗人到热情的行动者的转变一直持续到他呼吸急促，这时需要深深地吸一口空气，这促使他又开始进行无意义的讽刺。 “头脑，你们这些杰出的年轻绅士！——推动阴谋的是头脑，而不是腿和手臂。”现在，无论你怎么想，你在这个行业中都只是腿和胳膊。如果你不服从，你就会表现出反抗身体成员的令人震惊的神话般的精神；这不是我们希望看到的反抗。我立即去找我的女儿，我们都会睡一个星期的好觉，而特德斯基人则狩猎、炖菜，耗尽他们顽皮的怀疑。你知道教皇的嘴是闭着的吗？我们让它在咬紧牙关之前撒了一个弥天大谎——我承认这是一个坏兆头；但这个想法非常巧妙。巴托，这个罪人——我一定要掐死他，因为他给我的天鹅留下了污点；只是，还没有，还没有：他是一个盲目的鼹鼠，一个疯狂的爱国者；但是，正如我所说，我们的野兽巴托昨晚把一个奥地利人拉到了嘴边，并带领狗从里面取出了一封信，详细说明了今晚的整个情节，以及人们将如何驻扎在这里，准备好他们携带着火和剑，向科尔索河、那里的维科洛以及全城其他地方爆发。系统的情节地图。这是写给塞拉比廖内伯爵的——我的孩子们！我的男孩们！你怎么看呢？太棒了！但如果巴托——”阿戈斯蒂诺停顿了一下，他就是一头致命的野兽。 ‘是的，他太过分了！太远！'

“你说他是不是太过分了？”

卡罗严肃地说。他的长辈被他死气沉沉的热情激怒了，这个男孩竟敢跟踪一个赤裸裸的自私情人的感情来批评他，阿戈斯蒂诺，这让他觉得很可怕。阿戈斯蒂诺控制住了愤怒，走近他，在他耳边低声说了几句话。

阿戈斯蒂诺随后称他为“斯巴达好男孩”，因为他保持着勇敢的面容。等到你从哲学上理解女人。到那时他们一切都会有麻烦。今晚在斯卡拉歌剧院，我的孩子们！我们已经演练过惨败； Tedeschi 执行此操作。你走吧，我一个人出去！

他似乎认为找到维多利亚并屈服她的意志是一件不容置疑的事情。

阿戈斯蒂诺向年轻人暴露了他的弱点，年轻人以一种特别不赞成的敏锐眼光阅读他的文章。他对阴谋的黑暗之网感到高兴，并相信自己不是那种暗无天日的工作的普通编织者。它激发了他的想象力，让他的骄傲充满了越来越高的气体。因此，他一方面与梅多莱结盟，另一方面又与巴托·里佐结盟。年轻人精明地读懂了他的意思，但说话是没有用的。

在卡洛与卢西安诺分开之前，他告诉了他耳语的负担，这证实了他在阿米广场听到的事情。事情是这样的：巴托·里佐知道皮尔森中尉是从米兰大公到当时在维罗纳的元帅的信件的携带者，他紧随其后，并通过非凡的努力提前到达了维罗纳；在那里欺骗并伏击了他，并获得了维多利亚最近写给他的一封信，而不是快递，这损害了叛乱计划。

“如果是这样的话，我的卡洛！”他的朋友耸耸肩说道，用一种非常世俗的方式谈论女性。

卡洛甩开他。那天剩下的时间里，他独自一人，拿着他的新闻笔。这支钢笔横渡海洋和大陆，就像一个被主人交给了缰绳的老工匠一样。除了他灵魂的绝望不安之外，他还想到了吉达斯卡皮，他认识他们，并且与他们结盟；想到了伦肯斯坦家族，他同样认识他们，或者在贾科莫·皮亚韦尼活着的时候就认识了他们；还有比安卡·冯·伦肯斯坦，劳拉的妹妹拜访了她国家的人民。安娜伯爵夫人和莱娜·冯·伦肯斯坦伯爵夫人是米兰的德国美女，活泼的小女人，又甜美。他和莉娜伯爵夫人之间曾有过温柔的交往，在这个时代，甜食已经失去了吸引力，必须提供魅力。她很有钱，对奥地利充满热情，对意大利充满浪漫情怀，性情泼妇，但她的太阳穴闪烁着珍珠般的光芒，让她的照片一直留在他的记忆中。此外，在那些日子里，当女人对我们作为女神慷慨时，她们给予的从来没有这么少，她曾屈尊与他抚摸手；她的胸部明显起伏，让整个宇宙都摇晃起来；所有神秘的钥匙都叮当作响；并且曾经（为了让自己在他的记忆中得到防腐）曾经、曾经把她的嘴唇交给了他。莉娜伯爵夫人可能会拥护阿米亚尼，相信她有能力用这样的意大利材料造就一个奥地利人。皮亚韦尼叛乱阻止了这一点以及他们所有的交往，因为白手党的分裂，正如它所说的那样。否则，尸之手。阿米亚尼还认识保罗·冯·伦肯斯坦伯爵。在他看来，死亡并没有多大意义，无论生活多么愉快：他的父亲和他的朋友都高高兴兴地死去了；他本人已经做好了传唤的准备，但是吉达斯卡皮家族似乎对保罗伯爵进行了国内司法处决，这让他感到害怕，并终止了他暂时的劳动能力。他感觉好像有一发子弹击中了他的肋骨；那是一种未知的恐惧感。变了，就变成了遗憾。 “这些奥地利人死得很惨！”他说。

有一段时间，他认为他们的处境最为艰难。一束像炽热的黄铜一样的阳光警告他，天已经黑了。他送到母亲的马厩，骑着马绕米兰一圈，独自在一个普通的旅馆花园里吃饭，而他对那里是个陌生人。一个人可能有足够的勇气面对他确信将要上演的场景，但他会因为一个悬而未决的时刻而退缩。他意识到自己脸色苍白和冰冷，当两个身着便服、对米兰陌生的斯比里（sbirri）经过金色大厅另一边的一张空桌子时，他们的目光落在他身上，他对此并不感到惊讶。 -鱼池，他坐的地方。他推测他们可能正在追击吉达斯卡皮，并且还活着，看到了一张痛苦的脸。 “然而里纳尔多和安吉洛都不会像我现在这样，”他想，意识到这些人正在根据这些迹象来判断，并有他们的想法。尽管他自以为是民主党人，但他却以贵族般的蔑视态度鄙视那些对出身男人的品格如此死心的生物，以为他们在受到正义的打击后脸色苍白，悔恨不已，浑身颤抖！阿米亚尼看着自己的手：他的意志力无法阻止它的麻痹。吉达斯卡皮家族是博洛尼亚的儿子。意大利人的愚蠢是众所周知的，否则米兰骑士会惊讶地发现自己被误认为是博洛尼亚人。他向侍者招手说道：“告诉我喷泉那边那两个家伙是在什么地方长大的。”侧目一看，回答是：“那不勒斯人。”服务员正准备补充几句，阿米亚尼却点点头，用牙签交谈起来。他确信那些那不勒斯人是博洛尼亚警察的新兵；可能在 Guidascarpi 的轨道上。由于他在身材上与安吉洛·吉达斯卡皮（Angelo Guidascarpi）没有什么不同，他开始感到不安，生怕他们在他和斯卡拉之间犯了错误。想到任何人力都会阻止他到达目的地，阿米亚尼的手就变得非常坚定。他戴上手套，大声说出他要去的地方。 “阁下，”侍者一边说，一边接过钱，假装数着账单：“他们问我米兰是否有两位阿米亚尼伯爵。”卡罗的眉毛开始皱起。 “他们会追我吗？”他想了想，说道：“当然；”这个世界上有双重的东西，米兰就是它的缩影。

扮演角色给了他阿戈斯蒂诺引人入胜的讲话方式。服务员现在认识他了，把这当成命令说“是”。他显然很尊重阿米亚尼的名字：卡洛认为他是米兰的战士之一。通过电路和听者的帮助，某种导致“是”的答案被传达给 sbirri。他们是真正的那不勒斯人，容易怀疑，但又因怀疑而犹豫不决。他很快意识到，他们并不比一般的笨蛋更可怕，而诸神有时会奇怪地偏爱他们。他们让他感到困惑：为什么他们要追捕他？是什么让他们问他是否有兄弟？在前往斯卡拉歌剧院的途中，他遭到跟踪，但没有受到骚扰。

看着舞台的幕布，阿米亚尼心里激动不已。十五号之夜来临了。在最初的几分钟里，他在幕布前感到强烈的兴奋，在一大群像他自己一样的小心脏中砰砰跳动、颤抖着，再加上他相信这将是一个发生重大事件的夜晚，这让他不再意识到这一切。曾受挫；除了阴谋、阴谋、反阴谋和纠缠、分裂、愚蠢的狡猾、嫉妒、虚荣、敌对因素的可怕聚集之外，什么也没有；丝线全部松动，舌头摇摆，这里压力，那里压力，就像在无方向的地球内脏中的不确定的愤怒，并且没有大师在场来融合和指向强烈的分散力量。

因此，幕布就像任何普通的歌剧屏幕一样悬挂着。大只与新首席女主角的命运有关。他甚至失去了维多利亚会出现的确定性。他从窗帘的空白处转向房子，房子里很快就挤满了人，不像无精打采的米兰要批评一个未经尝试的声音。贵族们通常空荡荡的包厢里挤满了人，令人惊奇的是，尽管可以看到，但白色制服并没有过多。阿米亚尼见到的第一个人是阿戈斯蒂诺，他说话粗声粗气。维多利亚对他来说是隐形的。无论是大师、经理还是侍女，都没有听说过她。幕后和幕前都存在不确定性。但眼前却是充满期待的不确定性，平息了平常的喧闹，让目光明亮地向前看。阿米亚尼在房子里监视着，发现了劳拉·皮亚韦尼和科尔特上校在她身边。伦肯斯坦一家在大公的包厢里。安东尼奥-伯里克利、英国女士和甘比尔船长就在他们旁边。舞台上方他母亲的包厢里出现了一件白色制服，这让阿米亚尼关上了玻璃。他正前往那里，准备开始今晚的敌对行动，这时阿米亚尼伯爵夫人走进大厅，一脸严肃地握住儿子的手臂，触感颤抖。

“我的包厢里的人都是我的客人，”伯爵夫人说道，同时在卡洛的手臂上施加了痉挛般的压力，以帮助她深呼吸的意思。她是一个很少要求服从的女人，但她却被自发地服从了。对于坠机事件，我们无法提出任何问题，也无法做出任何解释，他们在无数次的问候中继续前行，米兰社会已经习惯性地不再聚集，现在却带着毫不掩饰的陌生感聚集在一起。伯爵夫人私人休息室的桌子上放着一张卡片：上面写着皮尔森将军的名字。她甩掉黑色蕾丝围巾。 “安吉洛·吉达斯卡皮在米兰，”她说。 “他用剑对剑杀死了伦肯斯坦家族的一名成员。你走后一小时他来找我；斯比里人正在跟踪他；他被误认为是我的儿子。他现在由乔装打扮的巴托·里佐负责。可能就在这个房子里。他的兄弟在城里。尽可能长时间地将头罩戴在头上；如果这些猎犬看到并认出你，就会造成恶作剧。”她没有再说什么，对自己的理解感到满意，但打开了包厢门，走了进去，并庄严地向两名军官致意。卡罗也同样向他们低下了头。这就像弯曲他的膝盖一样，因为他在两个入侵者中较年轻的一个身上认出了皮尔森中尉。伯爵夫人接受了空出的座位。她的耳腔接受了将军的道歉。他告诉她，他对这次闯入深感遗憾；他奉命出席歌剧，并尽可能靠近舞台，指定伯爵夫人的包厢。她的脸有着一成不变的镇定，就像旧画布上画着的头像一样。将军坚持找借口。她回答说：“当一个人太弱而无法反抗时，最好是静静地忍受暴行。”皮尔森将军立即就任了分配给他的职位。这不是一件令人愉快的事情。卡罗和中尉之间没有尝试交谈。

将军用英语向他的侄子讲话。 “威尔弗里德，你看到幕后的那个女孩了吗？”

答案是“不”。

“伯里克利把她迅速关在蒂罗尔河里：如果她反对鞭打，这里就是她最好的栖息地。你看到艾尔玛了吗？

'不;她也失踪了。

“那么我想我们必须下定决心创作一部无头无尾的歌剧。正如帕特谈到那袋土豆时所说，“如果有土豆，那将是一头强大的野兽。”

军官们躲在望远镜里，一边环顾房子一边说话。

“如果这个女孩和艾尔玛都不会出现，那么我就没有必要出现在这里，”将军说道，并为自己辩解。 “我会坐下来看完第一个场景，然后就撤退。我可能马上就走；这件事看起来无害，但你知道，当没有什么可看的时候，你必须报告你看到了它，否则你的上级会不满意。

中尉不太能用轻松的谈话来掩饰他所处的令人厌烦的处境。他的目光落在莱恩·冯·伦肯斯坦伯爵夫人身上，她的手快速动作，让他说他应该走到她身边。

“很好，”将军说。 “小心，不要对这件可怕的事情透露任何暗示。”他们回家后就会听到这个消息：时间足够了！”

皮尔森中尉在途中碰触了他妹妹的箱子。她很兴奋，问了无数遍——有危险吗？他手头是否有整个团来保护爱好和平的人？ “否则，”她说，“我将无法让那个男人（她的丈夫）在意大利再呆一个星期。”他今晚拒绝离开，尽管我们知道不会发生任何事情。你的天上女主角已经安全了。”

“哦，她很安全，——ze minx”； “安东尼奥-伯里克利喊道，笑着向出现在包厢前面的格拉特利公爵夫人致敬。德·皮尔蒙特少校就在她身后，希腊人很高兴地把他们指给英国女士看，简单地暗示了他们之间的关系，她的卷发悲伤地摇晃着。

“请原谅，夫人，”伯里克利说道。 “在意大利，丈夫不在身边，朋友就取得了头衔：一切都不再是了。”

“这是非常可耻的，”她说。

“女士，士气，适合太阳。”

甘比尔船长把箱子留给威尔弗里德，用一句话表达了他想把伯里克利扔进坑里的愿望，而在另一句话中，他相信一位名叫梅瑟·波伊斯的英国朋友就在屋子里。

“他不会在城里呆四二十个小时，”威尔弗里德说。

'出色地;你会保持沉默。

天啊！甘比尔，如果你知道我们必须承受的侮辱就好了！天使的脾气根本受不了。我对这些家伙和他们混乱的国家感到非常遗憾，但对他们保持礼貌是一项绝望的工作；以我的名誉担保，确实如此！我希望他们能站起来，让我们结束这一切。我们必须从女性身上承受比男性更多的负担。”

“我让你冷静一下，”甘比尔说。

这位指挥大师迟迟没有离开乐团指挥的位置，音乐家们坐在那儿等待他，这似乎证实了现在在观众中流传的一个谣言，警告所有人做好失望的准备。他的指挥棒被拿来放在新序曲的书上。当最后人们看到他穿过乐谱架时，周围响起了低沉的窃窃私语声。罗科没有理会。他的举止让安东尼奥-伯里克利心中非常满意，他站了起来，对拍手的野蛮行为感到内疚。在大厅遇见阿米亚尼时，他说道：“来吧，我的好朋友，你将帮助我度过今晚的厄玛危机。”她是醋——我们将她与油混合。只为了今晚，拯救可怜的罗科的歌剧。

“艾尔玛！”阿米亚尼说； “这个时候她已经到了蒂罗尔。你的艾尔玛在六十小时之内要出现在这里会有些困难。

'如何！'伯里克利惊讶地喊道，并拉着卡罗阻止他。 “我打赌你——”

'多少？'

“我跟你赌一千弗罗林，今晚你不会看到拉维多利亚。”

'好的。我跟你打赌一千弗罗林你不会看到艾尔玛。

“我说，没有维多利亚！”

“我说，不要拉泽罗拉！”

阿戈斯蒂诺在大厅里踱步，他讲述了艾尔玛被强奸的故事，这让伯里克利心烦意乱。他冲到皮亚韦尼夫人的包厢里，听到了重复的声音。他看到坐在后面的是一位英国老熟人，甘比尔上尉正在与他交谈。

“我亲爱的波伊斯，你从英国千里迢迢赶来，就是为了看你最喜欢的人的第一个夜晚。你会感到震惊的，先生。她忽视了她的艺术。她被放逐、放逐、被送去学习、静心。

“我认为你错了，”劳拉说。 “你几乎立刻就会见到她。”

“夫人，请原谅我；难道我不是最了解的吗？

“你可能做得很糟糕。”

伯里克利眨着眼睛，咬着胡子，仿佛这是为了保持耐心。

“我愿意赌一毫法郎，”他嘀咕道。他怀着绝对的悲痛向波伊斯先生讲述了这神圣的声音的失常，维多利亚努力成为的残骸，而他独自努力将她从其中拯救出来。他使用了大量的插图，粗俗而古怪，而且有些歇斯底里。他挥舞着白色的拳头，用狼般的表情敲打着膝盖上长长的突出部分。他那荒诞的真诚简直让人流泪。

“亲爱的波伊斯，你的妹妹呢？”他问道，仿佛又回到了对阴影的思考上。

“我姐姐陪我，但不去看歌剧。”

“为了另一场竞选——嘿？”

“无论如何，都要去意大利过冬。”

卡洛·阿米亚尼进来并热情地拥抱了梅瑟·波伊斯。这位英国人在意大利人中间感到很自在：伯里克利觉得自己并非如此，并认为他们都是一群没有医院的发烧患者，于是退休了。在他看来，为了这样一个他们称之为爱国主义的世俗问题，密谋或对牺牲像维多利亚这样的声音视而不见，是最卑鄙的背叛，最严重的自私。他对这件事的看法就像人们对苏提人的印度戏剧的看法一样。他从中看到了整个狂热分子联合起来的愚蠢行为，促使一种珍贵的东西走向灭绝。更糟糕的是；因为生活很普遍，妇女和印度寡妇也很常见。但维多利亚时代的声音只是一代人——以年为周期——的一次。鉴赏家的宗教信仰延伸到虔诚的观念，认为她的声音是一种精神天赋，将这种无价的宝石铸造到爱国者的血腥沟渠中，比任何奉献生命的灾难性的集会更加悲惨和可悲。他的脚步震动了大厅，想着如果没有维多利亚的疯狂，这可能会是一个美好的夜晚。序曲即将结束。通过将双臂抱紧在胸前，他获得了一些外在的镇静，并将眼睛盯着舞台。

当与劳拉·皮亚韦尼和梅瑟·波伊斯坐在一起时，阿米亚尼在他母亲的包厢里看到了韦斯普里斯上尉的幽灵。他忘记了她的禁令，匆忙走到她身边，把门开着。他的愤怒激怒了她警告性地抓住他的手臂，他用手套打了奥地利军官的脸。韦斯普莱斯拔出了剑。房子升起；有一个像野兽张牙舞爪的时刻。消息通过了：韦斯普里斯上尉遵照皮尔森将军的命令撤退。后者在一张纸条上写道，应该将两门火炮放置到位，并在门周围安排一队人：他把它交给了韦斯普里斯。

“我希望，”将军对卡洛说，“我们能够为你安排一切，而无需当局的干预。”

卡洛说道：“将军，他手上沾满了我们家族的鲜血。”我已经准备好了。'

将军躬身行礼。他看了一眼伯爵夫人，寻找母性虚弱的迹象，没有看到任何迹象，并且明白明天的娱乐活动中将有一场决斗，黎明前可能还会发生一场骚乱。在那短暂的爆发中，房子的脾气显露出来，快速颤动的闪电火焰暴露了风暴的前额。

阿米亚尼伯爵夫人吩咐儿子把外门锁紧。她平静的能量几乎无法控制她的激动。在帮助安吉洛·吉达斯卡皮逃避法律的过程中，她让儿子和她自己都陷入了危险。许多博洛尼亚斯比里人都在追捕安吉洛。有些人认识他的人，有些人则认识他。有些没有；但是，如果她之前认出安杰洛是她儿子卡洛的那两个人现在碰巧在房子里，看到他，听到他的名字，那么风险就会很大而且多种多样。

“你认识那个年轻英俊的阿米亚尼伯爵吗？”莉娜伯爵夫人对威尔弗里德说道。 '也许你不认为他英俊？他曾短暂地成为我的玩伴。他比我更有激情，这并不能说明什么。我警告你！看他多兴奋。难怪。他是——每个人都知道——他是拉维多利亚的情人。

莉娜伯爵夫人用意大利语说出了这句话。柔软的舌头像一条盘绕的蛇一样将它送入威尔弗里德的血管。在英语或德语中，它不会具有致命的含义。

她可能是故意的，因为她和她的妹妹安娜伯爵夫人审视着他的脸。幕布的拉开，将所有人的目光都吸引到了舞台上。

罗科·里奇（Rocco Ricci）的指挥棒敲响了他一首充满活力的合唱曲的开场；一群村民合唱着，唱出幸福，全人类的目标，承诺在这一天访问地球，让她见证高贵恋人卡米洛和卡米拉的结合。然后，牧羊人向即将到来的城堡伸出手，唱着一首诗。奥尔索伯爵住在那里：他会让他们的庆祝活动不受干扰吗？喧闹的声音被合唱压垮了，合唱抗议着天空在奥尔索伯爵之上。但另一位村民讲述了奥尔索的力量，并暗示了他的罪行。合唱队起身回应，警告所有人，只要三人聚集，奥尔索伯爵就会侧耳倾听。村民们散开，互相怀疑地看着对方，在散去之前又在幸福之歌中重聚。卡米洛进入唯我独尊。蒙蒂尼饰演的卡米洛受到了热烈的欢迎。但当他上前演奏他的歌曲时，可以看到他和罗科交换了绝望的眼神。卡米洛与奥索伯爵的女儿米奇埃拉有过一段爱情经历，并毫不犹豫地宣称他害怕她。孤儿卡米拉作为她的妹妹，和她一起在那边的城堡里长大，在最后的几分钟里，她仍然处于危险之中，这仍然使她脱离了他的怀抱。

“如果我永远见不到她——我就像死河岸边的一个可怜的幽灵，一想到她会像极乐世界的一缕光芒落在我的胸前——如果我永远见不到她，我就会感到受宠若惊。”她更多！这位著名的男高音把他的全部力量都投入到了绝望的呼喊中，整个房子都被它感动了：房子里有很多人和他一样担心一场可怕的灾难。

从此以后，歌剧和意大利观众就融为一体了。所说的一切都有意义，并且得到了同情的翻译。他们认为卡米拉是一个严肃的滑稽表演，但有其核心。机智的意大利人一下子就明白了这一点。奥地利“奥尔索伯爵”； “Michiella”是奥地利的阴谋精神； “卡米洛”是好逸恶劳的意大利、多情的意大利、漫无目的的意大利； “卡米拉”是年轻的意大利！

他们对看到维多利亚的渴望现在变得炽热，当卡米洛喊道“她来了！”许多人从座位上站起来。

韦斯普里斯船长递给安东尼奥-伯里克利一张纸片，简短地说他在马车里找到了艾尔玛，而不是小“v”，感谢他的笑话，并把她带了回来。因此，当艾尔玛饰演的米基埃拉气喘吁吁、满脸愤怒的表情出现时，伯里克利并不感到惊讶。他知道自己被骗了。

卡米洛和米基埃拉之间出现了一些活泼的场面——责备、灾难威胁、她主动表示爱意。对他表现出宫廷的蔑视。艾尔玛的声音非常细腻地捕捉着她昔日的情人。那是一种带着利爪的声音，尖锐地进入听觉，并留下它在休息时拔毛。当她向他求爱无果后，转身说道——

“对于一个喜欢芦苇的人来说，这是什么变化？
屈服于我扭曲的双手？他会退缩吗？
这就是我曾经喂过的猎犬吗
用几滴醋和几滴油？

米基埃拉进一步向观众传达的信息表明，她允许卡米洛和卡米拉举行结婚仪式，是为了在最后一刻向年轻人展示她的力量，让可憎的卡米拉陷入羞耻和悲惨之中。 。

卡米洛退休：奥尔索伯爵出现。父女之间有一首二重唱：她承认了她对卡米洛的热情，并恳求她的父亲停止仪式；在这里，意大利人的正义感情，即使是在热血沸腾的情况下，也是值得注意的。奥尔索伯爵说，他愿意满足他的女儿，就像这会让他自己满意一样，但他必须尊重法律。 “法律是你自己制定的，”米奇埃拉说。 “那么，我就必须更加尊重它，”奥索伯爵回答道。

观众们在一阵短暂的低语中对奥地利做出了如此多的赞扬。

米奇埃拉在一旁说道：“我会等待，直到他被愤怒吞噬为止！”创造了笑声；这与奥尔索伯爵——花脸、大腹便便的男低音勒布鲁诺——所表现出的异常浮夸的自我满足形成鲜明对比。这是不可抗拒的。他站着，浮肿得像一只晨鸡。为了进一步说明这一点，他用戴着黑手套的手摘下了黄色帽子，并将重要的颜色显着地敲在他巨大的胸前——这个想法不是阿戈斯蒂诺的，而是勒布鲁诺自己的；阿戈斯蒂诺愤怒地咒骂道。他和罗科都知道，他们的共同努力可能只能在奥地利领土上展示一晚的存在，但他们对勒布鲁诺将其发送到阴影的主要优点感到不满。

听到村民们走近的声音。 '我的父亲！'米奇埃拉心烦意乱地喊道； “时辰已近：你的女儿将面临死亡！”监禁卡米洛：我可以带二十个证人来证明他已经宣誓你是这个国家的非法领主。你会后悔这段婚姻。像你以前那样做。及时大胆。箭头在绳子上——把绳子剪断！”

“像我以前那样吗？”奥尔索皱着眉头回答道，样子棒极了，就像黑色的波峰。他大大地转身，以父亲的方式接受同胞们的合唱——这是一场令人钦佩的严肃滑稽表演。

此时，德国部分观众已经通过某种感官隐约察觉到这部歌剧是某种隐藏的影子——多亏了水牛男低音勒布鲁诺。毫无疑问，他们以前会看到这一点，但奥地利的审查制度似乎是绝对的保障。

'我的孩子们！在这个我快乐的王国里，所有人都是我的孩子！奥尔索伯爵说着，在收到一首颂扬其父权政府的合唱歌曲的赞美后，便向前迈进。米奇埃拉跟着他。

然后是深深的呼吸暂停。因为，就像在午夜，你数着辛苦时刻的钟声，却不知道在黑暗中是否还会有一个钟声超越它，所以你悬在深渊上，直到十二点钟声响起，观众和演员凝视着带着同样的期待，望着从城堡蜿蜒而出的小路，等待着新首席女主角的声音。

“米娅妈妈！”它发出微弱的颤抖声。没有人能说出谁会出现。

罗科·里奇用指挥棒击打了两下，用他的肩膀向所有的朋友投来了光芒四射的一瞥，屋子里充满了欢乐。维多利亚站在他们面前。

她的打扮就像出自提香之手的高贵少女。意大利观众在第一眼看到一位首席女主角时，不得不持批评态度，因为他们被要求向一位因她的优点而被接受的女王致敬：他们所听到的和被教导的对她的期望都被比较迅速观察她的外表和举止。她接受严格检查以发现缺陷。一开始并没有强烈的忠诚度。现在很明显，维多利亚选择模仿一个重要人物，她的方法表现受到了嫉妒的关注，以寻找不平等的迹象，无论是在她的动作还是她眼神的力量上。在其他情况下，如此沉默的接待可能会显得很残酷。尽管在所有情况下，获得桂冠的候选人都必须与罪犯一样，经历辩护的考验。人们不会衷心低头，除非他们让有抱负的人参加一些个人较量，并发现自己处于劣势。感官在开始时就比判断更加严格，比意志更加专横，随时准备成为奉承和快乐的奴隶。人们看到了一个穿着琥珀色和淡蓝色丝绸的人物，就像总督出征与亚得里亚海人结婚的那天，伟大的威尼斯人可能在他的窗户上画出的那样：一个美丽的意大利头像，有着深色的带状发辫和一双深邃的深色眼睛毫不掩饰柔软的眼皮下！她的移动就像是，在长时间凝视一幅美丽女子的画作后，我们可能会看到她从画框中移开的景象。这是一幅理想意大利的动画图片。一直到最高的围墙的头海在她面前闪闪发光，而她却像月出一样沉默。一位处女从怀中放出一只鸽子时，并不比维多利亚发出声音更费力。白鸟飞快地振翅；它盘旋并飞行。这声音似乎不太像歌手自己的。

主题如下：——卡米拉一夜之间梦见她失踪的母亲来到她的床边祝福她的婚礼。她的母亲裹在黑色裹尸布里，看上去像死亡一样无形，就像真正的死亡，只是死亡不流泪。她哭了，声音没有变化，也没有颤抖，就像一个天生在哭泣的人：“随着她眼泪的流淌，我对她的容貌有了了解。”看阿迪杰河、明乔河、台伯河和波河！——如此伟大的河流，她的泪水从她的眼中涌出。她掀开裹尸布：她的胸部和四肢光滑而坚挺，如同不朽女神的胸部和四肢；但胸部和四肢却显示出卑鄙之人在殉道圣人身上的残酷笔迹。鲜血从那些深深的伤口中时不时地涌出来，与她的泪水混合在一起。她说：

'我的孩子！如果我是女神，我的伤口就会愈合。如果我是圣人，我应该在天堂里。我不是女神，也不是圣人：但我不能死。我的伤口流淌，我的泪水流淌。我的眼泪不是因为肉体的痛苦而流淌：我宽恕我的敌人。我的血从我的身体流淌，我的泪水从我的灵魂流淌。它们流淌是为了洗刷我的耻辱。我必须用我身体的耻辱来弥补我灵魂的耻辱。哦！尽管每天我都带着太阳，就像我跳动的心一样，但我该如何告诉你在我的孩子们中间行走是什么感觉呢？每个夜晚的月亮，就像一颗没有血液的心。他们看到太阳和月亮，但看不到我！他们不认识他们的母亲。我向上帝哭泣。我们上帝的回答是这样的：——“让你的孩子一一喝你混合的泪水和血：——然后，如果他们有美德，他们就会复活，你就会复活。”如果他们没有德行，他们和你就会继续屈服，牛就会从你身上踩过去。”卡米拉啊，我的孩子，从天堂的高坛上，我得到了这个银色的圣杯。把我的眼泪聚集在里面，用我的血填满它，然后喝下去。

到目前为止，这首歌一直非常单调，几乎是格里高利历的严肃性。

”我接过杯子。我看着妈妈的脸。我用她的泪水和她的血来盛满杯子；我喝了！

维多利亚用力地喊出了这最后一句话。她从采访中根深蒂固的女低音，上升到纯粹的女高音来描述自己的行为。 “我喝了，”声音逐渐减弱：最后一个音符是小调——它抓住了耳朵，仿佛更多的声音必须随之而来：就像决心胜利后的哀号。这是大胆的戏剧音乐天才的杰作，以睿智的狡猾和勇气向在场的同情观众演奏。所谓的不完整让他们继续倾听。专心致志地发出了最后一个落下的（可以说是破碎的）音符，唤醒了他们的脑海。正是小调的效果，以这种特殊的暗示来搅动男人的心。房子升起，意大利人和德国人一起。天才、音乐和热情打破了国籍的界限。一场花束雨落在维多利亚周围；埃维瓦斯、勇敢、喊叫——所有疯狂男人的叫喊声包围了她。男男女女，甚至在冷酷的合唱中，也一起颤抖着哭泣。 “阿戈斯蒂诺！”和“罗科！”被称为; “维多利亚！” “维多利亚！”最重要的是，雷声越来越大，就像一场暴风雨冲下山谷，从岩石到岩石，轰鸣声很大，在山谷的前面再次爆发。她的名字被一遍又一遍地传唱——“维多利亚！”维多利亚！就好像嘴巴对它着迷一样。

“意大利的维多利亚万岁！”是从屋体中传出的。

一个回声回答道——“Italia a il premio della VITTORIA！”这句众所周知的谚语被光荣地改编，光荣地从耻辱中拯救出来。

但那股巨大狂乱的对象和源头却像被她刻意掌握的魔法的揭秘一样冻结了。一根花束，最后一支支流阵雨，从远处喷出，落在她的脚边。她无意识地优先考虑了它，然后把它捡了起来。中间固定了一张小纸。她用机械手打开了它，认为里面可能有给她的爱国命令。这是一张面值一千几尼的支票，由安东尼奥-伯里克利·阿格里奥普洛斯（Antonio-Pericles Agriolopoulos）亲笔向一位英国银行家开出。刚画的；墨水只干了一半，显示出强烈冲动的迹象。这些扎实的散文，以及令人信服的证据，证明她的艺术是成功的，恢复了维多利亚的平静，尽管不是她早期的雕像般的简单。罗科用询问的眼神看她是否会重复这首歌。她坚决地摇头。她打开花束里的纸，平息了大家的热情，她的愿望被看到，合唱队被允许篡夺她的位置。阿戈斯蒂诺在大厅里来回踱步，担心自己让她走向了虎头蛇尾。

他遇见了安东尼奥-伯里克利，并告诉了他这一点。补充道（现在面具已经被看穿了，不再有用了）他不忍心将卡米拉母亲的幻象推迟到稍后的场景，以免出现中断，完全无法听到它。伯里克利对维多利亚尚未取得的任何成功表现出蔑视。 “等待第三幕，”他说；但他急于与每个人进行交流，无论是爱国者还是批评家，无论是德国人、英国人还是意大利人，这都暴露了他血管里流淌着的狂喜的激动。 “啊哈！”这是他问候的开始； “当安东尼奥-伯里克利告诉你，他有一位首席女歌手让你震惊整个基督教世界，他的音符就像天使在雅各布的梯子上上下下一样安全和坚定时，我的朋友们，他错了吗？啊哈！

“你看到你叔叔在向你打手势吗？”莉娜伯爵夫人对威尔弗里德说道。他像一个迷雾中的人一样回答，既没有看她，也没有看将军，将军没有听从手势，而是幽默地带着韦斯普里斯船长来到包厢。

“我们正在协助一场精彩的表演，”他说。

“我爱上了她的声音，”安娜伯爵夫人说。

哎呀；如果这只是声音的问题的话，伯爵夫人。

“我认为这些好人需要痛击，”韦斯普里斯上尉说。

“皮尔森中尉不同意你的意见，”安娜伯爵夫人说道。听到自己的名字，威尔弗里德转向他们，表现出一种疲倦，但还不足以引起嫉妒的观察，因为他的眼睛在不经意地垂下的眼睑下迅速移动，当他们假装协助他流利的舌头时，他的眼睛在舞台上敏锐地扫视。

莉娜伯爵夫人将她的歌剧镜对准卡洛·阿米亚尼，然后将镜子放在她姐姐的手里。威尔弗里德喝下了深深的苦涩。 “那是维多利亚的情人，”他想。 “曾经爱过我的艾米莉亚的情人！”

皮尔森将军可能注意到了这个小插曲：他用简短的军人语气对他的侄子说：“出去；出去；出去！”确保整个团的人都在房子附近；在每个后门驻扎十几个人和一名中士，然后留在下面。我大错特错了，否则今晚我们就得抓到这个小女人了。”

“到底是怎么回事，”他继续说道，威尔弗里德野蛮地站起来，用最僵硬的鞠躬走了出去，“这部歌剧被允许上演，我猜不出来！小孩子都能看穿它。我们民政当局的愚蠢超出了我的理解——这真是一个奇迹！我们有严格的命令，不得采取任何主动行动，否则我会阻止卡米拉小姐再发出任何声音。”

“如果你这么做了，我会生你的气，将军，”安娜伯爵夫人说道。

“我也认为政府不会做错事，”莉娜伯爵夫人也加入了进来。

将军满意地说：“好吧，我们拭目以待。”

莉娜伯爵夫人低声与韦斯普里斯上尉交谈，指的是她所说的韦斯普里斯上尉与卡洛·阿米亚尼之间的争执。船长的反驳非常有趣。

“你这个钢铁侠！”她惊呼道。

“用‘钢铁之躯’这个词更合适。”她姐姐低声说道。

“如果发生的话，这将是一次暗杀。”

“没有哪个军官能够忍受公开的侮辱，莉娜。”

“我不会坐视我的老玩伴安娜受到伤害。”

“小心不要为了讨厌你的人而背叛自己。”

蒙蒂尼和维多利亚之间的伟大二人组让所有谈话都安静下来。卡米拉告诉卡米洛她的梦想。他发誓要找到她的母亲（如果她还活着）；如果死了，就为她报仇。卡米拉说她相信她的母亲在奥索伯爵城堡的地牢里。两人的任务是让维多利亚表演华丽的段落。这证明了她良好的艺术能力。

“我是个傻瓜，”安东尼奥-伯里克利想。 “我把我的花束和牛群一起扔了出去。我当时很傻！我失去了理智！

他愤怒地敲击着外套口袋里的小墨水瓶。第一幕，在假卡米洛和米基埃拉之间的场景之后，以卡米洛和卡米拉的婚姻结束；——由蒙蒂尼、维多利亚、艾尔玛和勒布鲁诺组成的四人组。米奇埃拉陷入绝望；奥尔索伯爵对父权和对法律的奉献有着深刻的认识。他已将卡米拉母亲查封的部分财产归还给卡米拉。当他体验到她丈夫的良好行为后，剩下的一部分将交给她。其余的他认为通过（条约）合法地属于他自己，并通过占有和记录他的剑的权利。他必须守住那边的城堡。这是他所有其他领地的钥匙。没有它，他的地位就没有保障。 （暗指奥地利人的论点，即伦巴第平原是阿尔卑斯山的战略防御线。）

幕布落下后，当维多利亚被叫到时，阿戈斯蒂诺被虎头蛇尾的恐惧所驱使，从维多利亚的视线中逃跑了。他走向罗科·里奇（Rocco Ricci）（他已经在高处向公众鞠躬），发现这位大师喝阿斯蒂来抵消他自然的兴奋。罗科告诉阿戈斯蒂诺，直到最后一刻，他和幕后的任何人都不知道维多利亚会出现，除了她给他发了一张纸条，承诺做好接听电话的准备。伊尔玛很晚才飞来，她愤怒而混乱，祈祷能站在卡米拉一边；但她却没有这么做。但蒙蒂尼拒绝与第二女主角一起扮演第一女主角。他们在开始这部歌剧时不确定它是否可以超越卡米拉所呈现的情况继续下去。 “我准备扔出我的接力棒，”罗科说，“并公开指控政府强奸了我们的首席女主角。艾尔玛我已经准备好更换了。我本可以填补这个空白。他谈到了维多利亚的胜利。阿戈斯蒂诺脸色阴沉。 '哈！'他说，“只要我们不失败，就像你的阿斯蒂拔掉软木塞一样。”我应该更喜欢更进步一点的热情。在那场热烈的欢呼之后，我突然产生了倒退的念头。

“或者你认为你在第一幕中融入了你最好的诗歌？”罗科恶意地建议道。

“一点也没有！”阿戈斯蒂诺非常愤怒地否定了这个想法，并且气喘吁吁。但他说，“如果歌剧立即停演，我不应该哀叹。”

'不！'罗科喊道； “让我们度过一晚吧。”我为此讨价还价。梅多莱欺骗了我们，但我们继续前进。我们已经是受害者了，我的阿戈斯蒂诺。

“但我确实规定，”阿戈斯蒂诺说，“我的宝石今晚不会在杯子里融化。”我一定要见她。事实上，她不可避免地会在一周或一个月的监禁名单中排名靠后。

安东尼奥-伯里克利有一个独特的微妙之处，就是在他把他那一束华丽的财宝扔到维多利亚脚下后，他没有立即去见维多利亚。他陶醉于他预见到的并已达到顶峰的成功，现在不顾一切后果。他觉得自己已经准备好将爱国的意大利抱在怀里，只要它能像维多利亚那样成功，而且是当场成功。她唱起开场圣歌或赞美诗中严厉的乐句，使这个人转变了态度，一度给他带来了一颗新的心。他也感到安慰，因为他给予了它最辉煌的奖励——可以说，是用金色斜体字表示赞扬。因此，她肯定会宽恕他无私地移植她的努力，也许她未来会绝对服从或效忠。与皮尔森将军会面后，皮尔森将军重整旗鼓。

“哎呀，我亲爱的伯里克利，你把这个女孩赶走的计划是一致的。我唯一担心的是，在另一个场合，政府会对它和你采取不同的看法。

伯里克利耸耸肩。 “众神，我亲爱的将军，法令。我尽力向他们陈述情况；就这些。'

'呃，好吧！我认为你不会向统治米兰的诸神提出许多其他案件。

“我帮助他们创作了一部好歌剧。”

“你知道这部歌剧完全是由政治暗示组成的吗？”

皮尔森将军的言论带有攻击性，就像彬彬有礼的奥地利军队在向被征服者或平民讲话时偶尔允许自己做的那样。

“对我来说，”伯里克利回答道，“一部歌剧——它就是音乐。”我不知道更多了。

“你要对此负责，”将军严厉地说。 “这是基于你的信任而采取的。”

“残酷的奥地利人！”伯里克利低声说道。 “将军，你不太看重她的声音吗？”

“很公平，先生。”

“难怪她不愿意对这些猪张开喉咙！”改变了的希腊人想。

维多利亚的门对阿戈斯蒂诺关闭了。里面没有声音回答。他试了一下门锁，然后就离开了。她呆呆地坐着。对她来说，第二次露面比第一次露面更困难，当时残酷地附着在她身上的可耻怀疑帮助她用叛逆的骄傲平衡了她的步伐；更重要的是，她雄心勃勃的少女时代的巨大浪潮将她推到了这个位置，就像在为完美而做最后的努力一样。现在她已经赢得了公众的声音（爱，她的心称之为爱），她的眼睛向内看；她的眼睛向内看。她思考着自己必须要做的事情，紧张地咳嗽了一声。她咳嗽得吓坏了自己，一想到要再次在赤裸裸的舞台灯光和干渴的眼睛中前进，她就浑身发抖。而且，此外，第二幕的音乐和诗歌的特点并没有增强她的力量：——对其质量稍差的认识可能是阿戈斯蒂诺害怕虎头蛇尾的根源。第二个唐娜占据了其中的主要部分——尤其是一首咏叹调（罗科出于同情而给了她），这适合艾尔玛纯粹的尖叫声和她可能成为的悲剧骨架。当维多利亚发现自己的灵魂陷入对艾尔玛的嫉妒的浅滩时，她知道自己的处境有多低。有一段时间，她失去了与自己的所有亲密感。她看着镜子里自己的脸，吞了口水，以为自己做了一场梦，把自己的大脑与梦混淆了。她孤独的房间里的寂静映入了房子的色彩和喧闹的光辉，以及对最近模仿的理想人物的奇怪记忆，使她感到自己从一个强大的显赫地位上跌落下来，并且她的躺在尘埃里。她桌上堆满的那些散发着香气的花朵似乎有毒，并责备她是错觉。她独自蹲着，直到她的轮胎女工叫唤。多说话的事情太可怕了！她自己熟悉的女仆贾辛塔是最难忍受的。

现在，米奇埃拉通过与卡米洛的同事莱昂纳多做爱，发现卡米洛正在密谋反对她的父亲。如果莱昂纳多背叛他的朋友，她确实向他做出了非常愉快的承诺。莱昂纳多是一位摇摆不定的男中音，他抱怨说，爱情应该要求任何回报，除了爱情帝国的硬币。他被引诱了，如果他完成了他发誓要完成的事情，他就会对他的头上发出诅咒。卡米拉对这个可怜虫抱有完全的信心，并让她更加怀疑的丈夫在她的脑海里。

卡米洛和卡米拉同意戴上放荡情侣的面具。他们打开了他们的豪宅；掷骰子、打赌、勾心斗角、狂欢、掩饰，开始。米奇埃拉受到卡米洛的热烈追求。卡米拉轮流与莱昂纳多和奥尔索伯爵开玩笑。米奇埃拉再次嫉妒卡米拉，警告并威胁莱昂纳多；但她却成了卡米洛的骗子，部分是出于回报爱情，部分是出于对情敌报仇的渴望。卡米拉说服奥尔索抛弃米奇拉。痴情的伯爵蜡像是不祥的滑稽表演的化身；他对一切都按自己的方式行事。由于男低音勒布鲁诺的滑稽表演和维多利亚的狡猾，整个表演都是一部带有恐怖背景的高级喜剧。维多利亚表现出了迷人的幽默精神。她唱了一首迷人的船歌，让房子震动起来。她的心里是如此的忧郁，以至于她把自己抛在了所有的轻浮之中。该法案的弱点在于，在某些地方过于明显地暴露了诗意政治哑炮的手指。作为一个没有其他出路的阿戈斯蒂诺人，这样做的诱惑是不可抗拒的，现在他坐在那里为自己艺术上的堕落而呻吟，现在它就在他面前。掌声几乎无法安慰他，他带着羞辱的心情承认自己对音乐和歌手的亏欠，而他们对他的亏欠是多么的少。

现在，卡米洛很高兴接受妻子的热烈热情，这种伪装也符合他的品味，但他性格的缺陷是他不能在任何程度上配合；他坚持积极的领导权！——（暗指意大利在主权方面的弱点；这一点没有被注意到，并为他过度的狡猾而苦笑）。卡米洛不能把阴谋留给她。他追求米奇埃拉，用甜言蜜语制服她。对她的责备就停止了。他们之间有一个二人组。他们交换银钥匙，表达绝对的亲密，并给予相互的自由出入。卡米洛现在可以将他的追随者秘密藏在城堡里；米奇埃拉可以进入卡米拉的蓝色房间，并毁坏她的棺材，寻找叛国信件。她巧妙地让他反思她为他放弃了什么；这样可以帮助他抛开对他也可能造成危险的想法。

艾尔玛尖锐的渐强和八度跳跃，在她独特的窒息态度的帮助下，在这个场景中表现得很好。关于拉泽罗拉授予的恶劣特权的抱怨声是听不见的。但这一规定已有目击者。柱子后面不断变换的男中音，时不时地加入一句旁白。莱昂纳多发现他对卡米拉的忠诚正在恢复。他决定守护她。卡米洛现在把一块加了香水的手帕扔到鼻子下面，吸了一口浮夸的香气，想到自己将在没有卡米拉帮助的情况下完成这一切，让她大吃一惊；从而教会她知道他在某种程度上是一个英雄。她把自己的角色演得如此彻底，以至于他可以选择把她看成一个轻浮的人；他谈到了经常发生的事例：少女时期是疯狂的梦想家，婚后却成为疯狂的妻子。他的追随者聚集在一起，以便他可以利用交换的银钥匙。在冲突发生之前，他很感动地寻求卡米拉的拥抱：——她很美丽！从来没有像她这样美丽过！他去找她，是为了承受嫉妒的痛苦。但他在实践银钥匙的使用方面并不是最先的。米基埃拉首先与她的父亲安排在某个时间与武装人员一起出现在卡米拉的门前，当时她正在卡米拉的私人房间里，她的手放在一个怀孕的乌木盒子上，这时她被一声响动吓了一跳，陷入隐藏状态。莱昂纳多冲破平开窗。卡米拉随后出现。莱昂纳多向她伸出指尖；他跪下承认自己有罪并警告她。卡米洛进来了。米奇埃拉把自己推到他面前，指着那对受难的夫妇“看！”就是为了让你知道我在这里。看哪，盛大的四轮车！

在向卡米拉承认自己有罪的同时，莱昂纳多通过强调米奇拉对他的魔力影响来开脱。 （列奥纳多，事实上，就是现代意大利的小马基雅维利，他狡猾得无可匹敌，因为他总是在最后一刻成为他可怜的心灵或诚实的受害者：他缺乏伟大爱国目标的灵感。 ）如果说Michiella（奥地利阴谋）有什么爱好的话，那就是对于这样一个工具。她承受不起失去他的代价。她为他求情；而且，由于卡米拉对他的事情保持沉默，愤世嫉俗的宽宏大量的卡米洛倾向于饶恕一条无牙蛇。米奇埃拉把他从裸露的剑上拉到舞台后面。可怕的拒绝场景随之而来，卡米洛抛弃了他的妻子。如果这对一半的意大利观众来说是一个谜题，那么另一半则完全理解了它，并且欣喜若狂。因此，“年轻的意大利”经常受到妥协、不满、磨蹭的贵族阶层的对待。卡米拉对他喊道：“相信我！”对我有信心！对我有信心！这是对他的指控、他的永远厌恶的威胁和普遍的狂妄崇高的唯一回答。她无法保护自己；她只知道自己的清白。他是无情的，是两者之中有罪的一个。卡米拉双臂交叉，转身离开他，唱道：

'母亲！我的命运是我应该知道你的苦难，并追随你的足迹。悲伤踏遍地球的繁星点点：在你漫长的足迹中，我感受到是谁生下了我。我独自一人;没有主的妻子；我的家与陌生人同在——家令人厌恶！——但我相信在那里能遇见你的灵魂。悲伤之母！你无法分享的快乐：所以让我在坟墓间漫步，在柏树和枯萎的花朵间漫步。你的灵魂与死去的太阳同在：让我在那里；一个与你分享面纱的沉默之物。

低音提琴般美妙的颤抖声响彻整个房子。这是对维多利亚最高的敬意，不再有任何叫喊声，只剩下长时间的低语，就像当一个人给另一个人讲述一个深情的故事时，所有的感叹，所有隐秘的想法，所有聚集的情感温柔，都保留在最后，收盘时人们看到它们堆积如山，就像水坝上的水一样。看到一大群人类生物在巫师屈从于一个灵魂的声音中闪闪发光，这种奉承属于艺术家，也是歌唱者的荣耀，超越了这个世界所赋予的任何可怜的荣耀。她感觉到了，但她感觉这是一种不同的东西。她内心深处充满了意大利对意大利的呼唤：意大利的耻辱、她的悲伤、她的折磨、她不灭的希望和对自由的看法。它让她全身充满叛逆的血液。一旦它完全扼杀了她的笔记。她把下巴放到了喉咙里。毫无仪式感地停了下来；并恢复了自我。维多利亚有着过于强烈的艺术本能，无法迎合现实。从那时起，她就尽可能地纠正了阿戈斯蒂诺剧本中的下划线。

另一方面，伊尔玛陷入了他的所有陷阱，并用挥霍浪费的色彩和坦率的能量描绘了她的奥地利心：

“现在莱昂纳多是我的工具：
卡米拉是我的奴隶：
我讨厌的她走上前去冷静
她的愤怒超越了波浪。
喜悦！喜悦！
我因爱抚而得到全额报酬；
在牧师的祝福之前，我只接受，但不给予任何东西。

一个微妙的区别。她坚持尊重牧师（天主教）的祝福，同时她也表示决心在卡米拉的案件中取消这种祝福。艾尔玛对奥地利制服的同情心众所周知，这使得她在宣叙调中唱或朗诵的许多双刃剑的诗句变得荒唐可笑。强烈地为她鼓掌的讽刺是不可抗拒的。

卡米拉被指控犯有阴谋罪，并通过自己的承认证明有罪。

该法案随着奥尔索伯爵和他的部队的进入而结束。阴谋者被吓倒了；卡米拉否认了；奥尔索伯爵尽显正义；莱昂纳多懊恼不已。卡米洛被赦免；米奇埃拉胜利了。卡米洛为了安全牺牲了妻子。他拥有她的财产；因此，奥尔索伯爵对法律的尊重使他对婚姻联盟有着敏锐的洞察力，现在他像父亲一样愿意，甚至渴望在教皇离婚后将米基埃拉赐给他。这样，梦寐以求的硕果累累的土地就可以属于家庭了。合唱团唱起了一首赞美“伟大房屋的建造者”海门的歌。卡米拉开始流亡。这个词没有被说出，但提到“陌生人的面包、陌生的面孔、寒冷的气候”就足够了。

“问题是，我们是否应该静静地坐着，看着我们脸上闪过的火把，”帷幕落下时，皮尔森将军说道。他正在格拉特利公爵夫人的包厢外与德·皮尔蒙特少校交谈。两名将军加入了他们，不久之后是塞拉比廖内伯爵，他带着礼貌的半讽刺的微笑，他们立即转身背对着他。幸运的是这种侮辱没有被看到，伯爵抚摸着剃光的下巴，微笑着继续前进。军官们要决定的重点是，他们是否敢于冒犯热情的家族——米兰人口的火热核心——在更糟糕的情况发生之前阻止歌剧演出。

他们自己的观点完全是军事性的。但最近从维也纳发出的伪自由主义电报让他们陷入瘫痪。他们耸耸肩，有些恶意地同意，最好把这种厌恶的责任留给审查剧本的局。事实上，他们看到，试图阻止房子内的事态发展会带来极大的危险。

“这群人的脾气正在发生奇怪的变化，”皮尔森将军说。德·皮尔蒙特少校听了一会儿他们要说的话，然后回到公爵夫人身边。阿玛莉亚给劳拉写了这样的诗句：“如果她唱那首歌，她就会被抓住在舞台的两侧。”我命令我的马车准备好带她去她昨晚应该去的地方。你是否只策划她逃出房子？乔治·德·P. 会帮助你。我喜欢顽皮的叛逆者！

德·皮尔蒙特少校将信送到了劳拉的信箱。他下楼去找公爵夫人的猎手，给了他一定的命令和旅行费用。他环顾四周，看到了威尔弗里德，后者恳求他代替他休息两分钟。德皮尔蒙特笑了。 “她很棒，我的朋友。跟我来吧。我要去幕后。不幸的经理是一个破产的人；让我们都向他表示哀悼。他可能有孩子，而孩子们喜欢面包。”

威尔弗里德正挽着德皮尔蒙特的手臂，怀着对往日的生动回忆，他用维多利亚的眼睛扫了一眼自己的制服。 “她会朝我吐口水！”他嘟囔着，然后落在了后面。

维多利亚在她的房间里与罗科、阿戈斯蒂诺和经理萨尔沃洛（萨尔沃洛）商议，萨尔沃洛在一定程度上是他们的骗子。萨尔沃洛向她提出了皮尔森将军新写的禁令，要求他将第三幕的主要独奏部分排除在外，并迅速结束该剧。他的理由是，如果接下来发生起义，他已经准备好付出很多代价。但仅仅让当局留胡子就是疯狂的。他陈述自己的情况决不是以辩护人的身份，尽管这位首席女歌手的成功给他留下了深刻的印象，使他表现出礼貌的紧迫感。

“划掉你喜欢的东西，”维多利亚说。

阿戈斯蒂诺用食指打她。 '流氓！你值得一顶皇冠。你受过君主制教育。你已经准备好放弃你不喜欢的东西，以及不属于你自己的东西。

阿戈斯蒂诺与萨尔沃洛的争执浪费了大部分时间。他们为这个那个印刷的咏叹调讨价还价，争吵不休，但这是对这个不幸的人的可悲的欺骗。随着维多利亚唱这首煽动性歌曲的决心越来越坚定，她就越有必要让自己的灵魂摆脱欺骗。她说：“萨尔沃洛先生，您对我很好，我不会做任何损害您利益的事情。”我想你一定会因为自己是意大利人而受苦，就像我们其他人一样。我要唱的歌曲不是写出来的，也不是印刷出来的。书中的内容不会伤害你，因为审查已经通过了；当然，只有我一个人负责唱出书中没有的内容——我和大师。他支持我。我们都采取了预防措施”（她微笑着）“以确保我们的财产安全。如果您被掠夺了，我们将与您分享。并且相信，哦！以上帝的名义，相信你不会无缘无故地受苦！

萨尔沃洛惊讶地从她身上惊呆了。他宣称自己被严重欺骗并落入陷阱。他威胁要立即派公司去他们家。 '敢于！'阿戈斯蒂诺说；从这栋房子的气氛来判断，可以肯定的是，如果他这样做，斯卡拉歌剧院在早晨的眼中就会成为一座破烂的公寓。但阿戈斯蒂诺支持了他对她放弃那首歌的请求；罗科让了步，半羞涩地要求她谨慎行事。她记得劳拉、卡洛，还有她那可怜的、受惊的外国母亲。她对自己职责的强烈理想观念在她的大脑中沉入并舞动，就像飞行员之星在颠簸的船头跳舞一样。所有人都反对她，就像暴风雨反对这艘船一样。就连上面的光（我想象她可以用它来代表她顽固意志的智慧而恳求的光）也被彻底的黑暗染成了黑色。她不记得有一句话可以证明她既定方针的正确性。她唯一的想法就是用一根看不见的线来控制自己的国家，如果她放松控制，意大利的永久福利就会受到危害。简单的固执的意志支撑着她。

当天空黑暗、大海愤怒时，你们水手们就会把舱口封起来。维多利亚同样相信自己的直觉，关闭了她的感官通道——什么也看不见，什么也听不到。经理人绝望的表情后来触动了她。贾辛塔用双手击打他的额头，把他赶了出去。她对阿戈斯蒂诺和罗科也做了同样的事，因为他们不外露。

他们知道，此时政府特工很可能正在洗劫他们的房间，并没收他们的物品。

“你的钢琴租了吗？” ”前者说。

“不，”后者说，“你的拖鞋是吗？”

他们笑着走各自的路。

第三幕的歌词充满了青年意大利的情感。我希望我能将罗科·里奇的美妙音乐的任何想法传达到您的脑海中，并触摸您来感受这个新声音中的启示。罗科和维多利亚赋予了这些诗句现在不属于他们的生命；然而，由于它们包含了反抗的许多重要精神，它们可能会帮助你了解信仰的一些想法，并可能有助于证明这段历史的合理性。

罗科在《卡米拉》歌剧中的音乐源自一口新鲜的意大利井。既不是挽歌般的旋律，也不是感性的抒情诗，也不是欢乐的狂人；它像一部古老的杰作一样严肃，充满了轻快活泼的脉络，旋律足够清晰，足以让那些喜欢吮吸声音糖梅的人着迷。他确实本想为公众提供更多甜蜜的东西，但这部歌剧是为她创作的，一直在他身边的维多利亚很年轻，而且坚定地致力于古典音乐的理想，应该提升而不是低落。引诱或奉承不假思索的听众。正如她的声音为这部歌剧提供了灵感一样，她的品味也受到了影响。她的声音属于伟大声音的范畴，是其中的王者之声。纯粹而不衰减，热情而不扭曲，一听就让人绝对放心。当晚，她的主题和她的模仿都是偶然的介绍，但有些段落中，她卓越的艺术才华和她歌声的至高无上的饱满和火热，让人想起了感激的喜悦。这就是伟大的声音为我们所做的。它很少让我们的耳朵感到惊讶。它照亮了我们的灵魂，就像你看到闪电让难以理解的渴望黑暗跃入长长的山脊、蜿蜒的山谷、城市的尖顶，以及光中的光的内部凹处，玫瑰般的，朝着紫罗兰色热量的中央核心。

幕布升起时，平原骑士鲁道夫、罗穆尔多、阿诺多等人在卡米洛的愚蠢行为毁掉了一切时密谋推翻奥尔索伯爵，他们聚集在一起，对卡米拉的流放表示遗憾，并表示失去了她，他们的无助和优柔寡断。他们对卡米洛表示蔑视，卡米洛今天将与妻子离婚，娶了令人厌恶的米基埃拉。他的品味不被人欣赏。

他们假装走了。卡米洛出现。据他所知，他比奥索伯爵家里的养老金领取者好不了多少。他靠着忍耐守住了自己的土地。他的感官瘫痪了。他正处于白内障的第一个平滑的肩坡上。他知道他对妻子的嫉妒不仅毫无根据，而且是出于一种强烈的骄傲。有什么可做的吗？除了无奈地准备与阴谋家卡米拉离婚并与米奇埃拉结婚之外，什么也没有。杯苦苦，其歌悲。他做了一个人在这种困境中会做的最罕见的事情——他承认他会得到应得的报应。卡米拉的忠诚和纯洁触动了他的内心意识。他不知道她可能在哪里。他秘密地派遣使者到四面八方寻找她，找回她，并获得她的赦免：但徒劳无功。或许，他也不应该再见到她了。他被诅咒了，抛弃了他最亲密的朋友。胆怯的心永远无法与她的心协调一致地跳动。

“她在黑暗中，我在光明中。”我是光明上的一个污点；她是黑暗中的光。

蒙蒂尼以如此美好的心情倾诉了这句话，以至于全场的人都不再不耐烦地想见到女主人公了。但伊尔玛和勒布鲁诺在忍无可忍之下挺身而出。

“我们还不如敲手鼓，”勒布鲁诺在爱抚中说道。艾尔玛羞愧地咬着下唇。他们的笔记就像子弹撞在墙上一样平淡无奇。

这种情况激起了安东尼奥-伯里克利对剧本和革命者的愤怒。 “我认为，”他咧嘴一笑，说道，“这已经成为一场音乐会，而不是一部歌剧；这是市场上的音乐长篇大论。错觉是：这就是政治！

卡洛·阿米亚尼和他的母亲以及卢西亚诺坐在一起，气喘吁吁地等待着维多利亚的到来。里面的包厢门被粗暴地摇动了：一张纸条被塞到了门下面。他宣读了警告，要求他立即离开家。卢西亚诺和他的母亲都建议他离开。可恶的首字母“BR”和“Sbirri”一词揭示了谁发出了警告，以及危险是什么。朋友的建议和母亲的命令都未能打动他。 “当我看到她安全时；以前没有，”他说。

阿米亚尼伯爵夫人对卢西亚诺说道：“这是一个年轻人对一个女人的爱。”

“这个女人值得，”卢西亚诺回答道。

“没有哪个女人值得牺牲母亲和亲戚。”

“最亲爱的伯爵夫人，”卢西安诺说，“看看这个坑；这是一个大锅。我们很快就会把他救出来，不用担心：很快就会有足以让路西法逃脱的喧嚣。如果今晚什么都不做，明天早上他和我将前往加尔达湖，钓鱼、射击，并与卡图卢斯交谈。

伯爵夫人悲伤而严厉地看着她的儿子。他的眼睛呈现出明亮呆滞的神情，这表明他的大脑已冻结，内心正在动荡——理智的男人都会被疯狂所迷惑。她知道这没有什么吸引力。

听到一种非常沉闷的连续声音，就像一群愤怒的蜂群发出的声音，或者更像是电线快速、低沉的嗡嗡声。观众们在一侧侧翼看到了一名身穿棕色大衣的士兵。好奇的克罗地亚人只是满足了看一眼拥挤的半圆脑袋的愿望；他撤回了自己的，但在他唤醒了人群中的野兽之前。再过一会儿，野兽的吼叫声就会爆发出来。人们认为维多利亚已被逮捕或被禁止露面。阴谋者——平原骑士——相遇：鲁道夫、罗穆尔多斯、阿诺多斯和其他人——所以你知道卡米拉并没有闲着。她在歌剧结束的伟大场景中登场。

这是城堡的宴会厅。教皇离婚书摊在桌子上。宫廷朋友、侍卫和合唱团的婚礼团围成一圈。

“我已经得到了它，”奥尔索伯爵说道，“但我付出了代价。”

永远摇摆不定的莱昂纳多让我们知道，它有一个附带条件：如果卡米拉在一定期限内不露面，那就是最后一天。卡米洛挺身而出。当他意识到自己的错误和弱点时，为时已晚。他把心爱的人从怀里扔了出来，绝望地拥抱着他们。合唱团婚礼公司给出了中间的节节。骑士队入场。 “仔细观察它们，”莱昂纳多说。他们是平原的骑士。 “他们是来嘲笑我的，”卡米洛惊呼道，并避开了他们。

莱昂纳多、米奇埃拉和卡米洛现在唱着三尖瓣三重奏，或者用三点方式和谐地表达他们不同的情感。快速聚集的骑士们为每一个间隔的合唱都赋予了阳刚的特征。莱昂纳多恳求地拉着米奇拉的手臂。她拒绝他。他为她服务；她不再需要他了；但她会推荐他去其他地方，并请他去寻找那些地方。 “我会给你一个颈圈，上面写着“忠诚”。这是我能为你们的种族做的最大努力。”莱昂纳多认为自己受到了侮辱，但心中仍然存有一丝疑虑。 ‘她真是太公平了！她的伪装真是太棒了！她之前曾告诉他，她正在扮演一个角色，就像卡米拉那样。艾尔玛把太阳穴上的金环上的头发全部脱掉了，就像野蛮人一样。她的外表带有某种匈人的威严，这也部分地原谅了那个痴情的可怜虫，她因她的蔑视而颤抖，又因她的美丽和狡猾而狂喜。

在合唱团的中间，有一个蒙着面纱的身影和一个清晰可辨的声音。这个声音在每个节段都比其他声音更持久，并设法添加一个补充的对声短语，依次让人想起歌剧中最喜欢的旋律。卡米洛听到了，但认为这是充满激情的记忆的错觉，只是他反复吟诵的悠扬悔恨的主题。米奇埃拉听到了。她用卡米洛独奏的第三个音符来告诉我们她怀疑他们中间有一条蛇。莱昂纳多听到了。三人组成立。奥尔索伯爵在没有听到的情况下，邀请新婚夫妇办理必要的手续，做了一个四人组。合唱团将其小节改为处女膜之一。未知的声音以小调的三个小节不祥地结束了它。米基埃拉像阿提拉愤怒的女儿一样在歌手们身边悄悄靠近。她在蒙着面纱的人物面前停下来，说道：“你为什么在我的婚礼上戴着黑色面纱？”

“因为我的哀悼时间还没有结束。”

“你是我幸福中的阴影。”

“明亮的太阳总会有它的影子。”

“我希望所有人都在这一天感到高兴。”

“我的欢乐时刻即将到来。”

“你愿意揭开面纱吗？”

“你想直面风暴吗？”

“你愿意揭开面纱吗？”

“你渴望闪电吗？”

“我命令你揭开面纱，女人！”

米奇埃拉响亮的命令尖叫声没有引起任何反应。

“是她！”米奇埃拉从收缩的胸膛中喊道；用紧握的双手击打它。

'迅速签名。对手啊！你来这里是为了尝尝什么苦涩。

卡米拉在一旁唱道：“如果我的丈夫爱我并且是真的。”

奥尔索伯爵喊道：“让号角吹响，庆祝活动开始吧。”当他的人民跳舞喝酒时，他的国家的主人可能会沉睡！

喇叭声盛行。证人被传唤到餐桌旁。卡米洛手里拿着笔，准备着最伟大的表演。莱昂纳多在一侧看着米奇埃拉的热切。合唱团以一种柔和的悬念唱着歌，而卡米洛则用钢笔蘸墨水。

“她远离了我：她蔑视我：她对我失去了。”没有尊严的生活就是猪的生活。没有爱的结合是野兽的枷锁。噢，我真可怜！上天能测出我堕落的深度吗？

奥尔索伯爵用一种父亲般严厉的半语气来善意地暗示时间正在流逝。他说，当他年轻的时候，他会在少女的眼睛里闪烁出肯定的光芒，或者鹅掉下羽毛之前，以宽广而仁慈的活泼方式签名。

卡米洛还是有些小事。然后他把笔猛地摔在地上。

'绝不！我只有一个妻子。我们的婚姻是不可撤销的。受辱的人是永远的弃儿。如果我内心感到羞耻，那么尘世的财产对我来说又算什么呢？让一切都过去吧虽然我失去了卡米拉，但我将配得上她。不是笔，不是笔；这是我必须用来写作的剑。罢工，伯爵啊！我在这里：我独自一人。借这把剑的边缘，我发誓，我的任何行为都不会剥夺卡米拉的遗产；即使我死了，她也不会为胆小鬼哭泣！

人群离开了卡米拉——不再戴面纱，而是容光焕发；清新如一颗穿过腐败蒸气发出的星星，她的声音在其明显的优势中以星空般的音调：

“撕掉那令人难以忍受的卷轴！——
噢，你，我的爱人和我的灵魂！
是剑重聚；
我们的灭亡所写的笔。

她被搂在丈夫的怀里。

米基埃拉站在他们面前，表情可怕：——

‘该死的离婚者！你敢吗
躺在那里无耻的喜爱？
弃！在你躺着的额头上
你的名字现在将被铭刻。

卡米拉挣脱丈夫的怀抱：

“我的名字是我不畏惧的；
这是你听得会畏缩的一句话。
去吧，冷却你忏悔的火焰，
你这个生物，充满卑鄙的欲望！

卡米洛（面对奥尔索伯爵）。

“选择权在你！”

奥尔索伯爵（画画）。

“选择已经做出！”

合唱（缩小圈子）。

'熟悉的是那把裸露的刀刃。
别人的命运，自己的命运
挑衅的伙计多快啊！

米歇拉（因嫉妒而愤怒）。

'是的;我可以打她的脸。
父啊，先读一下这东西的耻辱。
我怨恨他们，光荣的死。
在他们最后的呼吸中注入毒药！

ORSO（左臂伸出）。

“你们两个被分开了：带着敬畏的心聆听
法源的判断。

卡米拉（自信地微笑）。

“不是这样的，当我在源头的时候，
它对我说：——但是走你的路吧。

奥尔索（惊讶）。

“你的脚步是弯曲的吗？”

米歇拉（拒绝口头争议）。

'她假装！
我的血管里流淌着一千把剑。
朋友们！士兵们，我把他们打倒了，这两个人！”

卡米洛（保持警惕，紧紧拥抱着他的妻子）。

''很好！我为我们所分享的一切哭泣。
是的，生或死，都很好！ “很好！”

米歇拉（跺脚）。

“我的心是被扔进地狱的容器！”

莱昂纳多（旁边）。

“这一天不会以愉快的婚礼结束。”

奥尔索（对卡米拉）。

“你来我们这里有什么目的？——说吧！”

卡米拉（低声）。
'我已越过我的父亲
为了我母亲失踪的消息。

或者。
“你母亲死了！”

卡米拉。
'她住在！'

米歇拉。
‘你撒谎了！
墓碑违抗！
命运女神谴责，复仇女神追逐
那个在理性面前说谎的可怜虫。

卡米拉。
'那么，飞吧；因为我们很适合尝试
哪个是白痴，你还是我？

米歇拉。
毫无风度的卡米拉！

或者
‘没脑子的丫头！
我珍惜你一颗珍贵的珍珠，
差点就拥有了我的孩子。

卡米拉。
“你让我像一颗宝石一样闪闪发光，
不小心我是血肉之躯；
不再是最后的延迟。
是时候证明我有一颗心了——
从我的这些墙壁出发！
他们内心的鬼魂被扰乱了
出去吧，平息你的愤怒，
因为我很坚强：卡米洛的真相
武装了我们年轻人的愿景。
我们的工会由最高元首
是有福的：我们的分离是梦想。
我们这些喝过血与泪的人，
对凡人的恐惧一无所知。
生命如同死亡，直到发生冲突
在我们的正义事业中，将死亡视为生命。

或者
“这很疯狂吗？”

莱昂纳多。
“这疯了吗？”

卡米拉。
'伙计们！
这是理性，但超出了你的认知范围。
那里存在着无人能看见的光
他们的思想是野蛮的：——只有少数人看到，
因此，少数人拥有神圣之光
他们的愿景是上帝的军团！——标志，
我给你;因为我们是孤独的，
而你却被冻僵了。
你麻痹的双手拒绝使用他们的剑。
我的话里有更锋利的边缘，
我的哭泣中留下了更致命的伤口。
是的，你杀了我们，我们会死吗？
迫使我们承受最坏的情况，
你首先让我们成为了不朽者。
离开！不要打扰我的视线。

骑士合唱团：鲁道夫、罗马尔多、阿诺尔多等。

“她以天使的力量感动我们。
如果他的宿主数量超过我们的宿主怎么办！
“天赐予胜利的力量。”

[他们拔出钢铁。 ORSO，模拟对他们的感激之情
对他的忠诚，向他们讲话，以平息他们的友好热情。]

米歇拉对莱昂纳多（恳求）。
“我永远是我的朋友，我会呼吁
徒劳地看到你闪烁的钢铁？

莱昂纳多（终于下定决心）。
‘叛徒！相反，祈祷它可以休息，
或者它的第一个家将是你的乳房。

新娘公司合唱团。
'明亮的奥罗拉头上开出的花朵
我们竭尽全力铺上一张幸福的床，
他们会在晚上之前被浸在血中吗？
婚礼有祸了！悲惨的景象！

鲁道夫、罗马尔多、阿诺多等人向卡米洛前进。米奇埃拉鼓励他们，这件事由他们亲手完成是件好事。他们命令卡米洛举起剑攻击他的敌人。莱昂纳多加入了他们。奥索伯爵在一阵责备之后，接受了卡米洛的和平提议，并交出了离开城堡的保证金。米奇埃拉凶狠地盯着卡米拉，恳求她说出她胜利的蔑视。她向卡米拉保证她准确地了解自己的感受。

“现在你认为我不知所措；我将度过一个不安宁的夜晚，在我的哭声结束后，躺在床上，我的头发铺在枕头上，脸的两侧，就像枯萎瀑布的绿色苔藓：你认为你会赐予一条小蛇从我偷来的宝藏中得到的礼物来安慰我。你会用卡米洛的一绺头发来安慰我，今晚我可以把它放在胸前，做梦，哭泣，翻滚，咒骂我呼吸的空气，像一千个卡米洛一样紧紧抓住可憎的空虚。说话！'

米奇埃拉的手腕上的匕首闪闪发光；她以瘦骨嶙峋的三角形迈步，面临着恶作剧：一个野蛮的匈奴女人，有着女神般的头发——一只猫前爪的形象。她紧挨着卡米拉，整个身高都很高，当刺客将他的打击提高到三倍时，她迅速地哭了三次，“说话”，对着温和地面向她的卡米拉，她举起了手臂，短剑闪进了卡米拉的怀里。

“那就去死吧，别再激怒我了。”

卡米拉摇摇晃晃地走向她的丈夫。卡米洛接受了她的摔倒。被莱昂纳多抓住的米奇埃拉呈现出僵硬的复仇姿态，双眸凶狠，高举匕首。喊声很多，也很寂静。

卡米拉，由卡米洛支持。
“如果这就是死亡，那也不难忍受。
你的手帕很快就吸干了我的血
似乎很喜欢它。我自己的头发丝
都编织在其中。这是我投的那个
那个午夜，从我的窗外，当你站在那里
独自一人，天堂似乎如此爱你！
我没想到要用我的血沾湿它
下次我把它扔给下面我的爱人。

卡米洛（珍惜她）。
“卡米拉，可惜了！说你不会死。
你的声音就像一个迷失在天空中的灵魂。

卡米拉。

“我不知道我的灵魂是否已飞翔；我知道
我的身体是我无法举起的重量：
他们之间我的声音有问题，并且
我踏上了无数日子的旅程。
忘却如闭海；
但你在我之上仍然非常明亮。
我的生命就像别人赐予我一样
我进入一片广阔而寒冷的黑暗。

卡米洛。
‘高贵的心啊！一百万次火灾消耗
这只可恶的手将你送入灭亡。

卡米拉。
'快乐有尽头：没有尽头
去努力；因此让我们永远努力
在纯洁中，辛劳将成为朋友，
并让我们可怜的死亡率继续存在。
我像光一样悬挂在边界上
当白天消逝时，沿着山丘
我感觉到夜幕悄然降临。
对你来说，我的丈夫，有一条燃烧的道路。

卡米洛。
“我失去了你的眼睛：我失去了你的声音：很微弱。”
啊，天哪！看到圣人垂下的眼睑。”

卡米拉。
“我们的生命只是一点点持有，借给
做一项伟大的工作：我们是一体的
当它消逝时，与天堂和星星一起
为了实现上帝的目标：否则我们就会和太阳一起死去。”

她下沉了。卡米洛把头低到她的上方。

屋子里一片寂静，就像真正的死亡现场一样。这更像是一场大教堂仪式，而不是一场歌剧盛会。阿戈斯蒂诺尽了最大努力将他的酋长信条的核心融入到最后的诗句中。罗科的音乐以庄严的方式让它们飘浮起来，而维多利亚则小心翼翼地在整个神圣的单调中清晰地表达出来，以便理解它们的全部含义。

在印刷版的剧本中，骑士们齐声合唱，接着是卡米拉向他们、丈夫和生活告别的一首无伤大雅的诗句，结束了这部歌剧。

“让她到此为止吧——够了！——她不会受到影响，”皮尔森将军对安东尼奥-伯里克利说道。

“正如你所知，我有消息称一首极其无礼的歌曲即将推出。”

将军看到威尔弗里德在大厅里徘徊，公然违抗命令。他皱着眉头斥责了他的侄子，然后命令中尉绕到舞台上，看看幕布是否按照印刷书上的内容落下。

“走吧，老天爷！”离开！'伯里克利加快了他的速度。用英语补充道，“她应该尝尝监狱潮湿的味道吗？扎特的声音被杀死了。”

骑士们的合唱是一首哀歌：基调是绝望：普通的歌词诗句。

卡米拉睁开眼睛。她挣扎着被抬起来，然后被卡米洛举起，她唱着歌，仿佛用着最后的脉动，在丰富的女低音中轻柔地共鸣。她原谅了米奇埃拉。她告诉奥尔索伯爵，当他熄灭了对统治的渴望时，他将在邻居的友谊中享受到一种未知的快乐。她重复说，她的母亲还活着，有一天她会跪在女儿的坟前——不是悲伤，而是幸福——她向所有人告别。

就在她这么做的时候，蒙蒂尼在维多利亚耳边低声说道。她抬起头，看到向下卷曲的窗帘。边路一片混乱：观众可以看到克罗地亚人。卡洛·阿米亚尼 (Carlo Ammiani) 和卢西亚诺·罗马拉 (Luciano Romara) 跳上舞台；十几个米兰的贵族青年涌过木板，来到两侧翼楼，见证了幕布的落下。整个房子都因“维多利亚”的呼喊而起义。窗帘绳在克罗地亚人手中，但卡洛、卢西亚诺和他们的同伴将窗帘高高举起，与她两侧保持一臂距离。她被看见，她唱歌，全屋都在聆听。

在场的意大利人全部恭敬地站起来，低声念叨着。毫无疑问，许多贵族不希望这种对这个简单谜团的公开声明让他们随波逐流。当安东尼奥-伯里克利看到幻想被肆意摧毁，歌剧沦为纯粹的政治谴责工具时，有些人可能会同情安东尼奥-伯里克利的疯狂笑容，这种笑容扭曲了他的面容。但普遍的热情太高，不允许个人提出抗议。当国家站着时，坐着就是德国人。事实上，家里也没有哪个意大利人会愿意看到维多利亚被噤声，因为她选择了反抗斯卡拉歌剧院董事会的特德斯基。她声音的魅力甚至覆盖了德国观众。他们和意大利人一起说：‘听她说！听她说！窗帘的两侧被搅动，但在中央，十二个年轻人举起手臂，将窗帘保持在维多利亚的头顶上方：

“我数不清岁月，
你会像我一样喝酒，
一杯血与泪，
当她出现在你面前时：——
意大利，意大利将获得自由！”

于是这个伟大的名字就传开了，它的敌人也听到了。

'你奉献你的生命
对她来说，你也会
她赖以生存的食物，
直到她伟大的一天到来
意大利，意大利将自由！

“她问你只是为了信仰！”
你对她的信任带她走
犹如天堂的气息，
在失败和死亡中：——
意大利，意大利将获得自由！”

首席女歌手在蒙蒂尼的怀抱中倒下时并没有表现出疲惫的样子。她的胸脯快速地起伏，她唱出了最后的诗句：——

'我进入黑船
在广阔的灰色大海上，
她所有的夕阳都漂浮在那里；
从此远方听到我的声音
意大利，意大利将获得自由！”

帷幕落下。

帷幕落下时，韦斯普里斯上尉将立即逮捕维多利亚的命令带到了舞台上，并由他在舞台上向指挥官、一名克罗地亚中尉传达，他的第一步行动是由军方决定的他本能地让他的部下排队，而他完全没有任何后续的想法。窗帘另一边房子里的雷鸣声足以让他这样的年轻人感到惊慌失措。克罗地亚军团的中尉在奥地利军队中的效率也没有很高的声誉。维多利亚站在她的支持者中间。她对围在她身边的热心年轻人说，脸色苍白，“只是非常口渴”，并恳求她不要害怕。卡洛在她的右手上；卢西安诺在她的左边。他们阻止她去她的房间。蒙蒂尼被派去给她的女主人接来她的女仆贾辛塔，她穿着斗篷和兜帽。年轻的克罗地亚中尉拔出了剑，但犹豫了。韦斯普里斯、威尔弗里德和德皮尔蒙特少校站在一侧，位于意大利绅士和士兵之间。歌剧团已经陷入了背景之中，或者站在出口的旁边。维多利亚的名字被用愤怒的、大海般的、可怕的、单调的重复方式喊出来，这比各种、尖刻、命令式的呼喊更能暗示人们的威胁性的不耐烦和积极的意愿。人们已经把狮子卡在了喉咙里。军官们都知道，只要她一声尖叫，他们就会像洪流一样冲上木板。执行将军命令的每一秒的拖延都增加了他们处境的难度。克罗地亚中尉大步走向魏斯普里斯和威尔弗里德，他们正在激烈地讨论行动计划。与此同时，在喧闹和争论中，德皮尔蒙特透过他的歌剧镜观察着维多利亚的容貌，带着一种令人钦佩的简单的倦怠。

威尔弗里德转向他，德皮尔蒙特没有改变酒杯的液位，说道：“她像柠檬冰一样凉爽。”那个女孩将成为英雄的母亲。同时拥有火山之火和控制她的神经，是一件了不起的事情。她是伟大的。偷看她一眼。我怀疑她右边的那个流氓正在趁机在她的记忆中植入一些小东西——动物！这只是一个时刻，他知道这一点。

德皮尔蒙特看着威尔弗里德的脸。

“我不小心撞到你什么地方了吗？”他问道，因为脸色已经变得惨白。

“看在上帝的份上，做我的朋友吧！”这是令人窒息的答案。救救她！把她带走！她是我的老熟人——我在英国的老熟人。做;不然我就得折断我的剑了。

'你认识她吗？你不去找她吗？德皮尔蒙特说。

“我——是的，她认识我。”

“那么，为什么不现身呢？”

'把她带走。平息韦斯普里斯的声音。他愿意不惜一切代价抓住她。挑起冲突是疯狂的行为。就听听房子的声音吧！我可能会崩溃，但我会救她。德皮尔蒙特，以我的名誉担保，如果你能帮我把她带走，我将永远支持你。”

“在你自己的时间提出我的需要并不是一个坏主意，”这位冷静的法国人说道。 “你有什么计划？”

威尔弗里德痛苦地敲击着额头。

“阻止泽特利施中尉。别让他走到她身边。不-'

德·皮尔蒙特惊讶地发现，这个英国人竟然出现了一种无言以对的感觉，就像那些在生命的最后一刻受到谴责的可怜虫一样。

“恐怕你的情况很糟糕，”他说。 “最糟糕的是，女性对这种情况没有同情心。对面阵营来了一位议员。让我们听听他的说法。

这是卢西亚诺·罗马拉。他站在他们面前请求拉开帷幕。军官们一起辩论，认为谨慎起见就同意了。

卢西亚诺进一步规定士兵必须撤走。

“在一侧机翼上，还是在两侧机翼上？”韦斯普莱斯船长说道，眼睛斜斜地闪烁着。

“走出房子，”卢西安诺说。

军官们笑了。

“你必须承认，”德皮尔蒙特和蔼可亲地说，“虽然鼓确实向马发出了命令，但在皮肤上的裂痕显示出它的空虚之后，它几乎不会考虑这样做。你能想象当我们看到你空手而归时我们可能会逃跑吗？这些事情都是需要计算的。

“这需要你正确计算，”卢西亚诺说道。

当他说话的时候，愤怒的房子的第一股浪潮冲上舞台，撞击着幕布，幕布突然变成了白色的锯齿状，就像惊慌失措的胸膛一样。

贾辛塔跑到她的情妇身边，赶紧给她披上斗篷，戴上兜帽。

倾心；阿米亚尼激动地在维多利亚耳边低声说道：“我自己的灵魂！”

她回答说：“我的爱人！”

于是，他们的第一次情话就被换成了意大利式的简单，在暴风雨中在他们周围形成了神圣的圆圈。

卢西亚诺回到他的队伍中，告诉他们他们掌握着紧急情况的关键。

“坚持住，”他说。 ‘你们谁都别动。谁迈出了第一步，谁就迈出了错误的一步；我看到。'

“我们没有武器，卢西亚诺。”

“我们有人民在背后支持我们。”

屋子里掀起一阵更猛烈的风暴，然后突然一片寂静。闯入舞台的人们加入了包围维多利亚的意大利卫兵，并告知灯光已经熄灭。然后是普遍混乱的低沉喧嚣。有些人是为了把她送进管弦乐队，让她从呕吐中出来，但卡洛和卢西亚诺紧紧地抓住了她。剧院一片漆黑。舞台上几乎没有灯光。 '圣玛丽亚！'贾辛塔喊道，“那些钢铁在黑暗中看起来多么可怕啊！”我希望我们可爱的孩子们能哭得更大声。”她的女主人几乎要笑了，吩咐她靠近，别动。 '哦！这一定就像在海上一样，”可怜的生物哀嚎着，捂住耳朵，闭上眼睛。维多利亚正处于密集的保卫者之中。她听见卢西亚诺和奥地利人之间正在进行谈判。卢西亚诺回到了她身边。 '快的！'他说; “没有什么比黑暗更能让暴民感到恐惧的了。”其中一名军官告诉我他认识你，并以他的名誉担保——他是英国人——带你出去：来吧。

维多利亚立刻把手放在了卡洛的手上。卢西亚诺为他们腾出空间。她听到低沉的英语声音。

'你不认识我了？没有时间可以浪费了。你曾经有过另一个名字，我很荣幸用它来称呼你。

“你是奥地利人吗？”她惊呼道，卡罗感觉她在退缩。

“我就是你认识的威尔弗里德·波尔。你被托付给我；我发誓，无论付出什么代价，都会安全地带你到门口。”

维多利亚悲伤地看着他。她的眼中充满了泪水。 “这个夜晚对我来说太糟糕了！”她低声说道。

“艾米莉亚！”

“那不是我的名字。”

“我不认识你。”可怜我吧。我愿意做任何事来为你服务。

德·皮尔蒙特少校走到他面前，碰了碰他的手臂。他简短地说：“我们肯定会发生冲突，除非人们从她的一组人那里得知她不在屋子里。”

威尔弗里德请求她向他伸出援手。

“我的手忙着，”她说。

威尔弗里德隆重地鞠了个躬，继续前行，维多利亚则带着卡罗、卢西亚诺和她的女仆贾辛塔，在刺刀列阵之间穿过昏暗的通道，下楼进入夜色中。

维多利亚在卡罗耳边说道：“我对他不友善。我在英格兰对他怀有深厚的感情。

“谢谢他；谢谢他，”卡洛说。

她离开了爱人的身边，羞涩地向威尔弗里德伸出了手。一辆马车停在路边石旁。门是开着的。她几乎没有说出一个字。当德皮尔蒙特少校指着一些正在靠近的军官时。 “趁还有时间，把她让开。”他用法语对卢西安诺说道。 “这是她的马车。快点，先生们，不然她就迷路了。”

贾辛塔通过手势读出了他的意思，并用力抓住了她情妇的袖子。她和德·皮尔蒙特少校把困惑不解的维多利亚安置在马车上。德皮尔蒙特关上门，向车夫示意。维多利亚探出头，最后看了她的爱人一眼，发现他正被黑衣男子的手臂搂住。斯卡拉歌剧院的每一扇门都在挣扎着咆哮着涌出它的居住者。当马车快速驶过灯火通明的广场时，她的叫喊声又被淹没了。贾辛塔不得不用尽全力压住她。他们一时间听到了巨大的喧闹声，然后就一片寂静。贾辛塔向车夫尖叫，直到她筋疲力尽。维多利亚颤抖着倒在女仆的腿上，遮住脸以免自己陷入回忆之中。

闪电划过她的大脑，但没有写下任何清晰的东西；歌剧的场景就像在白热的火焰中失去了轮廓。她试图哭泣，但徒劳地向自己的心祈求泪水，以便将这种纯粹感觉所带来的干燥、可怕、盲目的痛苦从她身上洗掉，让她的头脑清醒，去应对邪恶；然后，当暴风雨肆虐的夜空中出现可怕的裂缝时，她的爱人的照片落在了敌人的手中，而威尔弗里德穿着白色制服。她活着的激情所带来的折磨，她逝去的激情所带来的嘲笑。当她回想起来时，她不知所措。她从回忆到遗忘摇摆不定，就像一只被关在笼子里的野物。贾辛塔必须像母亲一样陪伴着她。可怜的浑身发抖的女孩，已经开始察觉到马车正在载着他们去某个未知的目的地，她撕开紧身胸衣的带子，把女主人的头拉到她温暖的怀抱里，摇晃着她，在她身上呻吟着，混合着一次献祭中充满了安慰和哀悼，因此设法让她流下眼泪，一场泪雨。不是断断续续的歇斯底里，而是泪水在眼球上蒙上一层黑色的面纱，不断地流下来。一旦被弱点所征服，维多利亚的本性就融化了。她哭得可怜兮兮，浑身发抖。她想起了劳拉的话，想起了自己所做的一切，心中充满恐惧和悔恨，并试图询问人们现在是否会打仗，但没有成功。劳拉似乎站在她面前，就像一个愤怒的人向那些被她用刺刀和枪扔去的亲爱的勇敢的人们伸出手指。那是一种难以忍受的痛苦。贾辛塔不得不让她哭泣，并不得不在无人帮助的情况下反思他们目前的处境。他们已经过了城门。车夫包厢里的声音给出了德国人的密码。如果不是马车对她来说是一个躲避外国士兵、白大褂等生物的避难所，她一定会尖叫起来。所以她退缩了。他们在繁星点点的旷野里，在藤蔓丛生的桑树间的大路上。她抱着女主人宝贵的头颅，祈祷圣徒们能尽快给她力量来谈论他们的困境，或者至少能安慰她一点；要不是它散发出的奇异的甜蜜让她女人的心激动不已，当维多利亚长时间地颤抖着抽泣之后，把嘴唇转向裸露的温暖乳房，在上面轻轻一吻，然后睡着了，她一定会感到烦恼。 。

维多利亚像一个疲惫不堪的孩子一样睡着了，而贾辛塔对着她点点头，吃了一惊，想知道他们可能正在穿过什么样的山峰，空气如此寒冷，黑暗如此浓重；更奇怪的是黎明那张苍老的脸，它似乎对她的激动一无所知。但早晨总比夜晚好，她不再向前向后数着自己的罪过；对他们添加评论，原谅一些人并承认其他人的堕落，并说“哦！”我很调皮，我的神父！我很顽皮——她把它们全都塞进记忆的备用麻袋里，并系住麻袋的脖子，这样它们就可以安全地交给她的忏悔父亲了。在这样的时刻，经过血液的骚动，女人们会对彼此的美丽产生温柔的喜悦。贾辛塔宠爱着她大理石般的脸颊，她的脸颊仰起在她的腿上，黑色的未绑发绺滑过脸颊。发冠的辫子松散；嘴唇相连的弓形边缘，珍珠般的小酒窝偶尔会一闪而过，就像梦中的空洞一样。有时它会抽搐；有时它会抽搐。但亲爱的眼睑仍然紧闭着。

当你爱着下面的眼睛时，看着闭上的眼睑，或多或少是一种令人捉摸的神秘，会吸引你的嘴去亲吻它们。他们的睫毛似乎以某种婴儿般的挑衅来回应你。侧弯的脸上纤细的睫毛暗示着一种内心的微笑。贾辛塔看着，直到她再也无法忍受为止。她亲吻脸颊，低声吟唱，当她想到她的女主人一夜之间得到的心爱之物时，她因一种嫉妒的占有感而感到高兴。她的一个拥抱惊醒了维多利亚，她说：“关上我的窗户，妈妈。”然后很快又睡着了。贾辛塔发现他们离山脉更近了。山影投射出来，柏树的长长的影子爬上红黄色的起伏，告诉人们太阳即将来临。太阳把耀眼的光芒照进马车里。他像一个好朋友一样闪闪发光，并帮助贾辛塔思考，正如她已经倾向于想象的那样，将他们抓出米兰的机器毕竟是友好的魔法，不值得尖叫。睡眠和阳光的良药使她的女主人恢复了活泼的色彩。贾辛塔现在让她安静下来，但维多利亚睁开了眼睛，定定地看着她，充满了平静。

'你在想什么？'她问。

“夫人，我自己，我在想我在山坡上看到的那些人是否和我一样喜欢咖啡。”

维多利亚坐起身来，一头栽倒在地，揉揉眼睛，集中精神。她浑身抽搐，但没有流泪。贾辛塔探出头来审问马车夫和猎手，与其说是因为他们的惊慌，倒不如说是因为他们所处的位置感到不舒服。她退后一步，说道：“圣母啊！他们是德国人。我们半小时后就停下来。说完，她用手整理和抚平维多利亚的头发和衣服——卡米拉的衣服——胜利的女主人公维多利亚现在觉得自己是一个奇怪的小幽灵。她换了座位，以便可以回头看看米兰。有人发现其中一个垫子上用别针别着一封信。她打开它，用铅笔写着：

'安静地走吧。你已经做了所有你能做的好事或坏事。马车会带你到一个安全的地方，在那里你很快就会见到你的朋友并听到消息。等到你到达梅兰。你会见到一位来自英国的朋友。第二次避开狮子的下巴。在这里你妥协了每个人。提交，否则你的朋友会认为你是个疯女孩。满意。救你的是奥地利人。认为自己不再被指派去火柴。如果第二次疯狂来临，请把自己淹死。我觉得如果顽固的灵魂离开了你的身体，我仍然可以爱你的身体。你知道是谁写的。我可能会署名“米奇埃拉”：我对她对挑衅卡米拉的愤怒表示同情。另外！来自斯卡拉歌剧院。

这些台词读起来就像是劳拉说的一样。维多利亚将斗篷裹在丝绸歌剧服装上，被动地向后靠去，直到马车停在一家乡村旅馆前，贾辛塔迅速做好了安排，尽可能满足她女主人每天用冷水洗澡的怪癖。旅馆的家庭服务人员从努力中恢复过来，充分帮助她制作热咖啡和甜面包，以及新的绿色条纹斯特拉基诺奶酪，这是逃亡者的早餐。贾辛塔一生中从未如此口渴过，现在却变得无比神清气爽，并被一种致命的欲望所抓住，想做点什么：做她无法说出的事情；但碰巧看到女主人脚上穿着丝质拖鞋，她大声抗议说应该给她买更结实的鞋具，并跑出去询问一位鞋匠可能有一双乡村套鞋出售。她回来说，车夫和他的战友，德国猎手，正在给马喝水，休息了两个小时后才出发，她提议步行到贝尔加马斯克的一个小镇，只需两两分钟。村子里有几英里远，可以在那里买到鞋子，也许还可以找到替代丝绸衣服的东西。得到同意后，贾辛塔低声说道：“外面有一个人想和你说话，夫人。别害怕。他在村头向我扑来，气喘吁吁，就像一个恋爱中的男孩。昨晚在马车上他一直跟在我们后面。他提到了你的名字。他衣着很普通，但他是一位英勇的绅士，和我们的卡洛先生一模一样。我最亲爱的女士，我不在的时候他会陪伴你。我可以请他进房间吗？

维多利亚立即认为这是为她的爱人的到来和她的喜悦铺平了道路。她站了起来，用尽全身的力气，让他能更公正地对待她，更珍惜她。但进来的并不是卡洛。她的希望彻底破灭了，她的脸对她为养活自己所做的努力感到厌恶。他说：“我向维多利亚夫人讲话。我是阿米亚尼伯爵夫人的亲戚。我的名字是安吉洛·吉达斯卡皮。昨晚，我穿着这种伪装，在斯卡拉歌剧院的私人大门旁躲避斯比里，我预计卡洛会从那里出来。我看到他被误认为是我。我跳到你马车后面的空座位上。在我们进村之前，我让自己失望了。如果我被看见并认出，我就迷失了，巨大的灾难将降临在阿米亚尼伯爵夫人和她的儿子身上；但如果他们无法对抗卡罗和我，我的逃脱可以确保他的安全！

'我能做些什么？'维多利亚说。

他回答说：“我可以告诉你我做了什么来回答你吗？”

“您不需要，先生！

“足够了，我想为我的国家保持一把新鲜的剑。”我任由你摆布，夫人；我并不焦虑。我听到猎兵在斯卡拉歌剧院门口说，他有城门的夜间通行证和蒂罗尔河的命令。一到蒂罗尔州，我就进入了瑞士。我本应该留在米兰，但那里什么也不会做，安静的城市不是我的家。”

维多利亚开始承认他与她的爱人有相似之处，尽管她认为看到这一点似乎是一种内疚的弱点。

“米兰什么也不做吗？”这是她急切的第一个问题。

“没什么，夫人，不然我就应该在那里，而且很安全！”

“什么，先生，需要我帮你吗？”

“说我是你的仆人。”

“带你一起去吗？”

“这就是我的请愿书。”

“案子很紧急吗？”

“就我个人而言，如果我被发现，那只不过是意大利丢失一把剑而已。”但是，夫人，从阿米亚尼伯爵夫人告诉我的情况来看，我相信有一天你也会成为我的亲戚。因此，我不仅向一位慈善女士求助，还向我自己的家人求助。

维多利亚脸红了。 “我能做的我都会做。”

安杰洛必须向她保证，卡洛的身份一旦确定，他就一定会被释放。她高兴地呼吸着，说道：“我对这一切感到非常好奇。”我不知道他们把我抬到哪里，但我想我是在友好的手中。我欠你一个义务。在我们的旅程结束之前，你会允许我叫你贝波。

他们被窗户下的骑兵勒缰绳的声音所吸引，他对旅店老板的专横喊叫暴露了士兵要求平民立即服从的习惯，尽管他的服装没有任何军事特征。客栈老板和他的妻子应召而来，然后两人都为维多利亚号上侍候的猎手让路。骑士与这个人交谈。

“你吃过饭了吗？”维多利亚说。 “我有一些钱，够我们俩三天用的。”走吧，吃吃喝喝。为我们俩付钱。

她把钱包给了他。他用严肃的仆人弓接受了它，然后退休了。

不久之后，猎手传来消息。约翰内斯先生请求他有幸向她致敬：他必须见到她。她点点头。她第一眼看到约翰先生，就确信他就是她昨晚在舞台上看到的军官之一，于是她准备扮演自己的角色。约翰尼斯先生希望她回想起安东尼奥·伯里克利先生在罗科·利玛窦大师家里向她介绍的情况。 '是真的;请原谅我，”维多利亚说。

他告诉她，她在歌剧方面已经超越了自己。以至于他和许多其他德国人都被她彻底征服了。他听说她要被追赶，便策马整夜在通往索南贝格宫的路上疾驰，正如有人低声向他传言，她正飞向那里，以便劝她撒谎“perdu”停留了很短的时间，然后带她去了和蔼可亲的公爵夫人的宫殿。维多利亚感谢他，但谦虚地表示她更喜欢独自旅行。他宣称这是不可能的：她对艺术世界来说是宝贵的，决不能让她陷入危险。维多利亚试图坚持自己的意愿；但她发现它没有上弦。此外，她还认为，这位乔装打扮的军官，长着一双难看的眼睛，既然听到了她的声音，很可能会成为她声音的忠实信徒；但他的声音却很糟糕。想象他是敌人——一个被征服的卑躬屈膝的奥地利人——的俘虏，这让她更加受宠若惊。她看见他骑着马过来。他显然是跟着她了。他知道她现在明白的一定是她的目的地。

此外，劳拉还强调“是一位奥地利人救了你。”这个人可能是奥地利人。如果要抵制的话，他精确的讲话方式会招致极度反感。维多利亚对自己天生的刚毅的依赖太可靠了，她不会鼓励某些男人的冷酷面孔在年轻女性心中造成的身体厌恶。

“米兰很安静吗？”她问。

“安静得像枕头一样，”他说。

“并且会继续如此吗？”

“毫无疑问。”

“为什么毫无疑问，先生？”

“你在一场比赛中击败了我们德国人。另一方面你就没有机会了。但你一定不能浪费时间。克罗地亚人在你的轨道上。我已经吩咐了马车。

一提到克罗地亚人，她就感到惊慌失措。

“我必须等我的女仆，”她说道，试图沉思一下。

'哈！你有女仆：当然有！你的女仆在哪里？

“这个时候她应该已经回来了。如果没有，她就在路上了。”

'在路上？好的;我们会在路上接女仆。我们一分钟都没有空闲。夫人，我是您的谄媚仆人。快点出去吧，我求你了。我在学校被教导不要浪费时间。那些克罗地亚人一路上一直在喝酒什么的，否则他们早就来了。你不能指望意大利旅店老板来隐藏你。”

“先生，您是一个有尊严的人吗？”

“杰出的女士，我就是。”

她只是听着回应，没有注意到夸张的手势。既然米兰被宣布处于安静状态，逃跑的必要性就成了她唯一的想法。安吉洛站在马车旁。

“这是什么人？”约翰尼斯先生皱着眉头说道。

“他是我的仆人，”维多利亚说。

“我亲爱的好女士，您告诉我您的仆人是女仆。这是永远不会做的。我们不能拥有他。

“对不起，先生，我从来不带他一起旅行。”

'旅行！这不是旅行，而是跑步；当你逃跑时，如果你是认真的，你就必须扔掉你的行李和武器。

约翰内斯先生把胡子左右甩了甩，跺了跺脚。他坚持认为应该留下那个人。

“走开，先生！回到米兰，或者其他地方，”他喊道。

“贝波，登上箱子，”维多利亚说。

她的命令立即得到执行。约翰尼斯先生看着她的脸。 “你的决心很坚定，我亲爱的女士。”他似乎失去了自己的决定，但还是把维多利亚交给了他，然后从胸前的口袋里抽出一根长雪茄，点燃它，然后骑到了车夫身边。猎手已经消失了。

维多利亚恳求大家密切关注贾辛塔。路是笔直的上坡路，她也不怕别人看不见她的女仆。不久，一座城市的紫色圆顶映入眼帘。 “是贝加莫吗？——是布雷西亚吗？”她很想问，想着她的贝尔加马斯克和布雷西亚朋友，以及那两个因儿子的勇敢而闻名的地方：其中一个对她来说特别珍贵，是一位音乐天才的诞生地，她的血管里流淌着这位天才的血液。 “他有没有看到这些桑树？——他有没有看到这些绿草如茵的山谷？——他有没有听到这些落水的声音？”她问自己，并用对他和他的音乐的虔诚思想封闭了她的精神。她悲伤地看到他们正在离开这座城市。一个小纸团被射到她的腿上。她打开它，读到：“一位骑兵军官。——贝波。”她把手伸出窗外，表示她已经意识到了这种情况。然而，她的焦虑开始变得烦躁。无论从哪个方向都看不到贾辛塔。她的女主人开始责备这个缺席的、多嘴的女人，直到她怜悯她为止，她指责自己胆怯，因为她无法叫车夫停下来。快速的运动压制了她仅存的精力，她心甘情愿地让自己匆忙的感觉停留在长长的峡谷上方的岩石表面，以及栖息的古老城堡、白色别墅和亚阿尔卑斯山的牛群上。她从梦中惊醒，却又陷入其中，责备自己的软弱，说：“我是多么的东西啊！”当约翰内斯先生和车夫听到她的声音时，她感到紧张和羞愧，并半途同意了含糊的安抚答复，尽管她远没有理解她认为这是为了安慰。传达。她伸出手与Beppo交流。另一团铅笔写的字也回答了这个问题。她读到：“留意这个奥地利人。你的女仆在后面两个小时。拒绝与我分离。我的生命随时为您服务。——贝波。

维多利亚做出了最后的努力，以达成某种决心。最后以对可怜的贾辛塔的同情感叹结束。这个女孩很快就能找到返回米兰的路。另一方面，离米兰越远，卡洛亲戚面临的危险就越小，她现在觉得他的亲戚与她的情人更加相似。她坐回马车里，闭上了眼睛。虽然她对这样强迫睡眠的虚荣心一笑，但睡眠还是来了。经过最近几天的发烧，她健康的身体抓住了天然的药物来重建她。

她一直睡到岩石变成紫色，山谷里弥漫着玫瑰紫色的薄雾。马车停下来，让她惊醒。他们站在路边一家大型旅馆的门口，前面是一片森林的斜坡和一条奔流而下的小溪。白大褂们纷纷靠在门边。她看到内院挤满了他们。约翰内斯先生准备将她按倒在地。他说：“你没什么好害怕的。”这些人正在前往克雷莫纳。如果您在自己的房间里接受服务，也许会更好。一大早就会打电话给你。

她向他道谢，心里充满感激。 “贝波，你自己看看吧，”她说着就跑向退休的地方。

“我想这就是你适合做的事情，”约翰尼斯先生说道，他的眼睛盯着贝波的模仿者，贝波漫不经心地接受了审视，在看到维多利亚在马车座位上没有留下任何东西后，指示他走向厨房，这成了他的职责。约翰尼斯先生向一位蒂罗尔女仆招手，贝波曾向她打招呼。她自称卡琴。

“卡钦，卡钦，我可爱的家伙，”约翰先生说道，“这里有十弗罗林的银币，如果你能给我那个人的手帕的话：你刚刚向他伸出了手指。”

根据奥地利人的普遍看法，约翰内斯先生采取了正确的方法来确保蒂罗尔少女的忠诚。她惊讶地抿了抿嘴，做出了默认的鬼脸。十弗罗林的银子，让山女的迁徙时间缩短了整整三个月。约翰尼斯先生问她指挥官们吃晚饭的时间，并把自己的饭菜推迟到那个时间。卡琴开始赚钱。对于任何普通的贝波来说，这都是很容易的——简单的以物易物换取一个无害的吻。但这个贝波却显得难以接近；他是如此彬彬有礼，又如此矜持。蒂罗尔的少女也不是一个特别擅长诱惑的女人。当约翰内斯先生出现在军官们中间时，军官们的晚餐已经在桌子上冒烟了，很快，客栈里就充满了喧闹的欢迎声。卡钦发现贝波在大厅门口听着。她拍了拍他的手，把他拖走。

“你有什么权利把头靠在那里？”她说，并威胁要公开他的诉讼程序。贝波没有珠宝可以捐献，也没有多余的钱。他刚刚听到约翰内斯先生在军官中受到欢迎，他的名字让他几乎瘫痪了。 “如果你能在几个小时内找到我，你向我提出的任何要求都会得到满足，”他说。卡钦在那段时间点了休战协议，并看到她在奥伯林塔尔的家更近了——十二只山羊和一头牛是她无可争议的财产。她找到了他，尽管他已经迷路穿过旅馆的庭院，沿着空中花园来到了一条激流的边缘，激流浸湿了空气，在下面黑暗的峡谷中发出可怕的声音。他非常温柔地拥抱了她。 “一声尖叫，你就走了，”他说；她感到对她脚的保护被从她身上夺走了，所有的恐惧都在下沉，她咬住了她的嘴唇，仿佛用裸露的缝线来忍住尖叫。当他放开她时，她已经完全被掌握了。 “你确实会耍花招，”她说，浑身发抖。

'我不耍花招。告诉我这些士兵什么时候行军。”

“凌晨两点。”

“别害怕，傻孩子：如果你服从我，你就安全了。”我们的马车什么时候订的？

“四点钟。”

“现在发誓要做到这一点：——在两点一刻叫醒我的情妇：带她到我这里来。”

“是的，是的，”厨房急切地说，“把你的手帕给我，她就会跟着我。”我发誓；我做的；由大圣克里斯托弗！谁画在我们家的墙上。

贝波递给她甜美的银子，这银子暂时为她奏响了一首欢快的曲子——消失的牛和山羊。他在星光下凝视着她的面容，让她从口袋里掏出手帕。

'哦！你里面有什么？她说。

他用手指捂住她的嘴，示意她回家。

“亲爱的天堂！”卡琴嘀咕着走了进去。 “如果我知道那个看上去很温柔的年轻人是个魔鬼，我会去找他吗？”

安吉洛·吉达斯卡皮知道，一个没有责任感的军官，在他的战友们必须服从守卫者的时候，是睡得最快的。凌晨两点，号角响起：许多点燃的雪茄在旅馆黑暗的通道中闪烁；白大褂按照行军顺序排列。热咖啡被匆匆吞了下去；马厩、外屋、庭院和岩石屋顶下的稻草床里最后的散兵游勇，已经聚集到了主力部队。游行队伍继续前进。两名警官向昏昏欲睡的窗户喊道：“祝你好运，韦斯普里斯！”安吉洛从对面树林的隐蔽处走下来，他驻扎在那里观看出发。客栈就像一个翻身的熟睡者。他让卡琴给他带来面包、肉片和一瓶酒，这些东西都放在他的口袋里：他为情妇和他自己付了钱，等待维多利亚踏上楼梯。当维多利亚来时，她没有问任何问题，但对卡琴说：“你可以吻我”；厨房开始哭泣；她相信他们是为爱敢于一切的恋人。

“你有一个半小时的明确开始时间。然后离开公路，左转穿过森林，找到博尔米奥。如果你到达蒂罗尔州，来到锡尔茨，告诉人们你认识卡琴·吉斯林格，他们会对你很好。

说着，她就放他们出去，进入了黑眼星光之中。

对于这对飞翔的情侣来说，除了岩石和森林下蜿蜒的公路，以及峡谷深处到处流淌的流水，就像黑色大理石中的纹理一样，没有什么可区分的。他们走得很快，竖起耳朵聆听身后的马蹄声或脚步声。安杰洛答应她，天亮后她就休息；但她还是答应了。但她向他保证，她能忍受疲劳，她坚定的快乐使他的心充满活力。有时，黑暗笼罩着他们，正如愚昧的孩子想象的那样，黑暗降临在他们身上，仿佛他们的脸即将与森林毛茸茸的胸脯相遇。升到较轻的空气中，他们看到了远处的闪烁：可能是城市，或秋天的杂草，或林中的篝火，或灯塔的火焰：它们像孔眼一样闪烁，展现着广阔的看不见的土地的神秘。无数的小溪在与夜说话：雨季里的激流，现在是孩子气的声音，一首三音符的歌曲和一种不被注意的铿锵合唱的无休止的交织，仿佛一个小家伙在音乐的重击声中唱着歌。手鼓和铃铛。维多利亚有这些幻想，而安吉洛却没有。他走路就像一个生命受到威胁的被追捕的人。

“如果我们很快到达一个村庄，我们可能会得到一些交通工具，”他说。

“我宁愿步行也不愿开车，”维多利亚说。 '它让我无法思考！

“黎明来了，夫人！

维多利亚坐在一条岩石长凳上，吓坏了他。天还黑的时候，她脱掉卡米拉的丝鞋和丝袜，赤着脚站着。

“你以为我累了，”她说。 '不，我很节俭；我想尽可能保留我的华丽服饰。我赤脚走得很好。这些鞋没有保护作用；半天就穿坏了，再过一个小时就不能再像样地穿了。

看到坚硬的土地上那双漂亮的脚，安杰洛感到不安。他借口叫她出去吃苦。但她说：“我完全信任你。”她一边走一边抬头看着第一缕细细的色彩。

“你不认识我，”他说。

“你是阿米亚尼伯爵夫人的侄子。”

“正如我昨天荣幸地告诉你的那样，我的血管里流着你爱人的血。”

“我请求现在不要谈论他，”维多利亚说。 ‘我要我的力量！

“夫人，我们留下的那个人是他的敌人；——我的。”我宁愿看到你死，也不愿看到你活在他手里。你害怕死亡吗？

'有时;当我半醒的时候，”她承认道。 “我不喜欢去想它。”

他好奇地问她：“你没见过吗？”

'死亡？'她说着，把颤抖变成了微笑。 “我昨晚死了。”

安杰洛和她一起微笑。 “我亲眼看见你死了！

“好像是一百年前的事了。”

'或者六分钟。心算一切”

“人们很喜欢我吗，安吉洛先生？”

'他们爱你。'

“我没有给他们带来任何好处。”

'一切可能的好处。现在，我的职责就是保护你。”

'而昨天我们还是陌生人！安杰洛先生，您谈到了 sbirri。博洛尼亚没有起义。他们为什么追随你？你看起来太温柔了，无法给他们理由。

「我看起来温柔吗？」但我所背负的并不是负担。昨晚看到你的人会认出你是卡米拉吗？你会听到我的事迹，并作出判断。我们很快就会有人上路；你一定是被隐藏了。看，那里：天空中有我们的颜色。奥地利无法消灭他们。从我还是个孩子的时候起，我就一直睡在面向东方的床上，以便让这个事实摆在我的眼前。黑色和黄色落到地上，绿色、白色和红色升到天上。如果更多的我的同胞看到这些含义的话！——但他们正在学习。我的导师称它们为“日耳曼主义”。如果是这样，我就从敌人那里偷走了一颗宝石。”

维多利亚提到了酋长。

“是的，”安吉洛说。 '他教我们阅读上帝的笔迹。我尊敬他。这很古怪;我总觉得自己在地牢里听到了他的声音，看到他看着一盏灯。他有一个毛病：不懂得贵族的感受。你认为他在这方面改变了我们的卡洛吗？绝不！高血脂是无法根除的。

“我血统不高，”维多利亚说。

“阿米亚尼伯爵夫人俯瞰着它。此外，低血压可能会在没有奇迹干预的情况下升高。你有一颗高贵的心，女士。也许上帝的旨意是让你让我们的种族永存。除了卡洛·阿米亚尼之外，我们所有人似乎都在倒下。

维多利亚低下头，一束宽阔的阳光让她感到痛苦。他们脚下是一片连绵起伏的平原，上面是雄伟的阿尔卑斯山，四面八方都十分隐蔽。他们进入了一条森林小路，寻找安全的机会。对他们来说，深色的树叶和低矮的绿色屋顶比晴朗的空气和天空更甜美。黑暗的树林是逃亡者的家园，这里的脚步柔软，周围一片温柔——青草和苔藓，枯叶安详地平放在上面。这些鸟儿并不胆怯，当蜥蜴或蛇从她脚边溜走时，维多利亚觉得很有趣，而且看到它们受到恐惧也没有伤害她的温柔。他们在树下蜿蜒前行，蜿蜒穿过山谷的斜坡，那里翻滚的石头挡住了碧绿的水道，在寂静的地方充满了前进的声音。当太阳照耀山谷时，他们坐在半圆形橙色岩石中的一棵栗树下，吃安杰洛在旅馆里买来的食物。他在一个石头洞里为她倒了酒，深如蛋壳，她抿了一口，微笑着看着简单的设计。但安吉洛脸上没有笑容。他通过吃喝来维持体力，就像磨利武器一样。做完之后，他把剩下的东西收拾起来，躺在她脚边，眼睛盯着一块古老的灰色石头。她也坐着沉思。水流无尽的潺潺声和噪音使人们更加强烈地感觉到这是一种孤独的生活。一只鹰在头顶盘旋，几乎没有什么生气勃勃的特征。安吉洛转过身来看着她，当他躺着时向上看，他的视线被她一只撕破的白脚上的血迹所吸引，那只脚半靠在她衣服的褶皱里。他低下头，像一只啄食猎物的小鸟，热情地吻着那只脚。维多利亚的眼皮跳了起来。她的耳朵里似乎有一根弦突然响起：她把那只羞愧的脚偷偷藏起来，然后抽动着，但并不可怕，因为安杰洛的额头贴在地上。他的拳头之间粘满了草丛和锋利的燧石粉，他的拳头僵硬地从他两侧伸出。她听到他重重的呻吟声。当他抬起头时，脸色苍白得像疯了一样。她的女性天性毫不犹豫地用抚慰的双手抚摸着它。

她偶然说：“我是你的妹妹。”

'不，上帝啊！你不是我的妹妹，”年轻人喊道。 “她死时没有留下一点血迹；一朵百合从头到脚，就这样走进了金库。我们的母亲会看到这一点。她会亲吻天堂里的女孩并看到这一点。他站起来，哭得更大声：“这里有回声吗？”但毫无疑问，他的声音敲击着岩石。

她看到他陷入了疯狂。他的目光中没有任何人类物体。他站着，双臂僵硬，半垂着，声音里带着强烈的悲惨旋律。

“里纳尔多，里纳尔多！”他喊道：“克莱莉亚！无论是人还是鬼都没有回应。”她死了。我们两个就对她说去死吧！她死了。因此她沉默了，因为死者没有一句话。哦！米兰，米兰！可恶的背叛之城！如果你保持信心，我应该在你身上找到我的工作。现在我在这里，对这个地方窒息的喉咙说话，却得不到答案。我在哪里？世界是空心的：可怜的躯壳！他们撒谎了。他们向我许诺了战斗和屠杀，而敌人就像收割钩上的成熟玉米。我会把它们厚厚地放在我手里。晚上我会洗手、吃饭、喝水、睡觉，早上又唱歌去上班。他们许诺给我一把剑和一片可以投入的大海，还有我们的母亲意大利来保佑我。我会努力工作：我会在生活中做好事。我会把我的灵魂沐浴在我们的色彩中。我会把我们的旗帜挂在我的身上作为裹尸布，上帝的战斗天使会为我铺开。现在我和我苍白的母亲就在这儿，每一次都想挡在我面前。让她走开！这是鬼，我知道。她将会触动我的力量。她不是我所爱和侍奉的母亲。去吧：珍惜你的女儿，你这个死女人！

安吉洛摇摇欲坠。 “一滴血让我发疯了。”他说着，发现眼前一片黑暗，倒在地上。

维多利亚环顾四周。漫长的沉默需要她的勇气。

她采用了他的语言：“我们的母亲意大利正在等待我们。”我们必须继续前行，不要疲倦。安吉洛，我的朋友，请帮我处理这些石头。

他静静地站起来。她把胳膊肘放在他的手上；就这样支撑着她离开了一个似乎在颤抖的地方。在这沉重的一天里，他们几乎一声不吭地走着。她不敢用问题探究他的痛苦；他平静而茫然，就像雷声过后的时刻一样。但是，她对在他身边的安全不再有任何怀疑。她让他收集杂草，绑在她的脚上，并进行友好的服务，确信世上没有任何事情可以导致这样的精神风暴再次发生。在任何季节都属于真正勇气的体贴观察告诉她，困扰安吉洛的并不是疯狂。

夜幕降临时，他们来到了一个林务员的小屋，在那里，他们受到了一位老人和一位小女孩的欢迎，并给了他们牛奶、黑面包和可以休息的稻草。安吉洛睡在外面的空气中。当维多利亚醒来时，她幻想自己已经跳进一口井里了。当触到底部时，发现她的头露出水面。当她的惊讶逐渐消失时，她看到樵夫的小女孩站在她的脚边，举起斗篷的一端，向里面窥视，对女主人公卡米拉华丽的裙子感到惊讶。维多利亚自然而然地进入了自己的思维状态，试图引诱孩子亲吻她。但很徒劳。孩子对这件衣服的崇敬之心让她只能伸手够到裙子的下摆，以此来满足她的好奇心。当维多利亚坐起来时，孩子向后靠在墙上，她笑了。当她站起来时，孩子就跑出了房间。 “我可怜的卡米拉！ “你可以迷惑别人，但是，”她一瘸一拐地说。她的脸色如同破裂的水，脚部疼痛。 “如果卡米拉的铃声现在响起，她会做出什么样的记录？”维多利亚用这种幽默的精神治疗她身体的虚弱和疾病。 “他们可能会说米奇埃拉迷住了你，我的卡米拉。我想你的声音听起来就像是拖着脚跟在它后面，就像鹳鸟飞翔一样。哦我的卡米拉！我不希望我也能这样做，不拘一格，轻松自在！我的卡米拉，你的高音的每一个音符都伴随着呻吟，就像十二月和五月一样。别让我尖叫！

脚上传来的剧痛几乎难以忍受，但这种压抑让她在与安杰洛会面时，比分开一段时间后更加自由。老樵夫正在为他们煮一种奇怪的面粉和牛奶，并撒上盐。安吉洛剪了一块厚布包住她的每只脚，并将它们绑在里面。他比她见过的任何时候都高兴，现在首先谈到了他们的目的地。他的计划是引导她靠近博尔米奥，在那里与几个为她服务的人交战，他们将陪她到梅拉诺，通过瓦尔迪索尔，而他独自穿过斯泰尔维奥河，在蒂罗尔山谷向左转，尝试进入瑞士的通道。

根据老樵夫的指示，当他们离开森林时，如果能找到交通工具的话，博尔米奥也不过是短短一天的路程。维多利亚引诱小女孩坐在她的膝盖上，给她唱歌，但大大削弱了她裙子的魅力。当他们告别小屋时，太阳已经升起。

中午时分，他们离开了森林树木的庇护所，站在破碎的地面上，没有路可以引导。维多利亚尽力嘲笑自己走路时的不幸，并将自己比作嘉布遣会朝圣者。但她不习惯光着头、光着鞋，虽然她勇敢地坚持着，但强烈的阳光和石路却扭曲了她的力量。她不得不检查来自阿拉伯故事的幻想，关于有时由空气精灵和魔法鸟类提供的帮助，这些故事如此持续而生动，以至于她发现自己对可见天空的孤独和无助感到生闷气，并担心她的大脑正在失去对事物的控制。安吉洛领着她来到一个半阴的空地，在那里他们吃完了昨天剩下的肉和酒。她看着石头旁的一只金绿色蜥蜴，就睡着了。

“我需要的睡眠时间是无法衡量的，”一分钟后，根据她计算的时间，她说道，并预计会看到蜥蜴仍然在石头旁。安吉洛就在她身边。天空充满色彩，大地充满阴影。

“又过去了一天！”她惊叹不已，心想人类的寿命已经变得像鱼在陆地上的喘息一样快，而且（除了一端）毫无意义。他告诉她，他已经探索了这个国家，直到他敢于离开她为止。他没有看到高地上有人居住。山谷太远了，陌生人无法在夜幕降临之前到达那里。 “我们可以再走一段路，”维多利亚说，然后又开始了行走的麻烦。他不止一次恳求她不要害怕。 “我能害怕什么？”她问。他的声音沉沉悔恨：“有什么事情可以帮你，你可以完全依靠我。”

“我确信这一点，”她回答道，知道他指的是他昨天的疯狂。事实上，没有哪个女人能拥有比她更温柔的伴侣了。

在高地的最高山脊上，他们望向无尽的黑暗深渊，看到了山谷的灯光。 “鸟儿可能会在那里找到栖息地，但我认为我们没有机会，”维多利亚说。 “当我们向他们走去的那一刻，灯光就会飞回来。这是他们的行为方式。

安吉洛绝望地环顾四周。沿着山脊继续前行，他的眼睛看到了正在闷烧的小火。当他到达那里时，他感到非常失望。黑暗中的一团火给人带来希望，人们就在身边。这里没有任何人类社会。火蹲伏在灰烬上。它位于一个长满青苔的岩石的圆形小山丘上。黑色的树枝、灌木丛、干蕨类植物和劈开的原木，触感黑黑，散落在各处。在他们的中心，火在灰烬中阴沉地盘旋，长着一只像蛇一样的长眼睛。

“你能睡在这里吗？”安吉洛说。

“任何地方！”维多利亚滑稽而悲伤地叹了口气。

“我可以保证让你保持温暖，女士。”

“明天之前我不会要求更多，我的朋友。”

她侧身躺下，盘起双脚，将脸颊放在手掌上。

安杰洛跪下来哄着火，它的胃口就像我们的胃口一样，是靠吃东西来满足的，因为在红嘴吃了六根木棍后，它就大声叫着要更多，然后火焰就在后面跳跃起来。火焰和浓烟。维多利亚透过薄薄的眼睑注视着这一幕。火焰、乡村的黑色深渊、星星和哨兵的身影。她在睡梦中打瞌睡，无法完全屈服。当她的耳边渐渐响起许多声音时，她相信自己是在做梦。火声听起来就像愤怒的大海，声音就像海岸一样，更清晰，但在尖锐的喧嚣中更加混乱。安杰洛叫醒了她，安杰洛单膝跪下，握住了她另一只手。然后她看到男人们围住了她们，有的人扔着点燃的木头，有的人踩着火焰的外缘。乍一看，它们看起来很邪恶。他告诉她，这些人很友好；他们很友善。他们是优秀的意大利人。这是为十五日晚上安排的灯塔，当时米兰没有看到任何信号。昨天下午，它被嘲笑地被部分消耗掉了。 “我们已经唤醒了整个国家，女士们，我们把这些可怜的家伙从床上拉了起来。他们认为米兰必须起床并开始工作。我已经向他们解释了一切。

维多利亚宁愿接受他们的借口，也不愿提出自己的借口。他们大多是年轻人，穿着像上层农民。他们嘲笑这一事件，表示如果看到整个湖区的高地都在燃烧，他们会多么高兴，并承诺明天采取行动。一个方肩汉子轻轻地将她从地上扶了起来。她觉得自己是一个被环境忙着谋划的生物，用心去思考是没有用的。长长的队伍在黑暗中沉没，留下低低的红色火焰在他们身后熄灭。

第二天早上，她在温暖的床上醒来，脑海中浮现出奇怪的景象：火焰像啼鸣的公鸡一样直立，又像母鸡一样畏缩在雏鸟上方。她在他们的一位新朋友的家里，她能听到安杰洛在隔壁房间里说话。一辆交通工具已经准备好带她去博尔米奥。一个女人来找她告诉她这件事，似乎有一种迟钝的愿望要让她走。她是一个衣衫褴褛的女人，脸上带着懒惰的痛苦，就像一个有罪的男人内心的幽灵。她说，她的丈夫愿意开车送这位女士去博尔米奥，这笔钱将立即支付到他妻子的手中。穷人从你们的爱国者和扰乱者那里得到的东西还不够多，他们引诱有秩序的人离开他们的劳动，造成寡妇和家庭破产。对于维多利亚来说，这是一种新的意大利语，当这位妇女继续讲述因丈夫对祖国的卑鄙迷恋而毁掉家庭的例子时，她并没有试图为这位鲁莽的领主辩护，而是迅速穿好衣服，以便尽快离开家。尽她所能。她的积蓄勉强满足了这位女士的需求。女人抓住它，把它藏在腰带里。当他们走进客厅时，正在和安吉洛聊天的她丈夫伸出手敲了敲腰带。

“这就是我们的伎俩，”他说。 ”我猜是这样的。筹集资金，我们肮脏的手指末端的小玛丽亚！我们不接受真正爱国者的金钱。亲爱的，到别的地方去挖吧！

女人歪着喉咙，发出狗一样的嚎叫声。但当他抓住她时，她的爪子就伸出来了。

“你会羞辱我吗，老鸟？”

“洛伦佐，愿你像南瓜一样腐烂！”

夫妻间的互惠是尖锐的，直到钱摆在桌子上，当女人开始痛苦地抱怨时，维多利亚敏感的神经在她的脸上跳舞，在她的权威介入下，洛伦佐非常不情愿地允许他的妻子接受他选择的认为公平的东西。一部分的钱，还有他的蔑视。她似乎要把钱舔起来，贪婪地弯下腰去。

'穷光蛋！'他观察到； “她是在一张租来的床上出生的。”

维多利亚觉得这个女人的回忆会困扰着她。她无法想象像洛伦佐这样英俊的年轻人竟然会嫁给这个不可爱的女人，他就像一个腐烂的爬行图像；但他似乎是为了解释自己的品味，说他娶她时，他们曾经是同龄人。现在她已经老了。他重复说她“是在一张租来的床上出生的”。他们再也没有看到她。

维多利亚的愿望是尽快到达梅拉诺，这样她就可以见到她的朋友，并得到她的爱人和这座城市的消息。高处那些令人困惑的灯塔火焰已经成为一种令人恼火的指示性景象：她渴望历史。洛伦佐提议带她越过托纳莱山口，进入瓦尔迪索尔，或者沿弗尔瓦谷，经过特雷西格诺里山口，进入蒙特谷，到达佩霍，然后经克莱斯或博尔扎诺到达梅拉诺。但她需要穿鞋和整修；由于其他原因，她决定继续前往博尔米奥。她猜想安吉洛没什么钱，而在她耳边听起来，在像博尔米奥这样的地方，她可能会得到零钱，换取她因歌唱的胜利从安东尼奥·伯里克利那里赢得的巨额汇票。尽管安杰洛呼吁她快点结束旅程，不要有任何停顿，但她还是决定去博尔米奥。洛伦佐私下向她保证，博尔米奥有银行家。他说，许多银行家都是从米兰来到这里的，她认为这一事实足以达到她的目的。游子们遗憾地分手了。有人向洛伦佐指出，路边一座小山丘上有一座小教堂，周围掩映着栗子树，可以去那里给安杰洛带一封信。维多利亚恳求安杰洛等他收到她的消息。然后，双方挥手，她就被赶出了他的视线。

告别维多利亚后，安吉洛来到一家客栈，像田里的人一样吃喝，从中午一直睡到第二天早上。旅馆老板来到他的房间，发现他醒了，就问他是否愿意在床上第二次休假。安吉洛跳了起来；当他这样做时，他的细高跟鞋从枕头底下滑落并闪烁。

“那是一块相当大的钢铁，”旅店老板说，但他一句话也说不出来。安吉洛很清楚，这个家伙有怀疑。安吉洛小心翼翼地把他的衣服捆成一捆。旅店老板什么也没看到，除了一个躺在床上的年轻人，他手边拿着一把可怕的武器，他眼中的神情警惕而懒散，建议谨慎行事。他出去了，又回来了第二次、第三次，说话越来越混乱、烦躁。但当他再次准备离开时，“不，不，”安杰洛说道，决心给他一个教训，“我喜欢你的陪伴。”这儿，到这儿来；我将向你展示一个技巧。当我三英尺高时，我从塞尔维亚人那里学到了它。看;你观察到，我静静地躺着。尝试从门的另一边爬过去，刀尖就会把你划破门。”

安吉洛将蓝色的高跷架在手腕上，手臂微微弯曲。 “试试吧，”他重复道，但旅店老板在走向门口时突然停了下来。 “那么，就呆在原地吧，”安吉洛说，“看吧；我会说到做到。这就是我要强调的重点。说着，他从手腕到手臂的肌肉以塞尔维亚人特有的方式猛烈地抽动，刀刃在伤口上颤动起来。旅店老板惊恐地向后退去。 “现在把它拿给我，”安吉洛说，漫不经心地将双手放在头下。旅店老板拉了拉刀片。 “杰出的先生，我害怕弄坏它，”他几乎呜咽道。 “它看起来还活着，不是吗？”

“就像老鹰捕食小鸟一样，”安吉洛说。 '这就是那些刀片的美丽之处。他们杀人，却不会让你受到像中枪一样的痛苦；这比在你的胸口中开一枪要好——有一些东西可以展示。派你的妻子或你的女儿来听听我的早餐。这是五个登山者的早餐；先生，请不要在我耳边或耳边称呼我为“杰出的先生”。让刀粘在上面。

店主默默地行了一礼，侧身走了出去。 “我可以信赖他几个小时的判断力，”安吉洛自言自语道。他知道展示身体的灵活性和力量对胆小鬼的影响。房东的女儿来接他订的早餐。安吉洛询问最近是否有德国人来拜访过他们。女孩告诉他，一名德国猎手带着几个士兵昨晚给他们打电话。

“如果他们把我拖出去枪杀，那不是很可惜吗？”安吉洛说。

“但他们是在追捕一位女士，”她解释道。 “他们已经前往博尔米奥，希望在那里或山里抓住她。”

“亲爱的，那里比山里好；你不这么认为吗？

女孩说她不想在山里遇见那些家伙。

假设你在山里，那些家伙和你一起上来；看到我在你们面前跳下来，你们不会拍手吗？安吉洛说。

“是的，我应该，”她承认。 “不过，一个人算什么！”

“如果他能吃掉五个的话，就有点东西了。”快的！我必须吃饭。你有情人吗？

'是。'

“想不到你正在等他。”

“他只是一个中等情人，先生。他住在克莱斯（Cles），在瓦尔佩霍（Val Pejo）那边，在瓦尔迪农（Val di Non），很远的地方，每年都会向我求婚两次，每次他都会过来做木工。他剪出的圣母像非常漂亮。他是德国人。

'哈！你向圣母跪下，向德国人献上你的嘴唇？去。'

“但是我不太喜欢他，先生；是我父亲希望我拥有他；他可以赚钱。

安吉洛示意她离开，心里自言自语道：“她的父亲会为了一把弗罗林而背叛圣徒。”

他穿好衣服，从门上拔下刀。下楼梯时，他听到门廊里马蹄声，停了下来。一个德国声音说道：“果然，我快乐的房东，她就在那儿，在沃尔姆斯——你们的博尔米奥。”在一家大旅馆里找到了她：一句话也不说；偷走，偷走。一瓶肖邦酒！我用四条腿向船长出发。罗韦雷多和特伦特追赶她的那些小伙子鼻子不好。 “鼻子可怜——肚子空空的。”船长说：“我坚持在十字路口。”我说：“队长先生，我首先回到您身边。”我的任务就是找到那个离家出走的美女——漂亮小姐！漂亮的小姐！来爱！她的仆人身上也有钱；他是一位伪装的阁下——一个英俊的男孩；但他已经摆脱了束缚，他就上吊了。两只鸟是这件事的骄傲；一个是满意——我很满意。我曾经杀过羚羊。雅各布，我是；鲍姆瓦尔德，我是；费克尔维茨也同样如此；以及跟踪轨道的魔鬼。啊！酒很好。你知道这首歌吗？

“喝酒的人，可能会忍不住哭泣，
命运是我的，愿她依然粘着我。”

我用德语给你——歌曲的语言！我自己的，我的家乡“来-爱-来-爱-拉-拉-莱-爱-i-ie！”

“当星星仍然坐着
在山顶上，
我拿起我的枪，
亲吻小家伙
在母亲的胸前。
哎-iu-e！

“我的烟斗点燃了，
我爬上斜坡，
我遇见黎明
一点点
在母亲的胸前。
哎哎哎：哒哒太：iu-iu-iu-e！”

又一个肖邦，我快乐的房东。你在嘟哝什么？是关于我家离家出走的小姐的仆人吗？他去吊死吧！什么 - ？'

安吉洛的脚重重地踩到了楼梯上。店主咳嗽一声，跑回来，向客人鞠躬。猎手喊道：“我要在间隙里喝更多的酒！”随着猎手疾驰而去，一枚硬币在台阶上叮当作响。 “特德斯科的野兽，”房东拿起钱时惊呼道。 “他们负责计算——而不是我们。”如果我为他提供了这个价值的话，我应该把瓶子放在我的头上。我们的国家是怎样的一个国家啊！我们被碾压了，被碾压了！安吉洛强迫房东和他坐在一起，而他则像五个登山者一样吃饭。他只在桌子上留下了骨头。 “太棒了，”旅店老板说。 “你不知道什么是恐惧。”

“我想我不这么认为，”安吉洛回答道。 '你做;懦夫必须轮流为每一方服务。起来，跟着我，直到我把你打发走。你知道通往 Val Pejo 和 Val di Sole 的通道。旅店老板站在一块坚固的底板后面。安吉洛告诉他，他只是希望有人指出出路，从而让他屈服了。 '带上烟草； “你会闲着一天的，”安吉洛说，“我们分手时我付钱给你。”他对恳求和拒绝充耳不闻，眼神开始变得疯狂。他可怜的胆小鬼不断地劝告他，并提出让他的妻子、他的女儿，半个村庄来提供服务：他必须遵循，但不会接受雪茄。安杰洛让他的女儿去拿面包和雪茄，并在他的口袋里放了一把，在安杰洛在小教堂脚下等待维多利亚使者到来的两个小时后，店主很高兴地关上了他的面包和雪茄。拳头。中午时分，洛伦佐来了，立刻对安杰洛做了个眼神戏，让他看出他对这个人的不信任，以及他身上的许多坏处，尽管安杰洛已经点头，他还是不愿意拿出一封信；再次皱起眉头，强调喜剧的表现力。信中说：

“我爱上了英国朋友。他们借钱给我。借助这些便条飞往卢加诺：我将它们附上，并且不会为此请求原谅。瓦尔泰利纳河很危险；我们知道值得关注的斯泰尔维奥。原路返回，然后尝试恩嘎丁。如果我认为我的同伴，我的卡洛的表弟即将被捕，我应该在断桥上停下来。我受到了很好的照顾：我最亲爱的朋友之一，一位英国军队的上尉，陪着我渡过河。我有一个村里的女佣，一个心甘情愿的女孩。我们骑马上山；明天我们将穿越山口；有一座冰川。 Val di Non 听起来是意大利语，但我正在进入敌人的土地。你看我戒备森严。我眼前的焦虑与你有关；我们的卡洛会问我什么？一刻也不能耽误。走开，别留住洛伦佐。他奉命今晚在高山上与我们会合。他是最好的仆人，但我总是在任何地方遇到最好的仆人——也就是说，在意大利。离开它，我感到悲伤。米兰没有任何消息，除了那里一片混乱。根据睡眠的安静情况，我判断我们在那里没有受到任何伤害。

'你最忠实的

“维多利亚。”

安杰洛读完之前，洛伦佐和旅店老板发生了争执。安杰洛检查了一下，并告诉洛伦佐加快速度：他没有发送任何消息。

“我的人性，”安杰洛对他胆怯的同事说，“告诉我，最好把你拖远一点，而不是杀掉你。”你是个聪明人，你知道我为什么要考虑这件事。我给你冰川的导游费和十弗罗林布奥马诺。你愿意用乡下人的鲜血换来它吗？我不能让你的舌头在运行特德斯基的大道上：你知道的。

“杰出的先生，服从是必要的，”旅店老板说。 “如果我们再多几支我的雪茄就好了！”

“上来，”安吉洛严厉地说。

他们一直走到天黑，空气清新。倾斜的树林边上有一座小屋，里面堆满了刚刚割下的草，为他们提供了庇护。旅馆老板晚上和早上都在呻吟着要食物，安吉洛扔给他几片面包。越过树林，他们来到了光秃秃的峭壁上，开始了更陡的攀登，到达了高处，并惊醒了一只老鹰。那只大鸟尖声叫喊着飞了起来，用打结的爪子悬在他们身上。它的影子延伸到大片新雪上。旅店老板在老鹰身后发出嘲笑的叫声。

“在这里，人们忘记了自己是一位父亲，更重要的是，一位丈夫，”他一边说，一边用手指敲击着鼻子一侧。

“还有一只恶狗，一个叛徒，一个腐肉，”安吉洛说。

“啊，先生，人们可能知道你是一位贵族。你无法理解我们的烦恼，我们头上顶着房子，还得张大嘴吃饭。”

“当你有更好的话说的时候就说吧，”安杰洛回答道。

“Padrone，我真的很想听听你的好意见；而我却瘦得像只只吃一点肉的狼。我可以为了看红肉而放弃我的布翁马诺——哦！红肉滴下来。

“如果，”安吉洛喊道，他的眉毛向着那个男人皱起，“如果我知道你一生中曾经背叛过我们中的一个人，请看下面；你应该躺在那儿，任由啄食和啃咬。

“啊，雅各布·克鲁奇，当你充满善意时，你的结局是多么美好啊！”旅店老板呻吟道。 “我看到你的肋骨了，我可怜的灵魂！”

安吉洛离开了他。阿尔卑斯山的幽静给他带来的巨大兴奋就像一杯烈酒，让他精神饱满。对他来说，生与死就像普通人的是与否：只不过是向右或向左转。令他惊讶的是，这个家伙明知自己的懦弱和良心，竟然同意活下去，并且愿意为了生存而吃东西。

当他回到同伴身边时，发现同伴正在喝一名奥地利士兵的烧瓶。另一件白大褂就躺在附近。他们强迫安杰洛喝酒，并开始玩一些滑稽的恶作剧。一个人拍手，另一个人把烧瓶猛撞在不情愿的嘴上，直到安吉洛绊倒了他，让他成为了嘲笑的对象；于是他们就成了好朋友。士兵们肩上扛着步枪，下山，吹着指甲，吸着烟草——劳特·凯泽利彻（帝国军衔），就像他们在点燃时悲伤地强制辞职一样，描绘了普遍令人憎恶的政府发行的烟叶。

“他们在追她。”雅各布说着，伸出拇指，眼皮一扭。他的表情变得傲慢起来，并补充道：“我让他们继续；但现在，就我而言，我必须告诉你，我可敬的先生，我已经受够了。你走你的路，我走我的。付钱给我，然后我们分手。怀着最大的敬意，我离开了你。在我这个年纪去爬山是没有理由的。如果你想要同伴，我会向那对Tedeschi发出信号；他们正处于冰雹之中。你愿意吗？如果你愿意的话，请说出来——嘿！

安杰洛对酒的明显效果笑了。

“巴托·里佐（Barto Rizzo）会是接手你的人，”他说道。

旅店老板把头向后一仰，准备射精，低声说道：“巴托·里佐！”保护我免受他的侵害！哎呀，他为了米兰的利益而向瓦尔泰利纳的我们征收捐款；如果我们不付钱，我们所有人都会被记入黑名单。不服从，比发誓不向合法政府缴税更糟糕——毁掉它！——政府。你认识巴托·里佐吗，牧师？我希望你不认识他？我确信你不会认识这样的人。

“我是他最喜欢的学生，”安吉洛说。

“我早就发誓了，”旅店老板呻吟着，咒骂着安杰洛跨进门槛的日子和时间。完成后，他请求允许返回，流着泪恳求怜悯：“巴托·里佐的学生总是在忙着该死的事情！”安杰洛告诉他，他现在有机会赢得巴托·里佐的认可，然后说，“继续”，他们就追上了那两个白大衣。旅店老板一直嘀咕着，他想要巴托·里佐的认可，而不是他的敌意。他既不想要霜，也不想要火。他们穿过冰川，绕过一条小溪，到达一家客栈，发现士兵们正在那里尽情享受。他们告诉雅各布，他们追赶的那位女士还没有过去。他们把酒推给安杰洛喝，他拒绝了，说他在射杀背上有白色十字架的羚羊之前发誓不喝酒。

“来吧，我们是二比一，”他们说，“这次你就喝吧！”

“二比二，”安吉洛回答道，“这是我的雅各布，如果他算不上一，我就不会叫他岳父，住在克莱斯的那个人不用争取就能拥有他的女儿。”她。'

“是的，”一名士兵说道，“而且你的德语已经说得不赖了。”

“我不是当过兵吗？”安杰洛一边说，一边吹响了骑兵起床号。

他和他们相处得很好，以至于他们讲述了这次探险的目标，即抓住一名逃跑的年轻叛逆女士，并为伟大的船长——“图赫蒂格·豪普特曼先生”将她牢牢扣押在克莱斯。

“她不是一个仆人，一个无赖吗？”安杰洛问道。

'是这样；她有：但母鹿是这场追逐中的雄鹿。

安吉洛扔给他们雪茄。山谷就像一座翻倒的山峰，峭壁密布，高耸入云，河水在山谷中艰难地流淌，蜿蜒的泡沫，在拐弯处急流而过。安吉洛从远处的高处一路注视着，直到太阳落山。他看到另外几个士兵在旅馆里与这两个人会面，然后其中一对朝谷头走去。维多利亚选择了另一条路线，这似乎让他们感到不安。

“帕德罗内，”当他们下楼去找休息的地方时，雅格布突然对他说，“我谦虚地说，你真是个魔鬼，所以在我继续和你在一起之前，我必须与你达成一项协议，并且立即采取最坏的情况。这将是我离开妻子睡觉的第二个晚上：我只是提到这一点。我捏她，她打我，我们是平等的。但如果你想让我打架，我告诉你我不会。如果我身后有一个熔炉，我宁愿掉进去，也不愿撞上刺刀。我听说神经在我们的前面，那是我感到震惊的地方。现在我们已经踏上平坦的道路了。说我不打架。我会做你的仆人，直到你释放我，但请说我不参加战斗；帕德罗内，说吧。

“我不能这么说：我会说我不会让你打架，”安吉洛回答道，安抚他。从这一刻起，雅格布不再像一只被铁链拉着的粗鲁狗一样跟着他。事实上，带着未来的安全感，他尝到了一种奢侈的惊奇，被优越的意志所感动，从客栈飘出来，并为目睹奇怪的事件而付出代价。安吉洛在他们睡觉的地方照顾得很好，但他自己却什么也没吃。天刚破晓，他们就登上了道路上方的高处。大约中午时分，安杰洛看到一队人步行从山口过来，其中有两女三男。他们在他过夜的村庄休息了一个小时。步枪距离他们后方四分之一英里。当他们重新出发时，其中一支步枪已经发射，当回声滚滚远去时，前方响起了回应的声音。安吉洛从他的观察位置可以看到维多利亚一行人在两名警卫之间行进，而她本人一定也察觉到了前面和后面的一对夫妇。然而她和她的队伍仍以平稳的步伐继续前进。有一段时间，他把他们看得一清二楚。但沿着峭壁的斜坡是一项艰苦的工作：不久雅各布就滑倒了。 “啊，老兄，”他说，“我完蛋了；离开我吧。

“虽然我不应该把你背在背上，”安吉洛回答道。 “如果我真的离开你，我就必须割掉你的舌头。”

“我宁愿扭伤脚踝继续前行，”雅各布说道，他勇敢地努力克服疼痛。一瘸一拐地喊着：‘哦，我的小村庄！哦，我的小旅馆！一个人什么时候才能说他已经跑完了世界！他一坐下，魔鬼就进来了。

安杰洛不得不领着他来到开阔的道路上，他们在路上缓慢地前进。

“这位高贵的绅士可能会让我回来——他现在可能会信任我了，”雅各布呜咽道。

“魔鬼不相信任何人，”安吉洛说。

啊，帕德罗恩！有一个十字架。让我跪下吧。

安吉洛纵容了他。雅格布跪在路边，祈祷脚踝能安稳，有一个打鼾的枕头，不要叫醒人。此后，他神清气爽。太阳落山了；黑暗向四周蔓延；空气变得冰冷。 “圣母有没有考虑过爱国者必须忍受什么？”雅各布自言自语，引起了安杰洛罕见的笑声，安杰洛抓住他的腋下，把他半举了起来。在他们休息的旅馆里，他给脚洗澡并包扎。

“我不禁对你产生了善意，”雅各布说。

“我不能丢下你。”安吉洛集中了注意力。

“帕德罗内，我们一直以来都是通过拇指来了解彼此。这是我的那家老旅馆——税收！我们必须出卖灵魂来纳税。那是东西的舌头。我不会背叛你；我不会。

“我要试试你，”安杰洛说，并在第二天向他提供证据，当时士兵们在他们驾驶马车时拦住了他们，雅各布向他们发誓说安杰洛是他预定的女婿。

显然，位于农谷下游的宪兵队正在开展一项不寻常的活动。因为雅各布不得不不止一次地重复他的寓言，而安吉洛认为谨慎的做法是不要询问有关旅行者的事情。在这个山谷里，他们又迎来了夏日的炎热。夏日的辉煌披上了破碎的土地。农谷面向太阳，以太阳谷为岸，就像石头下的南方蜥蜴。栗子林和肩并肩的葡萄园，还有奇妙的翠绿草地，中间到处都是树木丛生的峭壁，山顶有城堡废墟，祖传的城堡仍然是温暖的家，村庄坐落在其中，还有一条河流流过在意大利的阳光下，一切都变成了金色，急切地冲过丰富的围墙，形成了这一场景。山谷有相当的宽度：它享有一个巨大的椭圆形天空：阴影分散，点缀在空旷的山脉上，并且在正午时分不是从右到左掠过的宽阔的窗帘。太阳统治着，也统治着 Val di Non。

“帕德罗，葡萄在这里发挥了最大的作用，”雅各布说。

但这个地方人口太多，而且太容易受到大众的关注，安杰洛无法取悦。在克莱斯，他们被迫接受检查，于是发生了一件小喜剧。雅格布在展示安吉洛为他的女婿后，看到士兵们脸上的疑虑，提到了德国求婚者的名字——木匠约翰·斯佩尔曼，他要求带他去他的工作室。约翰是山谷中奇怪的德国人之一，他是众所周知的：他骑在凳子上雕刻木头，停止吹口哨，听士兵们的讲话，士兵们从雅格布嘴里说出了第一个词，并被约翰的说服所说服。下巴耷拉下来，表明这个故事有一定道理；更重要的是，当约翰对瓦尔泰林旅店老板大喊大叫，想知道他为什么来找他时，如果他准备欺骗他的话。一名士兵直言不讳地说，安吉洛的外表符合他们正在寻找的一个人的肖像，如果他们的同胞愿意，他们会带他去，并给他一次行军和监禁。

啊！ “这不会让我的小罗塞塔更爱我。”约翰喊道，他开始对女人进行一系列的责备，并将他的雕刻刀片和工具扔到木屑中。

“好吧，现在你不想和这个小伙子打架，这很奇怪，”雅各布说。 “如果你觉得最好的话，他会以这种方式与你协商。”

约翰在对性别的强烈咒骂之间省略了一句话，说他已经准备好战斗了。但他的复仇想法是针对不忠的女性这一抽象概念。安吉洛因为厌恶德国人，暂时投入到了自己所扮演的角色中，甚至到了鄙视他的程度。约翰向雅格布承认，六个月的求爱间隔对于洛夫来说是一个很大的跳跃。

'是的;爱！爱！他极其沮丧地喊道。 “我可以等。”出色地！既然你把那个年轻人带来了，我们就把它拿出来。

他赤手空拳地走到安杰洛面前。雅各布不得不介入。士兵们支持约翰，约翰现在对安杰洛说：“既然你是来找它的，我们就解决它。”

雅各布很难让他明白这是一件需要讨论的事情。约翰发誓他不会谈论这件事，并准备好与十几名意大利人战斗，人上人下。

“赤手空拳？”雅各布尖叫道。

'嘿！老办法！给他指关节，打断他的背，我的孩子！士兵们喊道； “山这边没有他们的钢铁。”

约翰等着安杰洛举起双手。为了煽动他不情愿的对手，他捶胸顿足；但安杰洛没有动。士兵们怒吼起来。

“如果她有了你，她就会有一个洋娃娃，”约翰说，现在他迫不及待地想把这样的丈夫送给他的小罗塞塔。就在这时，雅各布扑到了他们中间。

“这将是一场真正的战斗，”他说。 “我的女儿拿不定主意，她应该找最好的男人。”让我公平地安排这一切； “我的孩子们，几个小时后你们就到这里来了，”他对士兵们说道，士兵们不情愿地离开了这个肯定很有趣的场景，因为确信接下来会有一个更热闹的场景。

当他们转身离开商店时，雅各布对约翰做了个鬼脸。约翰转向安吉洛，看到了一个微笑。然后是解释。

‘你说什么？她是真的——她是真的吗？惊讶的情人惊呼道。

“确实如此，但旅馆里的女孩想要更激烈的求爱，”雅各布说。 “阁下是来寻找他自己的心上人的。”

约翰轻呼一声，拥抱安杰洛的双手，用力地、孝顺地拍拍雅各布的肩膀。为他们准备了面包、葡萄和蒂罗尔葡萄酒，约翰的母亲很快就准备了沙拉、鸡蛋和家禽。然后当场宣布她愿意接纳罗塞塔加入这个家庭，“如果她一开始就发誓永远不会有‘heimweh’（对家的渴望）”；就像人们——男人和女人——在翻山越岭搬新家时总是做的那样。

“她不会——她会吗？”约翰疑惑地问道。

“不是她，”雅各布说。

饭后他把约翰拉到一边。他们回到安杰洛身边，约翰示意他从后面的小路离开房子，沿着花园的斜坡爬上高高的藤蔓杆。他说他看到一队人很早就从克莱斯客栈出发，乘坐一辆轻型汽车，前往梅兰。宪兵队在路上很忙：一个小时后，一名骑警冲到旅馆，尾随他们：这是村里的传言。

“帕德罗内，你现在解雇我了，”雅各布说。

“我付钱给你，但不要解雇你，”安吉洛说着，递给他一张钞票。

“我会一直跟着你，牧师，直到你解雇我为止。”雅各布叹了口气。

约翰主动提出带他们一直到帕拉德山口，他们就出发了，避开了宽阔而坚固的大路。在攀爬树林下的一个村庄的视野中，他们看到一辆敞篷车，两侧装有刺刀，正在返回克莱斯。安吉洛在他们前面冲下斜坡，站在路上迎接游行队伍。车里坐着一个女孩，低着头哭泣。洛伦佐就在她身边。一个步行的英国人雇佣了两名士兵来陪伴他。当他们大步走近时，洛伦佐打了个哈欠，把手举到脸颊上，拇指始终指向身后。包括女孩在内，共有四名囚犯，但维多利亚不在。当他被推进时，英国人用法语向安杰洛讲话，问他是否能忍受看到一个无罪的外国人受到肆意违法的对待。士兵们对着他们的俘虏吼叫，安吉洛在他身后愚蠢地耸了耸肩。他们绕过了路的一个拐弯。安吉洛拉紧了腰间的带扣。

“现在我相信你了，”他对雅各布说。 “沿着五英里越过山口：如果你没有看到我，你就拥有了自由、舌头和一切。”

说完，他双臂交叉，稳步奔跑，让同伴们猜测他的耐力。他们做得很自满，直到雅各布支持他一段距离，约翰对他下注，这时看到他们时不时地小跑以保持他的视线。

与此同时，韦斯普里斯船长也没有闲着。他站在通往维多利亚假定目的地的道路上的一个钝角处，沿着一侧经过特伦特和另一侧经过博尔米奥通往梅拉诺的路线召集了宪兵队；他很快就得出结论，她已经拒绝了阿迪杰河谷而选择了瓦尔泰利恩河，因此他认为她可能会受到诱惑，要么穿越斯泰尔维奥河，要么穿越其中一个山口进入蒂罗尔最南端。他认为，根据与安吉洛·吉达斯卡皮（Angelo Guidascarpi）有关的一系列推理，她肯定会对瑞士造成影响，安吉洛·吉达斯卡皮（Angelo Guidascarpi）在鲜血的十字架下逃亡，可能会被算计要推动共和国的山脉；从危险的角度来看，他可能会把这位女士带到那里，安全地享受犯罪和爱情的果实。当船长在背叛的手帕上发现安杰洛的徽章和名字时，他对他们的亲密关系的本质毫不怀疑，并且他被一种新的、三次的渴望抓住这对夫妇——为了正义的罪犯，二是因为他在追求她的过程中保证了自己的名声。这个男人的虚荣心极其活跃。他已经订下了要征服那个顽固姑娘的决心，他想，有可能从爱国者队伍中娶到一个情妇，哈哈！哈！有些人战胜了革命者，有些人战胜了他的同志。此外，他是伦肯斯坦的安娜伯爵夫人的最爱，但她却拒绝将她的庄园交给他。她敢于小事；她也是一个需要粗暴教训的女人。韦斯普莱斯是一名贫穷的士兵，继承了强烈的欲望，他关注着自己的财富，既不单独侍奉火星，也不侍奉金星。安娜伯爵夫人是聚集在梅拉诺索南伯格城堡的那群人中的一员。如果他在以一种谨慎而令人兴奋的保留态度介绍维多利亚的同时，同时交出了刺杀保罗伯爵的凶手，那么就会得到丰硕的赞扬和各种令人愉悦的女性激情——一幅丰富的前景。一个月的阴谋；最后可能是他的富有的女士彻底驯服了，成为了妻子，并加倍战胜了他的战友。如果没有这些成功，奥地利军队中最敏锐的剑客的名声又有什么用呢？——盛宴和虚荣的羽毛为他的才智的有效运用提供了奖励。

他一直住在亚阿尔卑斯山的旅馆里，直到他的仆人威廉（他为他派遣了公爵夫人的猎兵，然后侍候维多利亚）带着他的制服从米兰抵达。猎兵被指示前往博尔米奥防线，并接到命令，只有当维多利亚位于瑞士边境的最边缘时，他才应逮捕她。魏斯普莱斯保持着通讯的警惕，沿着这条路去见他。财富对他的策略微笑。雅各布·鲍姆瓦尔德·费克尔维茨（Jacob Baumwalder Feckelwitz）喝满了酒，沿路欢呼雀跃，在埃多洛（Edolo）咆哮的奥廖（Oglio）桥上遇见了他，并向他通报了逃亡者的消息。 “他们俩都在博尔米奥的大旅馆里，”雅各布说。 “我还写了一份报告，称斯泰尔维奥号遭到监视；就是这样。'他补充说，他以为他们会分开。他听说过一些类似的事情。他相信这位年轻女士一心要穿越其中一个山口前往梅拉诺。昨晚，他的任务是吻掉那位年轻女士的女仆的眼泪，这位女仆是一位瓦尔泰林农家姑娘，她对翻山越岭的想法感到遗憾，并且带着这些意大利风流女子通常的猫一样的倾向，撕破脸颊以换取他的勤奋。雅各布展示了在船长先生的服务中获得的漂亮刮痕，并因看到维多利亚并看到了重影而得到了他的钱。韦斯普里斯心中认定，为了安全起见，安吉洛现在已经与她（或者更确切地说，她与他）分开了。他认为她很可能也会飞往瑞士。然而，他知道梅拉诺有许多朋友对她有吸引力，他认为自己应该更加谨慎地投身这条线，于是他带着雅各布·鲍姆瓦尔德沿着瓦尔泰林经瓦尔维奥拉加速，到达恩嘎丁的蓬特，并命令他如果能看到她就抓住她，并将她转移到蒂罗尔的克莱斯那里。维多利亚只是对她的行为进行了最温和的解释，没有受到禁令的约束，在那个军事时代，一个肆无忌惮的帝国军官可能会为了自己的目的而冒险使用宪兵队，只要他能够给帝国利益披上一种貌似可信的色彩。

猎手悲痛地疾驰而回，韦斯普里斯从埃多洛上方的小村庄带去向导，离开卡莫尼卡山谷，爬上托纳莱河，到达同名分支山谷中的韦尔米利奥，一路上科学地观察着这个国家的地貌。在韦尔米利奥，他遇到了他以前的一个团的一位兄弟军官，一位正在视察的肥胖少校，他碰巧比军队的消息晚了一周，并以帮助他开车为借口拘留了他——这是一种嘲弄。这迫使韦斯普里斯不断地回答：“你是我的上级军官。”这让少校不得不问他是否被降级了。像往常一样，韦斯普里斯被迫在剑的阴影的支持下表现出他的傲慢。 “我是一个有家庭的人，”少校谦虚地说。 “那么，在他们允许你继续这样的情况下，我将称你为我的上级军官，”韦斯普里斯回答道，他蔑视着一名已婚士兵。

“我自己曾经一度渴望成为参谋，”少校说道。 “不幸的是，我的腰围变大了——这对实现野心来说是错误的。我极其轻松地消化、吸收。粗壮的人注定要走更晦涩的道路。你可以引用拿破仑作为一个相反的例子。当他的男仆不得不松开他背心和马裤的扣子时，我肯定地认为他的一天已经结束了，他的太阳已经被遮住了。现在，你说什么？

“我说，”韦斯普里斯回答道，“如果纸币进一步贬值，我们谁都没有太多机会消化或同化——如果我完全知道这些过程意味着什么的话。”

“我们的好伦巴第牛还没有被挤够一半，”少校用一种保密的语气观察道。 “当她发出声音时——快点！”把桶放在她的乳房上，然后继续工作；这是我的建议。这首诗是什么？——我是说，我们茨维特维茨的；维也纳诗人：——

“她的牛奶很好——伦巴第奶牛；
让她随心所欲地吵闹
但如果她踢了水桶 我发誓
我们会让她习惯更剧烈的挤压：
我们将把她的伟大事迹写在奶酪中：
（也就是说，如果她产奶量足够的话）。”

'首都！首都！'少校对他的引用表示赞赏，并接着说“那个茨维特维茨”在制造了一些宫廷丑闻后曾在边境军团服役，还说他从她的领主手中夺走了一位瓦拉赫女士并将她卖给了一个土耳其人，并把她变成了土耳其人。土耳其人自己也养着后宫。五年后，他带着一本他所谓的“黑鹰诗”再次出现在维也纳，并重新获得了他的男爵爵位。 “到目前为止，一切顺利，”少校说。 “但是当他申请了他在军队中的旧职务时——那就太酷了。”

韦斯普里斯清晰地咕哝道，“我听过这样一句话，你不可能听一个人五分钟而不从他那里得到一些东西。”

'我不知道;可能是这样。”少校说道，他想象着韦斯普里斯要求在他的演讲中加入一些更强烈的八卦味道。 “这些山谷里没有任何动静。昨天下午，他们在特伦特附近的某个地方逮捕了一个自称贝波的人，他是一位意大利女人的仆人——我想是一位舞者。据我所知，他们也在寻找她。但我什至无法猜测她在蒂罗尔会做出什么样的举动。

少校的车正悠闲地驶向克莱斯。 “鞭打那个畜生！”韦斯普里斯向司机大声喊叫，请求少校原谅，并要求知道他要去哪里。少校告诉他，他希望在特伦特吃晚饭。 '天哪！不能按这个速度，”韦斯普莱斯喊道。但步伐几乎没有加快，并且他隐瞒了自己提到速度的原因。他们到达特伦特时已经很晚了，韦斯普里斯在那里看到了这个被囚禁的可怜虫，他可怜兮兮地宣称自己是维多利亚夫人信任的无辜仆人，并且一直在走遍梅兰的所有城堡寻找她。当可怜的贝波郁郁寡欢地徘徊时，船长的随从威廉向他扑了上去。韦斯普里斯让他嚎叫，他从布翁康西利奥军营的一位骑兵上校那里借了一匹马，在黎明前一小时上马，威廉紧随其后。他及时赶到了克莱斯那里，得知维多利亚一行人比他先通过了那里。在那里吃早餐时，他享受了许多天来第一支真正平静的雪茄。他在附近遇到的宪兵紧随其后走了进来。他们说，该党肯定会被逮捕，或者不被允许穿过帕拉德山。通往梅兰和博岑的通道以及通往特伦特的道路都受到严格把守。韦斯普里斯催促他们向前走，并特别命令他们要拘留除那位女士之外的整个队伍。如果她和其他人一起被捕，他们将释放她：她的女仆和三个男人将被带回克莱斯，并在那里被严禁。

现在这个游戏是他自己的了：他像在地图上一样观察它相当复杂的动作。他完全抛弃了约翰内斯先生的性格：一个穿着制服、腰带上佩剑的帝国军官，几乎无法继续那种温顺的表现。 “但我可能会欣赏音乐，并恳求她给我一个特别的音符，如果她有的话，”船长说道，他沉思着即将到来的场景，就像一只颤抖的鹰即将合拢翅膀。他的心剧烈跳动；这让他大吃一惊：迄今为止它还从未做出过这样的动作。

他从克莱斯寄了一封信给梅兰的美丽女主人，告诉她，通过巧妙而熟练的步伐管理，他将带来第十五宫的难缠的女主角，预计大约两三天后就会到来。这封信被委托给威廉，威廉将借来的马带回了特伦特。

韦斯普里斯在通往山口的最后一个村庄上方一英里处的骡道上，观察到了这群囚犯，然后爬进了隐蔽处。当他们经过时，他只看到一个穿着女装的人。由于必须蹲下以求隐蔽，他无法单独检查它们。他数了数三人，发现其中一人是宪兵。 “那一定是我的恶棍，”他说。

很明显，维多利亚选择了独自前行。队长赞扬了她的精神，现在又迈着猎人的步伐向前迈进。他经过一家客栈，关门了，没有房客：他身后是农河谷。在阿迪杰河更黑暗的山谷前：猎物在哪里？一股愤怒的风暴向他袭来，他担心自己被愚弄了。他点燃了一支雪茄，无论情况如何，都表现得轻松自在，并通过外在的反映获得一些内心的平静——并非完全没有成功。 “我的女士一定是个勇敢的步行者，”他想。 “按照这个速度，她将在日落前到达乌尔滕塔尔。”当他迅速下降时，他左边有一片树林茂盛的高度。来到一处布满灰色岩石的草丛前，他爬了上去，登上了其中一块巨石，只见下方六块石头的距离处，有一个女人的身影，她的手呈杯状，握在一块石头上。路边的水落下。她所走的小路绕过了他所站的高度。他跳过岩石，抓住了发出咔哒声的钢刀鞘。穿过色彩缤纷的树叶和绿色的林下，在倾斜的河岸上稳住脚后跟，然后走上布满石头、泥土和荆棘的小路，当维多利亚拐过山路的拐弯处时，及时出现了一个坐着的行人。

他优雅地从嘴里抽出雪茄，用内翻的手指抚摸自己的胸部，用滑稽的歌剧般的高音向她搭话。

“意大利！”

她将双臂抱在胸前，迅速环顾四周：然后，她的敌人出现了。

这只不过是你对你一直在追逐并捕获的猎物表示的一种讽刺形式的尊重。韦斯普里斯认为他有充分的理由用最适合他性格的语气称呼她：他用一种可笑的装腔作势的温和语气说道：

'我的可爱！你不累吗？我们已经好几天没见面了！您是否忘记了热情的约翰内斯先生？毫无疑问，你们一直有愉快的陪伴；但我一直都是孤独的。想想看！这是一个多么幸运的机会啊！我悲伤地抽烟，想象着除了这种狂喜之外的任何事情。——不，不，小姐，要有礼貌。船长挡住了她的通道。 “我说话的时候你不可以离开我。一个好的家庭教师会在托儿所里教你这一点。我担心你的家庭教师不专心，没有让你记住当你遇到朋友时要认出他们的义务！哈！我听说你在英国受过教育。握手。我们的习惯是亲吻左脸和右脸，我认为这是更好的习惯，但我们会握手。

“看在上帝的份上，先生，让我继续说下去吧。”维多利亚只能集中声音说道。

“但是，”高兴的船长喊道，“你用深低音的语气跟我说话！这是荒谬的。你以为我会被你的诡计所欺骗吗？——你真是无赖！我不知道你是女人吗？一个甜蜜、欣喜若狂、可爱的小女人！

他笑了。听到孤独的回声，她浑身发抖。最远的阿迪杰城墙上有阳光，但潮湿的阴影已经填满了朝东的空洞。

“我非常恳切地请求你让我继续说下去，”维多利亚说。

“我同样真诚地请求你让我陪你，”他回答道。 “我无意冒犯，小姐；但我发誓，除了我之外，我和任何人都不会带你去索南伯格城堡，在那里你会见到伦肯斯坦女士，我有幸认识了她们。你看，如果你不搞愚蠢的恶作剧，就像牧场上踢腿的母马一样，你就没有什么可害怕的。

“如果你愿意的话，”她严肃地说。但他伸出了一只手臂。她退后一步。当她看到自己陷入的陷阱时，她最初的茫然绝望在她天生的勇气面前消失了。

'我的小女士！我亲爱的首席女主角！你拒绝我最微不足道的帮助吗？这是因为我是德国人。

“有很多高贵的绅士都是德国人，”维多利亚说。

'那是因为我是德国人；我知道它是。但是，你难道没有看到，德国入侵了意大利并控制了她吗？上帝如此规定——去问牧师吧！你是一位美味的意大利少女，你将挽着德国人的手臂。”

维多利亚抬起脸。 “你的意思是我是你的囚犯？”

“你在斯卡拉歌剧院看起来并没有更勇敢”；船长向她鞠了一躬。

“啊，我忘了，”她说。 '你在那儿看到了我。先生，如果您能帮我一个忙，带我去最近的旅馆，我就唱歌给您听。

“这正是我的愿望，夫人。

我想你没有和吉达斯卡皮那个人结婚吧？不，不：你只是他的……朋友。我能有幸听到你称我为你的朋友吗？怎么，你颤抖了！你害怕我吗？

“说实话，你说得太多了，无法取悦我，”维多利亚说。

队长称赞她的坦诚，他很喜欢。她颤抖的身躯仍然吸引着他的目光，但她的勇气、毫无女人味的表现和畏缩的举止给他留下了深刻的印象。他站在那里看着她，咬着小胡子，试图激起她微笑。

“带你到最近的旅馆；是的，”他说道，仿佛在沉思。 “到最近的旅馆，你会在那里给我唱歌；唱给我听。这并不是一个令人反感的计划。客栈不会是选择：但社交会是精致的。先说，我是你的宣誓骑士？

“我不适合这么说，”她回答道，假装端庄的真诚，几乎要忍耐了。

“你允许我说吗？”

她怒视了他一眼，然后从他身边走了过去。他跟着她拍手，假装把这个动作视为歌剧场景的一部分。 “现在是拔出匕首的时候了，”他说。 “我确信你有一个。”

“除了碰我之外什么都可以！”维多利亚喊道，转身对着他。 '我知道我很安全。如果你觉得有趣的话，你就可以逗我玩。

“现在我不是你所憎恶的对象吗？”

“你已经快要成为这样了。”

'你看！你没有伪装；我为什么要？'

这句话给了她强烈的震撼。

“我的脾气很愚蠢，”她轻声说道。 “我一直习惯于善良。”

他发誓她不懂仁慈；不然她还会继续挑衅他吗？她否认自己有挑衅行为：对此，他指责她怀里的手握着一把匕首。她把匕首扔到他脚边。这是一件高尚的事，他对这一行为的勇气和灵感并非无动于衷。因为它检查了他想向一名武装少女展示的一个力量考验的小例子。

“要我帮你拿一下吗？”他说。

“你会答应我的，”她回答道。但她无法控制下唇的抽搐，她的防御本能告诉她最好隐藏起来。

“当然，你知道你是安全的，”他重复着她之前的话，同时检查了匕首的银色手柄。 '安全的？当然！这是 CA 到 V...。 A. 雕刻工整：礼物；这样，年轻的绅士就可以确信，如果年轻的女士穿过森林、越过山口，她会保护自己免受狮子、老虎和野猪的袭击。我不会妨碍我的好奇心，但V是谁…… A。？'

这把匕首是卡洛送给她的礼物；雕刻师由于一次意外的不幸，在她名字的最后一个字母上写了一个大写字母，而不是小写的a；她记得当她让卡洛注意这个错误时他脸上的红晕，以及当她猜到它的含义时她自己的脸红。

“它拼出了我的名字，”她说。

“你的假名维多利亚。” CA 是谁？

“这是卡洛·阿米亚尼伯爵姓名的首字母缩写。”

“另一个情人？”

“他是我唯一的爱人。他是我的未婚夫。哦，天哪！她举目望天； “我要在我的道路上忍受这个人的折磨多久？”走吧，先生，或者让我继续。你令人难以忍受。这是老虎的精神。我不怕你。

“不，不，”魏斯普里斯说，“我问这个问题是因为我有义务对卡洛·阿米亚尼伯爵进行身体检查，我立刻就觉得我应该后悔这个必要性。至于你并不害怕我，真的，根本不是想伤害你——”

维多利亚看见她头顶上方的秋天森林里有一张白色的脸。她脸上的高兴表情是如此强烈，韦斯普莱斯抬起了头。

“来吧，安吉洛，到我这里来；”她自信地说。

维斯普里斯拔出剑，威严地叫他下来。

安杰洛用白色的手和闪烁的刀锋向下招手，在下垂的栗树树枝上稳住了他的脚和手，然后跳到了维多利亚的身边。

“现在继续前进，”韦斯普里斯挥舞着他的剑。 “你们是我的囚犯。”

“你，”安杰洛反驳道。 '我认识你;你是我们中的一员。如果你关心自己身体的安全，我请你回头。

“安吉洛·吉达斯卡皮，我也认识你。刺客！你这个双重杀人犯！违抗我，我就当着你情人的面杀了你。”

“韦斯普里斯船长，你所说的话该死。”我恳求我的创造者，让我不必杀了你。”

'傻子！你手无寸铁。

安杰洛把短剑握在拳头里。

“我已经警告过你了，韦斯普里斯船长。我站在这儿。我敢说你敢前进。

“你把我的名字念得很糟糕，”船长说着，放下了剑尖。 “如果你想反抗我，就别让女人看着。”他向维多利亚挥了挥左手。

安杰洛催促她走。 “为了我们的卡罗，请继续前进。”但这对她的要求太高了。

“你能和这个人战斗吗？”她问。

“我可以与他战斗并杀死他。”

“我不会踩，”她说。 “你一定要和他战斗吗？”

“别无选择。”维多利亚立刻走到了远处。

安吉洛把船长的目光投向了山口下方的一片平坦的草地。

Weisspriess nodded. ‘The odds are in my favour, so you shall choose the ground.’

All three went silently to the meadow.

It was a circle of green on a projecting shoulder of the mountain, bounded by woods that sank toward the now shadowy South-flowing Adige vale, whose Western heights were gathering red colour above a strongly-marked brown line. Vittoria stood at the border of the wood, leaving the two men to their work. She knew when speech was useless.

Captain Weisspriess paced behind Angelo until the latter stopped short, saying, ‘Here!’

‘Wherever you please,’ Weisspriess responded. ‘The ground is of more importance to you than to me.’

They faced mutually; one felt the point of his stilet, the other the temper of his sword.

‘Killing you, Angelo Guidascarpi, is the killing of a dog. But there are such things as mad dogs. This is not a duel. It is a righteous execution, since you force me to it: I shall deserve your thanks for saving you from the hangman. I think you have heard that I can use my weapon. There’s death on this point for you. Make your peace with your Maker.’

Weisspriess spoke sternly. He delayed the lifting of his sword that the bloody soul might pray.

Angelo said, ‘You are a good soldier: you are a bad priest. Come on.’

A nod of magnanimous resignation to the duties of his office was the captain’s signal of readiness. He knew exactly the method of fighting which Angelo must adopt, and he saw that his adversary was supple, and sinewy, and very keen of eye. But, what can well compensate for even one additional inch of steel? A superior weapon wielded by a trained wrist in perfect coolness means victory, by every reasonable reckoning. In the present instance, it meant nothing other than an execution, as he had said. His contemplation of his own actual share in the performance was nevertheless unpleasant; and it was but half willingly that he straightened out his sword and then doubled his arm. He lessened the odds in his favour considerably by his too accurate estimation of them. He was also a little unmanned by the thought that a woman was to see him using his advantage; but she stood firm in her distant corner, refusing to be waved out of sight. Weisspriess had again to assure himself that it was not a duel, but the enforced execution of a criminal who would not surrender, and who was in his way. Fronting a creature that would vainly assail him, and temporarily escape impalement by bounding and springing, dodging and backing, now here now there, like a dangling bob-cherry, his military gorge rose with a sickness of disgust. He had to remember as vividly as he could realize it, that this man’s life was forfeited, and that the slaughter of him was a worthy service to Countess Anna; also, that there were present reasons for desiring to be quit of him. He gave Angelo two thrusts, and bled him. The skill which warded off the more vicious one aroused his admiration.

‘Pardon my blundering,’ he said; ‘I have never engaged a saltimbanque before.’

They recommenced. Weisspriess began to weigh the sagacity of his opponent’s choice of open ground, where he could lengthen the discourse of steel by retreating and retreating, and swinging easily to right or to left. In the narrow track the sword would have transfixed him after a single feint. He was amused. Much of the cat was in his combative nature. An idea of disabling or dismembering Angelo, and forwarding him to Meran, caused him to trifle further with the edge of the blade. Angelo took a cut, and turned it on his arm; free of the deadly point, he rushed in and delivered a stab; but Weisspriess saved his breast. Quick, they resumed their former positions.

‘I am really so unused to this game!’ said Weisspriess, apologetically.

He was pale: his unsteady breathing, and a deflection of his dripping sword-wrist, belied his coolness. Angelo plunged full on him, dropped, and again reached his right arm; they hung, getting blood for blood, with blazing interpenetrating eyes; a ghastly work of dark hands at half lock thrusting, and savage eyes reading the fiery pages of the book of hell. At last the Austrian got loose from the lock and hurled him off.

‘That bout was hotter,’ he remarked; and kept his sword-point out on the whole length of the arm: he would have scorned another for so miserable a form either of attack or defence.

Vittoria beheld Angelo circling round the point, which met him everywhere; like the minute hand of a clock about to sound his hour, she thought.

He let fall both his arms, as if beaten, which brought on the attack: by sheer evasion he got away from the sword’s lunge, and essayed a second trial of the bite of steel at close quarters; but the Austrian backed and kept him to the point, darting short alluring thrusts, thinking to tempt him on, or to wind him, and then to have him. Weisspriess was chilled by a more curious revulsion from this sort of engagement than he at first experienced. He had become nervously incapable of those proper niceties of sword-play which, without any indecent hacking or maiming, should have stretched Angelo, neatly slain, on the mat of green, before he had a chance. Even now the sight of the man was distressing to an honourable duellist. Angelo was scored with blood-marks. Feeling that he dared not offer another chance to a fellow so desperately close-dealing, Weisspriess thrust fiercely, but delayed his fatal stroke. Angelo stooped and pulled up a handful of grass and soft earth in his left hand.

‘We have been longer about it than I expected,’ said Weisspriess.

Angelo tightened his fingers about the stringy grasstuft; he stood like a dreamer, leaning over to the sword; suddenly he sprang on it, received the point right in his side, sprang on it again, and seized it in his hand, and tossed it up, and threw it square out in time to burst within guard and strike his stilet below the Austrian’s collar-bone. The blade took a glut of blood, as when the wolf tears quick at dripping flesh. It was at a moment when Weisspriess was courteously bantering him with the question whether he was ready, meaning that the affirmative should open the gates of death to him.

The stilet struck thrice. Weisspriess tottered, and hung his jaw like a man at a spectre: amazement was on his features.

‘Remember Broncini and young Branciani!’

Angelo spoke no other words throughout the combat.

Weisspriess threw himself forward on a feeble lunge of his sword, and let the point sink in the ground, as a palsied cripple supports his frame, swayed, and called to Angelo to come on, and try another stroke, another—one more! He fell in a lump: his look of amazement was surmounted by a strong frown.

His enemy was hanging above him panting out of wide nostrils, like a hunter’s horse above the long-tongued quarry, when Vittoria came to them.

She reached her strength to the wounded man to turn his face to heaven.

He moaned, ‘Finish me’; and, as he lay with his back to earth, ‘Good-evening to the old army!’

A vision of leaping tumbrils, and long marching columns about to deploy, passed before his eyelids: he thought he had fallen on the battle-field, and heard a drum beat furiously in the back of his head; and on streamed the cavalry, wonderfully caught away to such a distance that the figures were all diminutive, and the regimental colours swam in smoke, and the enemy danced a plume here and there out of the sea, while his mother and a forgotten Viennese girl gazed at him with exactly the same unfamiliar countenance, and refused to hear that they were unintelligible in the roaring of guns and floods and hurrahs, and the thumping of the tremendous big drum behind his head—‘somewhere in the middle of the earth’: he tried to explain the locality of that terrible drumming noise to them, and Vittoria conceived him to be delirious; but he knew that he was sensible; he knew her and Angelo and the mountain-pass, and that he had a cigar-case in his pocket worked in embroidery of crimson, blue, and gold, by the hands of Countess Anna. He said distinctly that he desired the cigar-case to be delivered to Countess Anna at the Castle of Sonnenberg, and rejoiced on being assured that his wish was comprehended and should be fulfilled; but the marvel was, that his mother should still refuse to give him wine, and suppose him to be a boy: and when he was so thirsty and dry-lipped that though Mina was bending over him, just fresh from Mariazell, he had not the heart to kiss her or lift an arm to her!—His horse was off with him-whither?—He was going down with a company of infantry in the Gulf of Venice: cards were in his hands, visible, though he could not feel them, and as the vessel settled for the black plunge, the cards flushed all honours, and his mother shook her head at him: he sank, and heard Mina sighing all the length of the water to the bottom, which grated and gave him two horrid shocks of pain: and he cried for a doctor, and admitted that his horse had managed to throw him; but wine was the cure, brandy was the cure, or water, water! Water was sprinkled on his forehead and put to his lips.

He thanked Vittoria by name, and imagined himself that General, serving under old Wurmser, of whom the tale is told that being shot and lying grievously wounded on the harsh Rivoli ground, he obtained the help of a French officer in as bad case as himself, to moisten his black tongue and write a short testamentary document with his blood, and for a way of returning thanks to the Frenchman, he put down among others, the name of his friendly enemy’s widow; whereupon both resigned their hearts to death; but the Austrian survived to find the sad widow and espouse her.

His mutterings were full of gratitude, showing a vividly transient impression to what was about him, that vanished in a narrow-headed flight through clouds into lands of memory. It pained him, he said, that he could not offer her marriage; but he requested that when his chin was shaved his moustache should be brushed up out of the way of the clippers, for he and all his family were conspicuous for the immense amount of life which they had in them, and his father had lain six-and-thirty hours bleeding on the field of Wagram, and had yet survived to beget a race as hearty as himself:—‘Old Austria! thou grand old Austria!’

The smile was proud, though faint, which accompanied the apostrophe, addressed either to his country or to his father’s personification of it; it was inexpressibly pathetic to Vittoria, who understood his ‘Oesterreich,’ and saw the weak and helpless bleeding man, with his eyeballs working under the lids, and the palms of his hands stretched out open-weak as a corpse, but conquering death.

The arrival of Jacopo and Johann furnished help to carry him onward to the nearest place of shelter. Angelo would not quit her side until he had given money and directions to both the trembling fellows, together with his name, that they might declare the author of the deed at once if questioned. He then bowed to Vittoria slightly and fled. They did not speak.

The last sunbeams burned full crimson on the heights of the Adige mountains as Vittoria followed the two pale men who bore the wounded officer between them at a slow pace for the nearest village in the descent of the pass.

Angelo watched them out of sight. The far-off red rocks spun round his eyeballs; the meadow was a whirling thread of green; the brown earth heaved up to him. He felt that he was diving, and had the thought that there was but water enough to moisten his red hands when his senses left him.

The old city of Meran faces Southward to the yellow hills of Italy, across a broad vale, between two mountain-walls and torrent-waters. With one hand it takes the bounding green Passeyr, and with the other the brown-rolling Adige, and plunges them together in roaring foam under the shadow of the Western wall. It stands on the spur of a lower central eminence crowned by a grey castle, and the sun has it from every aspect. The shape of a swan in water may describe its position, for the Vintschgau and the stony Passeyrthal make a strong curve on two sides as they descend upon it with their rivers, and the bosom of the city projects, while the head appears bending gracefully backward. Many castles are in view of it; the loud and tameless Passeyr girdles it with an emerald cincture; there is a sea of arched vineyard foliage at his feet.

Vittoria reached the Castle of Sonnenberg about noon, and found empty courts and open doors. She sat in the hall like a supplicant, disregarded by the German domestics, who beheld a travel-stained humble-faced young Italian woman, and supposed that their duty was done in permitting her to rest; but the duchess’s maid Aennchen happening to come by, questioned her in moderately intelligible Italian, and hearing her name gave a cry, and said that all the company were out hunting, shooting, and riding, in the vale below or the mountain above. “Ah, dearest lady, what a fright we have all been in about you! Signora Piaveni has not slept a wink, and the English gentleman has made great excursions every day to find you. This morning the soldier Wilhelm arrived with news that his master was bringing you on.”

Vittoria heard that Laura and her sister and the duchess had gone down to Meran. Countess Lena von Lenkenstein was riding to see her betrothed shoot on a neighbouring estate. Countess Anna had disappeared early, none knew where. Both these ladies, and their sister-in-law, were in mourning for the terrible death of their brother, Count Paul Aennchen repeated what she knew of the tale concerning him.

The desire to see Laura first, and be embraced and counselled by her, and lie awhile in her arms to get a breath of home, made Vittoria refuse to go up to her chamber, and notwithstanding Aennchen’s persuasions, she left the castle, and went out and sat in the shaded cart-track. On the winding ascent she saw a lady in a black riding habit, leading her horse and talking to a soldier, who seemed to be receiving orders from her, and presently saluted and turned his steps downward. The lady came on, and passed her without a glance. After entering the courtyard, where she left her horse, she reappeared, and stood hesitating, but came up to Vittoria and said bluntly, in Italian:

“Are you the signorina Campa, or Belloni, who is expected here?”

The Austrian character and colouring of her features told Vittoria that this must be the Countess Anna or her sister.

“I think I have been expected,” she replied.

“You come alone?”

“I am alone.”

“I am Countess Anna von Lenkenstein; one of the guests of the castle.”

“My message is to the Countess Anna.”

“You have a message?”

Vittoria lifted the embroidered cigar-case. Countess Anna snatched it from her hand.

“What does this mean? Is it insolence? Have the kindness, if you please, not to address me in enigmas. Do you”—Anna was deadly pale as she turned the cigarcase from side to side—“do you imagine that I smoke, ‘par hasard?’” She tried to laugh off her intemperate manner of speech; the laugh broke at sight of a blood-mark on one corner of the case; she started and said earnestly, “I beg you to let me hear what the meaning of this may be?”

“He lies in the Ultenthal, wounded; and his wish was that I should deliver it to you.” Vittoria spoke as gently as the harsh tidings would allow.

“Wounded? My God! my God!” Anna cried in her own language. “Wounded?-in the breast, then! He carried it in his breast. Wounded by what? by what?”

“I can tell you no more.”

“Wounded by whom?”

“It was an honourable duel.”

“Are you afraid to tell me he has been assassinated?”

“It was an honourable duel.”

“None could match him with the sword.”

“His enemy had nothing but a dagger.”

“Who was his enemy?”

“It is no secret, but I must leave him to say.”

“You were a witness of the fight?”

“I saw it all.”

“The man was one of your party!

“Ah!” exclaimed Vittoria, “lose no time with me, Countess Anna, go to him at once, for though he lived when I left him, he was bleeding; I cannot say that he was not dying, and he has not a friend near.”

Anna murmured like one overborne by calamity. “My brother struck down one day—he the next!” She covered her face a moment, and unclosed it to explain that she wept for her brother, who had been murdered, stabbed in Bologna.

“Was it Count Ammiani who did this?” she asked passionately.

Vittoria shook her head; she was divining a dreadful thing in relation to the death of Count Paul.

“It was not?” said Anna. “They had a misunderstanding, I know. But you tell me the man fought with a dagger. It could not be Count Ammiani. The dagger is an assassin’s weapon, and there are men of honour in Italy still.”

She called to a servant in the castle-yard, and sent him down with orders to stop the soldier Wilhelm.

“We heard this morning that you were coming, and we thought it curious,” she observed; and called again for her horse to be saddled. “How far is this place where he is lying? I have no knowledge of the Ultenthal. Has he a doctor attending him? When was he wounded? It is but common humanity to see that he is attended by an efficient doctor. My nerves are unstrung by the recent blow to our family; that is why—Oh, my father! my holy father!” she turned to a grey priest’s head that was rising up the ascent, “I thank God for you! Lena is away riding; she weeps constantly when she is within four walls. Come in and give me tears, if you can; I am half mad for the want of them. Tears first; teach me patience after.”

The old priest fanned his face with his curled hat, and raised one hand as he uttered a gentle chiding in reproof of curbless human sorrow. Anna said to Vittoria, coldly, “I thank you for your message:” she walked into the castle by his side, and said to him there: “The woman you saw outside has a guilty conscience. You will spend your time more profitably with her than with me. I am past all religious duties at this moment. You know, father, that I can open my heart. Probe this Italian woman; search her through and through. I believe her to be blood-stained and abominable. She hates us. She has sworn an oath against us. She is malignant.”

It was not long before Anna issued forth and rode down to the vale. The priest beckoned to Vittoria from the gates. He really supposed her to have come to him with a burdened spirit.

“My daughter,” he addressed her. The chapter on human error was opened: “We are all of one family—all of us erring children—all of us bound to abnegate hatred: by love alone are we saved. Behold the Image of Love—the Virgin and Child. Alas! and has it been visible to man these more than eighteen hundred years, and humankind are still blind to it? Are their ways the ways of comfort and blessedness? Their ways are the ways of blood; paths to eternal misery among howling fiends. Why have they not chosen the sweet ways of peace, which are strewn with flowers, which flow with milk?”—The priest spread his hand open for Vittoria’s, which she gave to his keeping, and he enclosed it softly, smoothing it with his palms, and retaining it as a worldly oyster between spiritual shells. “Why, my daughter, why, but because we do not bow to that Image daily, nightly, hourly, momently! We do not worship it that its seed may be sown in us. We do not cling to it, that in return it may cling to us.”

He spoke with that sensuous resource of rich feeling which the contemplation of the Image does inspire. And Vittoria was not led reluctantly into the oratory of the castle to pray with him; but she refused to confess. Thereupon followed a soft discussion that was as near being acerb as nails are near velvet paws.

Vittoria perceived his drift, and also the dear good heart of the old man, who meant no harm to her, and believed that he was making use of his professional weapons for her ultimate good. The inquisitions and the kindness went musically together; she responded to the kindness, but rebutted the inquisitions; at which he permitted a shade of discontent to traverse his features, and asked her with immense tenderness whether she had not much on her mind; she expressing melodious gratitude for his endeavours to give her comfort. He could not forbear directing an admonishment to her stubborn spirit, and was obliged, for the sake of impressiveness, to speak it harshly; until he saw, that without sweetness of manner and unction of speech, he left her untouched; so he was driven back to the form of address better suited to his nature and habits; the end of which was that both were cooing.

Vittoria was ashamed to tell herself how much she liked him and his ghostly brethren, whose preaching was always of peace, while the world was full of lurid hatred, strife, and division. She begged the baffled old man to keep her hand in his. He talked in Latinized Italian, and only appeared to miss the exact meaning of her replies when his examination of the state of her soul was resumed. They sat in the soft colour of the consecrated place like two who were shut away from earth. Often he thought that her tears were about to start and bring her low; for she sighed heavily; at the mere indication of the displacement of her hand, she looked at him eagerly, as if entreating him not to let it drop.

“You are a German, father?” she said.

“I am of German birth, my daughter.”

“That makes it better. Remain beside me. The silence is sweet music.”

The silence was broken at intervals by his murmur of a call for patience! patience!

This strange scene concluded with the entry of the duchess, who retired partly as soon as she saw them. Vittoria smiled to the old man, and left him: the duchess gave her a hushed welcome, and took her place. Vittoria was soon in Laura’s arms, where, after a storm of grief, she related the events of the journey following her flight from Milan. Laura interrupted her but once to exclaim, “Angelo Guidascarpi!” Vittoria then heard from her briefly that Milan was quiet, Carlo Ammiani in prison. It had been for tidings of her lover that she had hastened over the mountains to Meran. She craved for all that could be told of him, but Laura repeated, as in a stupefaction, “Angelo Guidascarpi!” She answered Vittoria’s question by saying, “You could not have had so fatal a companion.”

“I could not have had so devoted a protector.”

“There is such a thing as an evil star. We are all under it at present, to some degree; but he has been under it from his birth. My Sandra, my beloved, I think I have pardoned you, if I ever pardon anyone! I doubt it; but it is certain that I love you. You have seen Countess Anna, or I would have told you to rest and get over your fatigue. The Lenkensteins are here—my poor sister among them. You must show yourself. I was provident enough to call at your mother’s for a box of your clothes before I ran out of wretched Milan.”

Further, the signora stated that Carlo might have to remain in prison. She made no attempt to give dark or fair colour to the misery of the situation; telling Vittoria to lie on her bed and sleep, if sleep could be persuaded to visit her, she went out to consult with the duchess. Vittoria lay like a dead body on the bed, counting the throbs of her heart. It helped her to fall into a state of insensibility. When she awoke, the room was dark; she felt that some one had put a silken cushion across her limbs. The noise of a storm traversing the vale rang through the castle, and in the desolation of her soul, that stealthy act of kindness wrought in her till she almost fashioned a vow upon her lips that she would leave the world to toss its wrecks, and dedicate her life to God.

For, O heaven! of what avail is human effort? She thought of the Chief, whose life was stainless, but who stood proscribed because his aim was too high to be attained within compass of a mortal’s years. His error seemed that he had ever aimed at all. He seemed less wise than the old priest of the oratory. She could not disentangle him from her own profound humiliation and sense of fallen power. Her lover’s imprisonment accused her of some monstrous culpability, which she felt unrepentingly, not as we feel a truth, but as we submit to a terrible force of pressure.

The morning light made her realize Carlo’s fate, to whom it would penetrate through a hideous barred loophole—a defaced and dreadful beam. She asked herself why she had fled from Milan. It must have been some cowardly instinct that had prompted her to fly. “Coward, coward! thing of vanity! you, a mere woman!” she cried out, and succeeded in despising herself sufficiently to think it possible that she had deserved to forfeit her lover’s esteem.

It was still early when the duchess’s maid came to her, bringing word that her mistress would be glad to visit her. From the duchess Vittoria heard of the charge against Angelo. Respecting Captain Weisspriess, Amalia said that she had perceived his object in wishing to bring the great cantatrice to the castle; and that it was a well-devised audacious scheme to subdue Countess Anna:—“We Austrians also can be jealous. The difference between us is, that it makes us tender, and you Italians savage.” She asked pointedly for an affirmative, that Vittoria was glad to reply with, when she said: “Captain Weisspriess was perfectly respectful to you?” She spoke comforting words of Carlo Ammiani, whom she hoped to see released as soon as the excitement had subsided. The chief comfort she gave was by saying that he had been originally arrested in mistake for his cousin Angelo.

“I will confide what is now my difficulty here frankly to you,” said the duchess. “The Lenkensteins are my guests; I thought it better to bring them here. Angelo Guidascarpi has slain their brother—a base deed! It does not affect you in my eyes; you can understand that in theirs it does. Your being present—Laura has told me everything—at the duel, or fight, between that young man and Captain Weisspriess, will make you appear as his accomplice—at least, to Anna it will; she is the most unreasoning, the most implacable of women. She returned from the Ultenthal last night, and goes there this morning, which is a sign that Captain Weisspriess lives. I should be sorry if we lost so good an officer. As she is going to take Father Bernardus with her, it is possible that the wound is serious. Do you know you have mystified the worthy man exceedingly? What tempted you to inform him that your conscience was heavily burdened, at the same time that you refused to confess?”

“Surely he has been deluded about me,” said Vittoria.

“I do but tell you his state of mind in regard to you,” the duchess pursued. “Under all the circumstances, this is what I have to ask: you are my Laura’s guest, therefore the guest of my heart. There is another one here, an Englishman, a Mr. Powys; and also Lieutenant Pierson, whom, naughty rebel that you are, you have been the means of bringing into disgrace; naturally you would wish to see them: but my request is, that you should keep to these rooms for two or three days: the Lenkensteins will then be gone. They can hardly reproach me for retaining an invalid. If you go down among them, it will be a cruel meeting.”

Vittoria thankfully consented to the arrangement. They agreed to act in accordance with it.

The signora was a late riser. The duchess had come on a second visit to Vittoria when Laura joined them, and hearing of the arrangement, spurned the notion of playing craven before the Lenkensteins, who, she said, might think as it pleased them to think, but were never to suppose that there was any fear of confronting them. “And now, at this very moment, when they have their triumph, and are laughing over Viennese squibs at her, she has an idea of hiding her head—she hangs out the white flag! It can’t be. We go or we stay; but if we stay, the truth is that we are too poor to allow our enemies to think poorly of us. You, Amalia, are victorious, and you may snap your fingers at opinion. It is a luxury we cannot afford. Besides, I wish her to see my sister and make acquaintance with the Austrianized-Italian—such a wonder as is nowhere to be seen out of the Serabiglione and in the Lenkenstein family. Marriage is, indeed, a tremendous transformation. Bianca was once declared to be very like me.”

The brow-beaten duchess replied to the outburst that she had considered it right to propose the scheme for Vittoria’s seclusion on account of the Guidascarpi.

“Even if that were a good reason, there are better on the other side,” said Laura; adding, with many little backward tosses of the head, “That story has to be related in full before I denounce Angelo and Rinaldo.”

“It cannot be denied that they are assassins,” returned the duchess.

“It cannot be denied that they have killed one man or more. For you, Justice drops from the bough: we have to climb and risk our necks for it. Angelo stood to defend my darling here. Shall she be ashamed of him?”

“You will never persuade me to tolerate assassination,” said the duchess colouring.

“Never, never; I shall never persuade you; never persuade—never attempt to persuade any foreigner that we can be driven to extremes where their laws do not apply to us—are not good for us—goad a subjected people till their madness is pardonable. Nor shall I dream of persuading you that Angelo did right in defending her from that man.”

“I maintain that there are laws applicable to all human creatures,” said the duchess. “You astonish me when you speak compassionately of such a criminal.”

“No; not of such a criminal, of such an unfortunate youth, and my countryman, when every hand is turned against him, and all tongues are reviling him. But let Angelo pass; I pray to heaven he may escape. All who are worth anything in our country are strained in every fibre, and it’s my trick to be half in love with anyone of them when he is persecuted. I fancy he is worth more than the others, and is simply luckless. You must make allowances for us, Amalia—pity captive Judah!”

“I think, my Laura, you will never be satisfied till I have ceased to be Babylonian,” said the duchess, smiling and fondling Vittoria, to whom she said, “Am I not a complaisant German?”

Vittoria replied gently, “If they were like you!”

“Yes, if they were like the duchess,” said Laura, “nothing would be left for us then but to hate ourselves. Fortunately, we deal with brutes.”

She was quite pitiless in prompting Vittoria to hasten down, and marvelled at the evident reluctance in doing this slight duty, of one whose courage she had recently seen rise so high. Vittoria was equally amazed by her want of sympathy, which was positive coldness, and her disregard for the sentiments of her hostess. She dressed hesitatingly, responding with forlorn eyes to Laura’s imperious “Come.” When at last she was ready to descend, Laura took her dawn, full of battle. The duchess had gone in advance to keep the peace.

The ladies of the Lenkenstein family were standing at one window of the morning room conversing. Apart from them, Merthyr Powys and Wilfrid were examining one of the cumbrous antique arms ranged along the wall. The former of these old English friends stepped up to Vittoria quickly and kissed her forehead. Wilfrid hung behind him; he made a poor show of indifference, stammered English and reddened; remembering that he was under observation he recovered wonderfully, and asked, like a patron, “How is the voice?” which would have been foolish enough to Vittoria’s more attentive hearing. She thanked him for the service he had rendered her at La Scala. Countess Lena, who looked hard at both, saw nothing to waken one jealous throb.

“Bianca, you expressed a wish to give a salute to my eldest daughter,” said Laura.

The Countess of Lenkenstein turned her head. “Have I done so?”

“It is my duty to introduce her,” interposed the duchess, and conducted the ceremony with a show of its embracing these ladies, neither one of whom changed her cold gaze.

Careful that no pause should follow, she commenced chatting to the ladies and gentlemen alternately, keeping Vittoria under her peculiar charge. Merthyr alone seconded her efforts to weave the web of converse, which is an armistice if not a treaty on these occasions.

“Have you any fresh caricatures from Vienna?” Laura continued to address her sister.

“None have reached me,” said the neutral countess.

“Have they finished laughing?”

“我不能说。”

“At any rate, we sing still,” Laura smiled to Vittoria. “You shall hear us after breakfast. I regret excessively that you were not in Milan on the Fifteenth. We will make amends to you as much as possible. You shall hear us after breakfast. You will sing to please my sister, Sandra mia, will you not?”

Vittoria shook her head. Like those who have become passive, she read faces—the duchess’s imploring looks thrown from time to time to the Lenkenstein ladies, Wilfrid’s oppressed forehead, the resolute neutrality of the countess—and she was not only incapable of seconding Laura’s aggressive war, but shrank from the involvement and sickened at the indelicacy. Anna’s eyes were fixed on her and filled her with dread lest she should be resolving to demand a private interview.

“You refuse to sing?” said Laura; and under her breath, “When I bid you not, you insist!”

“Can she possibly sing before she grows accustomed to the air of the place?” said the duchess.

Merthyr gravely prescribed a week’s diet on grapes antecedent to the issuing of a note. “Have you never heard what a sustained grape-diet will do for the bullfinches?”

“Never,” exclaimed the duchess. “Is that the secret of their German education?”

“Apparently, for we cannot raise them to the same pitch of perfection in England.”

“I will try it upon mine. Every morning they shall have two big bunches.”

“Fresh plucked, and with the first sunlight on them. Be careful of the rules.”

Wilfrid remarked, “To make them exhibit the results, you withdraw the benefit suddenly, of course?”

“We imitate the general run of Fortune’s gifts as much as we can,” said Merthyr.

“That is the training for little shrill parrots: we have none in Italy,” Laura sighed, mock dolefully; “I fear the system would fail among us.”

“It certainly would not build Como villas,” said Lena.

Laura cast sharp eyes on her pretty face.

“It is adapted for caged voices that are required to chirrup to tickle the ears of boors.”

Anna said to the duchess: “I hope your little birds are all well this morning.”

“Come to them presently with me and let our ears be tickled,” the duchess laughed in answer; and the spiked dialogue broke, not to revive.

The duchess had observed the constant direction of Anna’s eyes upon Vittoria during the repast, and looked an interrogation at Anna, who replied to it firmly. “I must be present,” the duchess whispered. She drew Vittoria away by the hand, telling Merthyr Powys that it was unkind to him, but that he should be permitted to claim his fair friend from noon to the dinner-bell.

Laura and Bianca were discussing the same subject as the one for which Anna desired an interview with Vittoria. It was to know the conditions and cause of the duel between Angelo Guidascarpi and Captain Weisspriess, and whither Angelo had fled. “In other words, you cry for vengeance under the name of justice,” Laura phrased it, and put up a prayer for Angelo’s escape.

The countess rebuked her. “It is men like Angelo who are a scandal to Italy.”

“Proclaimed so; but by what title are they judged?” Laura retorted. “I have heard that his duel with Count Paul was fair, and that the grounds for it were just. Deplore it; but to condemn an Italian gentleman without hearing his personal vindication, is infamous; nay, it is Austrian. I know next to nothing of the story. Countess Ammiani has assured me that the brothers have a clear defence—not from your Vienna point of view: Italy and Vienna are different sides of the shield.”

Vittoria spoke most humbly before Anna; her sole irritating remark was, that even if she were aware of the direction of Angelo’s flight, she would not betray him.

The duchess did her utmost to induce her to see that he was a criminal, outlawed from common charity. “These Italians are really like the Jews,” she said to Anna; “they appear to me to hold together by a bond of race: you cannot get them to understand that any act can be infamous when one of their blood is guilty of it.”

Anna thought gloomily: “Then, why do you ally yourself to them?”

The duchess, with Anna, Lena, and Wilfrid, drove to the Ultenthal. Vittoria and Merthyr had a long afternoon of companionship. She had been shyer in meeting him than in meeting Wilfrid, whom she had once loved. The tie between herself and Wilfrid was broken; but Merthyr had remained true to his passionless affection, which ennobled him to her so that her heart fluttered, though she was heavily depressed. He relieved her by letting her perceive that Carlo Ammiani’s merits were not unknown to him. Merthyr smiled at Carlo for abjuring his patrician birth. He said: “Count Ammiani will be cured in time of those little roughnesses of his adopted Republicanism. You must help to cure him. Women are never so foolish as men in these things.”

When Merthyr had spoken thus, she felt that she might dare to press his hand. Sharing friendship with this steadfast nature and brotherly gentleman; who was in the ripe manhood of his years; who loved Italy and never despaired; who gave great affection, and took uncomplainingly the possible return for it;—seemed like entering on a great plain open to boundless heaven. She thought that friendship was sweeter than love. Merthyr soon left the castle to meet his sister at Coire. Laura and Vittoria drove some distance up the Vintschgau, on the way to the Engadine, with him. He affected not to be downcast by the failure of the last attempt at a rising in Milan. “Keep true to your Art; and don’t let it be subservient to anything,” he said, and his final injunction to her was that she should get a German master and practise rigidly.

Vittoria could only look at Laura in reply.

“He is for us, but not of us,” said Laura, as she kissed her fingers to him.

“If he had told me to weep and pray,” Vittoria murmured, “I think I should by-and-by lift up my head.”

“By-and-by! By-and-by I think I see a convent for me,” said Laura.

Their faces drooped.

Vittoria cried: “Ah! did he mean that my singing at La Scala was below the mark?”

At this, Laura’s laughter came out in a volume. “And that excellent Father Bernardus thinks he is gaining a convert!” she said.

Vittoria’s depression was real, though her strong vitality appeared to mock it. Letters from Milan, enclosed to the duchess, spoke of Carlo Ammiani’s imprisonment as a matter that might be indefinitely prolonged. His mother had been subjected to an examination; she had not hesitated to confess that she had received her nephew in her house, but it could not be established against her that it was not Carlo whom she had passed off to the sbirri as her son. Countess Ammiani wrote to Laura, telling her she scarcely hoped that Carlo would obtain his liberty save upon the arrest of Angelo:—“Therefore, what I most desire, I dare not pray for!” That line of intense tragic grief haunted Vittoria like a veiled head thrusting itself across the sunlight. Countess Ammiani added that she must give her son what news she could gather;—“Concerning you,” said Laura, interpreting the sentence: “Bitter days do this good, they make a proud woman abjure the traditions of her caste.” A guarded answer was addressed, according to the countess’s directions, to Sarpo the bookseller, in Milan. For purposes of such a nature, Barto Rizzo turned the uneasy craven to account.

It happened that one of the maids at Sonnenberg was about to marry a peasant, of Meran, part proprietor of a vineyard, and the nuptials were to be celebrated at the castle. Among those who thronged the courtyard on the afternoon of the ceremony, Vittoria beheld her faithful Beppo, who related the story of his pursuit of her, and the perfidy of Luigi;—a story so lengthy, that his voluble tongue running at full speed could barely give the outlines of it. He informed her, likewise, that he had been sent for, while lying in Trent, by Captain Weisspriess, whom he had seen at an inn of the Ultenthal, weak but improving. Beppo was the captain’s propitiatory offering to Vittoria. Meanwhile the ladies sat on a terrace, overlooking the court, where a stout fellow in broad green braces and blue breeches lay half across a wooden table, thrumming a zither, which set the groups in motion. The zither is a melancholy little instrument; in range of expression it is to the harp what the winchat is to the thrush; or to the violin, what that bird is to the nightingale; yet few instruments are so exciting: here and there along these mountain valleys you may hear a Tyrolese maid set her voice to its plaintive thin tones; but when the strings are swept madly there is mad dancing; it catches at the nerves. “Andreas! Andreas!” the dancers shouted to encourage the player. Some danced with vine-poles; partners broke and wandered at will, taking fresh partners, and occasionally huddling in confusion, when the poles were levelled and tilted at them, and they dispersed. Beppo, dancing mightily to recover the use of his legs, met his acquaintance Jacob Baumwalder Feckelwitz, and the pair devoted themselves to a rivalry of capers; jump, stamp, shuffle, leg aloft, arms in air, yell and shriek: all took hands around them and streamed, tramping the measure, and the vine-poles guarded the ring. Then Andreas raised the song: “Our Lady is gracious,” and immediately the whole assemblage were singing praise to the Lady of the castle. Following which, wine being brought to Andreas, he drank to his lady, to his lady’s guests, to the bride, to the bridegroom, to everybody. He was now ready to improvize, and dashed thumb and finger on the zither, tossing up his face, swarthy-flushed: “There was a steinbock with a beard.” Half-a-dozen voices repeated it, as to proclaim the theme.

“Alas! a beard indeed, for there is no end to this animal. I know him;” said the duchess dolefully.

“There was a steinbock with a beard;
Of no gun was he afeard
Piff-paff left of him: piff-paff right of him
Piff-paff everywhere, where you get a sight of him.”

The steinbock led through the whole course of a mountaineer’s emotions and experiences, with piff-paff continually left of him and right of him and nothing hitting him. The mountaineer is perplexed; an able man, a dead shot, who must undo the puzzle or lose faith in his skill, is a tremendous pursuer, and the mountaineer follows the steinbock ever. A ‘sennderin’ at a ‘sennhutchen’ tells him that she admitted the steinbock last night, and her curled hair frizzled under the steinbock’s eyes. The case is only too clear: my goodness! the steinbock is the—“Der Teu!…” said Andreas, with a comic stop of horror, the rhyme falling cleverly to “ai.” Henceforth the mountaineer becomes transformed into a champion of humanity, hunting the wicked bearded steinbock in all corners; especially through the cabinet of those dark men who decree the taxes detested in Tyrol.

The song had as yet but fairly commenced, when a break in the ‘piff-paff’ chorus warned Andreas that he was losing influence, women and men were handing on a paper and bending their heads over it; their responses hushed altogether, or were ludicrously inefficient.

“I really believe the poor brute has come to a Christian finish—this Ahasuerus of steinbocks!” said the duchess.

The transition to silence was so extraordinary and abrupt, that she called to her chasseur to know the meaning of it. Feckelwitz fetched the paper and handed it up. It exhibited a cross done in blood under the word ‘Meran,’ and bearing that day’s date. One glance at it told Laura what it meant. The bride in the court below was shedding tears: the bridegroom was lighting his pipe and consoling her; women were chattering, men shrugging. Some said they had seen an old grey-haired hag (hexe) stand at the gates and fling down a piece of paper. A little boy whose imagination was alive with the tale of the steinbock, declared that her face was awful, and that she had only the use of one foot. A man patted him on the shoulder, and gave him a gulp of wine, saying with his shrewdest air: “One may laugh at the devil once too often, though!” and that sentiment was echoed; the women suggested in addition the possibility of the bride Lisa having something on her conscience, seeing that she had lived in a castle two years and more. The potential persuasions of Father Bernardus were required to get the bride to go away to her husband’s roof that evening: when she did make her departure, the superstitious peasantry were not a merry party that followed at her heels.

At the break-up of the festivities Wilfrid received an intimation that his sister had arrived in Meran from Bormio. He went down to see her, and returned at a late hour. The ladies had gone to rest. He wrote a few underlined words, entreating Vittoria to grant an immediate interview in the library of the castle. The missive was entrusted to Aennchen. Vittoria came in alarm.

“My sister is perfectly well,” said Wilfrid. “She has heard that Captain Gambier has been arrested in the mountains; she had some fears concerning you, which I quieted. What I have to tell you, does not relate to her. The man Angelo Guidascarpi is in Meran. I wish you to let the signora know that if he is not carried out of the city before sunset to-morrow, I must positively inform the superior officer of the district of his presence there.”

This was their first private interview. Vittoria (for she knew him) had acceded to it, much fearing that it would lead to her having to put on her sex’s armour. To collect her wits, she asked tremblingly how Wilfrid had chanced to see Angelo. An old Italian woman, he said, had accosted him at the foot of the mountain, and hearing that he was truly an Englishman—“I am out of my uniform,” Wilfrid remarked with intentional bitterness—had conducted him to the house of an Italian in the city, where Angelo Guidascarpi was lying.

“Ill?” said Vittoria.

“Just recovering. After that duel, or whatever it may be called with Weisspriess, he lay all night out on the mountains. He managed to get the help of a couple of fellows, who led him at dusk into Meran, saw an Italian name over a shop, and—I will say for them that the rascals hold together. There he is, at all events.”

“Would you denounce a sick man, Wilfrid?”

“I certainly cannot forget my duty upon every point”

“You are changed!”

“Changed! Am I the only one who is changed?”

“He must have supposed that it would be Merthyr. I remember speaking of Merthyr to him as our unchangeable friend. I told him Merthyr would be here.”

“Instead of Merthyr, he had the misfortune to see your changeable friend, if you will have it so.”

“But how can it be your duty to denounce him, Wilfrid. You have quitted that army.”

“Have I? I have forfeited my rank, perhaps.”

“And Angelo is not guilty of a military offence.”

“He has slain one of a family that I am bound to respect.”

“Certainly, certainly,” said Vittoria hurriedly.

Her forehead showed distress of mind; she wanted Laura’s counsel.

“Wilfrid, do you know the whole story?”

“I know that he inveigled Count Paul to his house and slew him; either he or his brother, or both.”

“I have been with him for days, Wilfrid. I believe that he would do no dishonourable thing. He is related——“.

“He is the cousin of Count Ammiani.”

“Ah! would you plunge us in misery?”

“怎么样？”

“Count Ammiani is my lover.”

She uttered it unblushingly, and with tender eyes fixed on him.

“Your lover!” he exclaimed, with vile emphasis.

“He will be my husband,” she murmured, while the mounting hot colour burned at her temples.

“Changed—who is changed?” he said, in a vehement underneath. “For that reason I am to be false to her who does me the honour to care for me!”

“I would not have you false to her in thought or deed.”

“You ask me to spare this man on account of his relationship to your lover, and though he has murdered the brother of the lady whom I esteem. What on earth is the meaning of the petition? Really, you amaze me.”

“I appeal to your generosity, Wilfrid, I am Emilia.”

“你是？”

She gave him her hand. He took it, and felt at once the limit of all that he might claim. Dropping the hand, he said:

“Will nothing less than my ruin satisfy you? Since that night at La Scala, I am in disgrace with my uncle; I expect at any moment to hear that I am cashiered from the army, if not a prisoner. What is it that you ask of me now? To conspire with you in shielding the man who has done a mortal injury to the family of which I am almost one. Your reason must perceive that you ask too much. I would willingly assist you in sparing the feelings of Count Ammiani; and, believe me, gratitude is the last thing I require to stimulate my services. You ask too much; you must see that you ask too much.”

“I do,” said Vittoria. “Good-night, Wilfrid.”

He was startled to find her going, and lost his equable voice in trying to detain her. She sought relief in Laura’s bosom, to whom she recapitulated the interview.

“Is it possible,” Laura said, looking at her intently, “that you do not recognize the folly of telling this Lieutenant Pierson that you were pleading to him on behalf of your lover? Could anything be so monstrous, when one can see that he is malleable to the twist of your little finger? Are you only half a woman, that you have no consciousness of your power? Probably you can allow yourself—enviable privilege!—to suppose that he called you down at this late hour simply to inform you that he is compelled to do something which will cause you unhappiness! I repeat, it is an enviable privilege. Now, when the real occasion has come for you to serve us, you have not a single weapon—except these tears, which you are wasting on my lap. Be sure that if he denounces Angelo, Angelo’s life cries out against you. You have but to quicken your brain to save him. Did he expose his life for you or not? I knew that he was in Meran,” the signora continued sadly. “The paper which frightened the silly peasants, revealed to me that he was there, needing help. I told you Angelo was under an evil star. I thought my day to-morrow would be a day of scheming. The task has become easy, if you will.”

“Be merciful; the task is dreadful,” said Vittoria.

“The task is simple. You have an instrument ready to your hands. You can do just what you like with him—make an Italian of him; make him renounce his engagement to this pert little Lena of Lenkenstein, break his sword, play Arlecchino, do what you please. He is not required for any outrageous performance. A week, and Angelo will have recovered his strength; you likewise may resume the statuesque demeanour which you have been exhibiting here. For the space of one week you are asked for some natural exercise of your wits and compliancy. Hitherto what have you accomplished, pray?” Laura struck spitefully at Vittoria’s degraded estimation of her worth as measured by events. “You have done nothing—worse than nothing. It gives me horrors to find it necessary to entreat you to look your duty in the face and do it, that even three or four Italian hearts—Carlo among them—may thank you. Not Carlo, you say?” (Vittoria had sobbed, “No, not Carlo.”) “How little you know men! How little do you think how the obligations of the hour should affect a creature deserving life! Do you fancy that Carlo wishes you to be for ever reading the line of a copy-book and shaping your conduct by it? Our Italian girls do this; he despises them. Listen to me; do not I know what is meant by the truth of love? I pass through fire, and keep constant to it; but you have some vile Romance of Chivalry in your head; a modern sculptor’s figure, ‘MEDITATION;’ that is the sort of bride you would give him in the stirring days of Italy. Do you think it is only a statue that can be true? Perceive—will you not—that this Lieutenant Pierson is your enemy. He tells you as much; surely the challenge is fair? Defeat him as you best can. Angelo shall not be abandoned.”

“O me! it is unendurable; you are merciless,” said Vittoria, shuddering.

She saw the vile figure of herself aping smirks and tender meanings to her old lover. It was a picture that she dared not let her mind rest on: how then could she personate it? All through her life she had been frank; as a young woman, she was clear of soul; she felt that her, simplicity was already soiled by the bare comprehension of the abominable course indicated by Laura. Degradation seemed to have been a thing up to this moment only dreamed of; but now that it was demanded of her to play coquette and trick her womanhood with false allurements, she knew the sentiment of utter ruin; she was ashamed. No word is more lightly spoken than shame. Vittoria’s early devotion to her Art, and subsequently to her Italy, had carried her through the term when she would otherwise have showed the natural mild attack of the disease. It came on her now in a rush, penetrating every chamber of her heart, overwhelming her; she could see no distinction between being ever so little false and altogether despicable. She had loathings of her body and her life. With grovelling difficulty of speech she endeavoured to convey the sense of her repugnance to Laura, who leaned her ear, wondering at such bluntness of wit in a woman, and said, “Are you quite deficient in the craft of your sex, child? You can, and you will, guard yourself ten times better when your aim is simply to subject him.” But this was not reason to a spirit writhing in the serpent-coil of fiery blushes.

Vittoria said, “I shall pity him so.”

She meant she would pity Wilfrid in deluding him. It was a taint of the hypocrisy which comes with shame.

The signora retorted: “I can’t follow the action of your mind a bit.”

Pity being a form of tenderness, Laura supposed that she would intuitively hate the man who compelled her to do what she abhorred.

They spent the greater portion of the night in this debate.

Vittoria knew better than Laura that the task was easy; she had but to override her aversion to the show of trifling with a dead passion; and when she thought of Angelo lying helpless in the swarm of enemies, and that Wilfrid could consent to use his tragic advantage to force her to silly love-play, his selfishness wrought its reflection, so that she became sufficiently unjust to forget her marvellous personal influence over him. Even her tenacious sentiment concerning his white uniform was clouded. She very soon ceased to be shamefaced in her own fancy. At dawn she stood at her window looking across the valley of Meran, and felt the whole scene in a song of her heart, with the faintest recollection of her having passed through a tempest overnight. The warm Southern glow of the enfoliaged valley recalled her living Italy, and Italy her voice. She grew wakefully glad: it was her nature, not her mind, that had twisted in the convulsions of last night’s horror of shame. The chirp of healthy blood in full-flowing veins dispersed it; and as a tropical atmosphere is cleared by the hurricane, she lost her depression and went down among her enemies possessed by an inner delight, that was again of her nature, not of her mind. She took her gladness for a happy sign that she had power to rise buoyant above circumstances; and though aware that she was getting to see things in harsh outlines, she was unconscious of her haggard imagination.

The Lenkensteins had projected to escape the blandishments of Vienna by residing during the winter in Venice, where Wilfrid and his sister were to be the guests of the countess:—a pleasant prospect that was dashed out by an official visit from Colonel Zofel of the Meran garrison, through whom it was known that Lieutenant Pierson, while enjoying his full liberty to investigate the charms of the neighbourhood, might not extend his excursions beyond a pedestrian day’s limit;—he was, in fact, under surveillance. The colonel formally exacted his word of honour that he would not attempt to pass the bounds, and explained to the duchess that the injunction was favourable to the lieutenant, as implying that he must be ready at any moment to receive the order to join his regiment. Wilfrid bowed with a proper soldierly submission. Respecting the criminal whom his men were pursuing, Colonel Zofel said that he was sparing no efforts to come on his traces; he supposed, from what he had heard in the Ultenthal, that Guidascarpi was on his back somewhere within a short range of Meran. Vittoria strained her ears to the colonel’s German; she fancied his communication to be that he suspected Angelo’s presence in Meran.

The official part of his visit being terminated, the colonel addressed some questions to the duchess concerning the night of the famous Fifteenth at La Scala. He was an amateur, and spoke with enthusiasm of the reports of the new prima donna. The duchess perceived that he was asking for an introduction to the heroine of the night, and graciously said that perhaps that very prima donna would make amends, to him for his absence on the occasion. Vittoria checked a movement of revolt in her frame. She cast an involuntary look at Wilfrid. “Now it begins,” she thought, and went to the piano: she had previously refused to sing. Wilfrid had to bend his head over his betrothed and listen to her whisperings. He did so, carelessly swaying his hand to the measure of the aria, with an increasing bitter comparison of the two voices. Lena persisted in talking; she was indignant at his abandonment of the journey to Venice; she reproached him as feeble, inconsiderate, indifferent. Then for an instant she would pause to hear the voice, and renew her assault. “We ought to be thankful that she is not singing a song of death and destruction to us! The archduchess is coming to Venice. If you are presented to her and please her, and get the writs of naturalization prepared, you will be one of us completely, and your fortune is made. If you stay here—why should you stay? It is nothing but your uncle’s caprice. I am too angry to care for music. If you stay, you will earn my contempt. I will not be buried another week in such a place. I am tired of weeping. We all go to Venice: Captain Weisspriess follows us. We are to have endless Balls, an opera, a Court there—with whom am I to dance, pray, when I am out of mourning? Am I to sit and govern my feet under a chair, and gaze like an imbecile nun? It is too preposterous. I am betrothed to you; I wish, I wish to behave like a betrothed. The archduchess herself will laugh to see me chained to a chair. I shall have to reply a thousand times to ‘Where is he?’ What can I answer? ‘Wouldn’t come,’ will be the only true reply.”

During this tirade, Vittoria was singing one of her old songs, well known to Wilfrid, which brought the vision of a foaming weir, and moonlight between the branches of a great cedar-tree, and the lost love of his heart sitting by his side in the noising stillness. He was sure that she could be singing it for no one but for him. The leap taken by his spirit from this time to that, was shorter than from the past back to the present.

“You do not applaud,” said Lena, when the song had ceased.

He murmured: “I never do, in drawing-rooms.”

“A cantatrice expects it everywhere; these creatures live on it.”

“I’ll tell her, if you like, what we thought of it, when I take her down to my sister, presently.”

“Are you not to take me down?”

“The etiquette is to hand her up to you.”

“No, no!” Lena insisted, in abhorrence of etiquette; but Wilfrid said pointedly that his sister’s feelings must be spared. “Her husband is an animal: he is a millionaire city-of-London merchant; conceive him! He has drunk himself gouty on Port wine, and here he is for the grape-cure.”

“Ah! in that England of yours, women marry for wealth,” said Lena.

“Yes, in your Austria they have a better motive” he interpreted her sentiment.

“Say, in our Austria.”

“In our Austria, certainly.”

“And with our holy religion?”

“It is not yet mine.”

“It will be?” She put the question eagerly.

Wilfrid hesitated, and by his adept hesitation succeeded in throwing her off the jealous scent.

“Say that it will be, my Wilfrid!”

“You must give me time”

“This subject always makes you cold.”

“My own Lena!”

“Can I be, if we are doomed to be parted when we die?”

There is small space for compunction in a man’s heart when he is in Wilfrid’s state, burning with the revival of what seemed to him a superhuman attachment. He had no design to break his acknowledged bondage to Countess Lena, and answered her tender speech almost as tenderly.

It never occurred to him, as he was walking down to Meran with Vittoria, that she could suppose him to be bartering to help rescue the life of a wretched man in return for soft confidential looks of entreaty; nor did he reflect, that when cast on him, they might mean no more than the wish to move him for a charitable purpose. The completeness of her fascination was shown by his reading her entirely by his own emotions, so that a lowly-uttered word, or a wavering unwilling glance, made him think that she was subdued by the charm of the old days.

“Is it here?” she said, stopping under the first Italian name she saw in the arcade of shops.

“How on earth have you guessed it?” he asked, astonished.

She told him to wait at the end of the arcade, and passed in. When she joined him again, she was downcast. They went straight to Adela’s hotel, where the one thing which gave her animation was the hearing that Mr. Sedley had met an English doctor there, and had placed himself in his hands. Adela dressed splendidly for her presentation to the duchess. Having done so, she noticed Vittoria’s depressed countenance and difficult breathing. She commanded her to see the doctor. Vittoria consented, and made use of him. She could tell Laura confidently at night that Wilfrid would not betray Angelo, though she had not spoken one direct word to him on the subject.

Wilfrid was peculiarly adept in the idle game he played. One who is intent upon an evil end is open to expose his plan. But he had none in view; he lived for the luxurious sensation of being near the woman who fascinated him, and who was now positively abashed when by his side. Adela suggested to him faintly—she believed it was her spontaneous idea—that he might be making his countess jealous. He assured her that the fancy sprang from scenes which she remembered, and that she could have no idea of the pride of a highborn Austrian girl, who was incapable of conceiving jealousy of a person below her class. Adela replied that it was not his manner so much as Emilia’s which might arouse the suspicion; but she immediately affected to appreciate the sentiments of a highborn Austrian girl toward a cantatrice, whose gifts we regard simply as an aristocratic entertainment. Wilfrid induced his sister to relate Vittoria’s early history to Countess Lena; and himself almost wondered, when he heard it in bare words, at that haunting vision of the glory of Vittoria at La Scala—where, as he remembered, he would have run against destruction to cling to her lips. Adela was at first alarmed by the concentrated wrathfulness which she discovered in the bosom of Countess Anna, who, as their intimacy waxed, spoke of the intruding opera siren in terms hardly proper even to married women; but it seemed right, as being possibly aristocratic. Lena was much more tolerant. “I have just the same enthusiasm for soldiers that my Wilfrid has for singers,” she said; and it afforded Adela exquisite pleasure to hear her tell how that she had originally heard of the ‘eccentric young Englishman,’ General Pierson’s nephew, as a Lustspiel—a comedy; and of his feats on horseback, and his duels, and his—“he was very wicked over here, you know;” Lena laughed. She assumed the privileges of her four-and-twenty years and her rank. Her marriage was to take place in the Spring. She announced it with the simplicity of an independent woman of the world, adding, “That is, if my Wilfrid will oblige me by not plunging into further disgrace with the General.”

“No; you will not marry a man who is under a cloud,” Anna subjoined.

“Certainly not a soldier,” said Lena. “What it was exactly that he did at La Scala, I don’t know, and don’t care to know, but he was then ignorant that she had touched the hand of that Guidascarpi. I decide by this—he was valiant; he defied everybody: therefore I forgive him. He is not in disgrace with me. I will reinstate him.”

“You have your own way of being romantic,” said Anna. “A soldier who forgets his duty is in my opinion only a brave fool.”

“It seems to me that a great many gallant officers are fond of fine voices,” Lena retorted.

“No doubt it is a fashion among them,” said Anna.

Adela recoiled with astonishment when she began to see the light in which the sisters regarded Vittoria; and she was loyal enough to hint and protest on her friend’s behalf. The sisters called her a very good soul. “It may not be in England as over here,” said Anna. “We have to submit to these little social scourges.”

Lena whispered to Adela, “An angry woman will think the worst. I have no doubt of my Wilfrid. If I had!—”

Her eyes flashed. Fire was not wanting in her.

The difficulties which tasked the amiable duchess to preserve an outward show of peace among the antagonistic elements she gathered together were increased by the arrival at the castle of Count Lenkenstein, Bianca’s husband, and head of the family, from Bologna. He was a tall and courtly man, who had one face for his friends and another for the reverse party; which is to say, that his manners could be bad. Count Lenkenstein was accompanied by Count Serabiglione, who brought Laura’s children with their Roman nurse, Assunta. Laura kissed her little ones, and sent them out of her sight. Vittoria found her home in their play and prattle. She needed a refuge, for Count Lenkenstein was singularly brutal in his bearing toward her. He let her know that he had come to Meran to superintend the hunt for the assassin, Angelo Guidascarpi. He attempted to exact her promise in precise speech that she would be on the spot to testify against Angelo when that foul villain should be caught. He objected openly to Laura’s children going about with her. Bitter talk on every starting subject was exchanged across the duchess’s table. She herself was in disgrace on Laura’s account, and had to practise an overflowing sweetness, with no one to second her efforts. The two noblemen spoke in accord on the bubble revolution. The strong hand—ay, the strong hand! The strong hand disposes of vermin. Laura listened to them, pallid with silent torture. “Since the rascals have taken to assassination, we know that we have them at the dregs,” said Count Lenkenstein. “A cord round the throats of a few scores of them, and the country will learn the virtue of docility.”

Laura whispered to her sister: “Have you espoused a hangman?”

Such dropping of deadly shells in a quiet society went near to scattering it violently; but the union was necessitous. Count Lenkenstein desired to confront Vittoria with Angelo; Laura would not quit her side, and Amalia would not expel her friend. Count Lenkenstein complained roughly of Laura’s conduct; nor did Laura escape her father’s reproof. “Sir, you are privileged to say what you will to me,” she responded, with the humility which exasperated him.

“Yes, you bend, you bend, that you may be stiff-necked when it suits you,” he snapped her short.

“Surely that is the text of the sermon you preach to our Italy!”

“A little more, as you are running on now, madame, and our Italy will be froth on the lips. You see, she is ruined.”

“Chi lo fa, lo sa,” hummed Laura; “but I would avoid quoting you as that authority.”

“After your last miserable fiasco, my dear!”

“It was another of our school exercises. We had not been good boys and girls. We had learnt our lesson imperfectly. We have received our punishment, and we mean to do better next time.”

“Behave seasonably, fittingly; be less of a wasp; school your tongue.”

“Bianca is a pattern to me, I am aware,” said Laura.

“She is a good wife.”

“I am a poor widow.”

“She is a good daughter.”

“I am a wicked rebel.”

“And you are scheming at something now,” said the little nobleman, sagacious so far; but he was too eager to read the verification of the tentative remark in her face, and she perceived that it was a guess founded on her show of spirit.

“Scheming to contain my temper, which is much tried,” she said. “But I suppose it supports me. I can always keep up against hostility.”

“You provoke it; you provoke it.”

“My instinct, then, divines my medicine.”

“Exactly, my dear; your personal instinct. That instigates you all. And none are so easily conciliated as these Austrians. Conciliate them, and you have them.” Count Serabiglione diverged into a repetition of his theory of the policy and mission of superior intelligences, as regarded his system for dealing with the Austrians.

Nurse Assunta’s jealousy was worked upon to separate the children from Vittoria. They ran down with her no more to meet the vast bowls of grapes in the morning and feather their hats with vine leaves. Deprived of her darlings, the loneliness of her days made her look to Wilfrid for commiseration. Father Bernardus was too continually exhortative, and fenced too much to “hit the eyeball of her conscience,” as he phrased it, to afford her repose. Wilfrid could tell himself that he had already done much for her; for if what he had done were known, his career, social and military, was ended. This idea being accompanied by a sense of security delighted him; he was accustomed to inquire of Angelo’s condition, and praise the British doctor who was attending him gratuitously. “I wish I could get him out of the way,” he said, and frowned as in a mental struggle. Vittoria heard him repeat his “I wish!” It heightened greatly her conception of the sacrifice he would be making on her behalf and charity’s. She spoke with a reverential tenderness, such as it was hard to suppose a woman capable of addressing to other than the man who moved her soul. The words she uttered were pure thanks; it was the tone which sent them winged and shaking seed. She had spoken partly to prompt his activity, but her self-respect had been sustained by his avoidance of the dreaded old themes, and that grateful feeling made her voice musically rich.

“I dare not go to him, but the doctor tells me the fever has left him, Wilfrid; his wounds are healing; but he is bandaged from head to foot. The sword pierced his side twice, and his arms and hands are cut horribly. He cannot yet walk. If he is discovered he is lost. Count Lenkenstein has declared that he will stay at the castle till he has him his prisoner. The soldiers are all round us. They know that Angelo is in the ring. They have traced him all over from the Valtellina to this Ultenthal, and only cannot guess where he is in the lion’s jaw. I rise in the morning, thinking, ‘Is this to be the black day?’ He is sure to be caught.”

“If I could hit on a plan,” said Wilfrid, figuring as though he had a diorama of impossible schemes revolving before his eyes.

“I could believe in the actual whispering of an angel if you did. It was to guard me that Angelo put himself in peril.”

“Then,” said Wilfrid, “I am his debtor. I owe him as much as my life is worth.”

“Think, think,” she urged; and promised affection, devotion, veneration, vague things, that were too like his own sentiments to prompt him pointedly. Yet he so pledged himself to her by word, and prepared his own mind to conceive the act of service, that (as he did not reflect) circumstance might at any moment plunge him into a gulf. Conduct of this sort is a challenge sure to be answered.

One morning Vittoria was gladdened by a letter from Rocco Ricci, who had fled to Turin. He told her that the king had promised to give her a warm welcome in his capital, where her name was famous. She consulted with Laura, and they resolved to go as soon as Angelo could stand on his feet. Turin was cold—Italy, but it was Italy; and from Turin the Italian army was to flow, like the Mincio from the Garda lake. “And there, too, is a stage,” Vittoria thought, in a suddenly revived thirst for the stage and a field for work. She determined to run down to Meran and see Angelo. Laura walked a little way with her, till Wilfrid, alert for these occasions, joined them. On the commencement of the zig-zag below, there were soldiers, the sight of whom was not confusing. Military messengers frequently came up to the castle where Count Lenkenstein, assisted by Count Serabiglione, examined their depositions, the Italian in the manner of a winding lawyer, the German of a gruff judge. Half-way down the zig-zag Vittoria cast a preconcerted signal back to Laura. The soldiers had a pair of prisoners between their ranks; Vittoria recognized the men who had carried Captain Weisspriess from the ground where the duel was fought. A quick divination told her that they held Angelo’s life on their tongues. They must have found him in the mountain-pass while hurrying to their homes, and it was they who had led him to Meran. On the Passeyr bridge, she turned and said to Wilfrid, “Help me now. Send instantly the doctor in a carriage to the place where he is lying.”

Wilfrid was intent on her flushed beauty and the half-compressed quiver of her lip.

She quitted him and hurried to Angelo. Her joy broke out in a cry of thankfulness at sight of Angelo; he had risen from his bed; he could stand, and he smiled.

“That Jacopo is just now the nearest link to me,” he said, when she related her having seen the two men guarded by soldiers; he felt helpless, and spoke in resignation. She followed his eye about the room till it rested on the stilet. This she handed to him. “If they think of having me alive!” he said softly. The Italian and his wife who had given him shelter and nursed him came in, and approved his going, though they did not complain of what they might chance to have incurred. He offered them his purse, and they took it. Minutes of grievous expectation went by; Vittoria could endure them no longer; she ran out to the hotel, near which, in the shade of a poplar, Wilfrid was smoking quietly. He informed her that his sister and the doctor had driven out to meet Captain Gambier; his brother-in-law was alone upstairs. Her look of amazement touched him more shrewdly than scorn, and he said, “What on earth can I do?”

“Order out a carriage. Send your brother-in-law in it. If you tell him ‘for your health,’ he will go.”

“On my honour, I don’t know where those three words would not send him,” said Wilfrid; but he did not move, and was for protesting that he really could not guess what was the matter, and the ground for all this urgency.

Vittoria compelled her angry lips to speak out her suspicions explicitly, whereupon he glanced at the sun-glare in a meditation, occasionally blinking his eyes. She thought, “Oh, heaven! can he be waiting for me to coax him?” It was the truth, though it would have been strange to him to have heard it. She grew sure that it was the truth; never had she despised living creature so utterly as when she murmured, “My best friend! my brother! my noble Wilfrid! my old beloved! help me now, without loss of a minute.”

It caused his breath to come and go unevenly.

“Repeat that—once, only once,” he said.

She looked at him with the sorrowful earnestness which, as its meaning was shut from him, was so sweet.

“You will repeat it by-and-by?—another time? Trust me to do my utmost. Old beloved! What is the meaning of ‘old beloved’? One word in explanation. If it means anything, I would die for you! Emilia, do you hear?—die for you! To me you are nothing old or by-gone, whatever I may be to you. To me—yes, I will order the carriage you are the Emilia—listen! listen! Ah! you have shut your ears against me. I am bound in all seeming, but I—you drive me mad; you know your power. Speak one word, that I may feel—that I may be convinced,… or not a single word; I will obey you without. I have said that you command my life.”

In a block of carriages on the bridge, Vittoria perceived a lifted hand. It was Laura’s; Beppo was in attendance on her. Laura drove up and said: “You guessed right; where is he?” The communications between them were more indicated than spoken. Beppo had heard Jacopo confess to his having conducted a wounded Italian gentleman into Meran. “That means that the houses will be searched within an hour,” said Laura; “my brother-in-law Bear is radiant.” She mimicked the Lenkenstein physiognomy spontaneously in the run of her speech. “If Angelo can help himself ever so little, he has a fair start.” A look was cast on Wilfrid; Vittoria nodded—Wilfrid was entrapped.

“Englishmen we can trust,” said Laura, and requested him to step into her carriage. He glanced round the open space. Beppo did the same, and beheld the chasseur Jacob Baumwalder Feckelwitz crossing the bridge on foot, but he said nothing. Wilfrid was on the step of the carriage, for what positive object neither he nor the others knew, when his sister and the doctor joined them. Captain Gambier was still missing.

“He would have done anything for us,” Vittoria said in Wilfrid’s hearing.

“Tell us what plan you have,” the latter replied fretfully.

She whispered: “Persuade Adela to make her husband drive out. The doctor will go too, and Beppo. They shall take Angelo. Our carriage will follow empty, and bring Mr. Sedley back.”

Wilfrid cast his eyes up in the air, at the monstrous impudence of the project. “A storm is coming on,” he suggested, to divert her reading of his grimace; but she was speaking to the doctor, who readily answered her aloud: “If you are certain of what you say.” The remark incited Wilfrid to be no subordinate in devotion; handing Adela from the carriage, while the doctor ran up to Mr. Sedley, he drew her away. Laura and Vittoria watched the motion of their eyes and lips.

“Will he tell her the purpose?” said Laura.

Vittoria smiled nervously: “He is fibbing.”

Marking the energy expended by Wilfrid in this art, the wiser woman said: “Be on your guard the next two minutes he gets you alone.”

“You see his devotion.”

“Does he see his compensation? But he must help us at any hazard.”

Adela broke away from her brother twice, and each time he fixed her to the spot more imperiously. At last she ran into the hotel; she was crying. “A bad economy of tears,” said Laura, commenting on the dumb scene, to soothe her savage impatience. “In another twenty minutes we shall have the city gates locked.”

They heard a window thrown up; Mr. Sedley’s head came out, and peered at the sky. Wilfrid said to Vittoria: “I can do nothing beyond what I have done, I fear.”

She thought it was a petition for thanks, but Laura knew better; she said: “I see Count Lenkenstein on his way to the barracks.”

Wilfrid bowed: “I may be able to serve you in that quarter.”

He retired: whereupon Laura inquired how her friend could reasonably suppose that a man would ever endure being thanked in public.

“I shall never understand and never care to understand them,” said Vittoria.

“It is a knowledge that is forced on us, my dear. May heaven make the minds of our enemies stupid for the next five hours!—Apropos of what I was saying, women and men are in two hostile camps. We have a sort of general armistice and everlasting strife of individuals—Ah!” she clapped hands on her knees, “here comes your doctor; I could fancy I see a pointed light on his head. Men of science, my Sandra, are always the humanest.”

The chill air of wind preceding thunder was driving round the head of the vale, and Mr. Sedley, wrapped in furs, and feebly remonstrating with his medical adviser, stepped into his carriage. The doctor followed him, giving a grave recognition of Vittoria’s gaze. Both gentlemen raised their hats to the ladies, who alighted as soon as they had gone in the direction of the Vintschgau road.

“One has only to furnish you with money, my Beppo,” said Vittoria, complimenting his quick apprehensiveness. “Buy bread and cakes at one of the shops, and buy wine. You will find me where you can, when you have seen him safe. I have no idea of where my home will be. Perhaps England.”

“Italy, Italy! faint heart,” said Laura.

Furnished with money, Beppo rolled away gaily.

The doubt was in Laura whether an Englishman’s wits were to be relied on in such an emergency; but she admitted that the doctor had looked full enough of serious meaning, and that the Englishman named Merthyr Powys was keen and ready. They sat a long half-hour, that thumped itself out like an alarm-bell, under the poplars, by the clamouring Passeyr, watching the roll and spring of the waters, and the radiant foam, while band-music played to a great company of visitors, and sounds of thunder drew near. Over the mountains above the Adige, the leaden fingers of an advance of the thunder-cloud pushed slowly, and on a sudden a mighty gale sat heaped blank on the mountain-top and blew. Down went the heads of the poplars, the river staggered in its leap, the vale was shuddering grey. It was like the transformation in a fairy tale; Beauty had taken her old cloak about her, and bent to calamity. The poplars streamed their length sideways, and in the pauses of the strenuous wind nodded and dashed wildly and white over the dead black water, that waxed in foam and hissed, showing its teeth like a beast enraged. Laura and Vittoria joined hands and struggled for shelter. The tent of a travelling circus from the South, newly-pitched on a grassplot near the river, was caught up and whirled in the air and flung in the face of a marching guard of soldiery, whom it swathed and bore sheer to earth, while on them and around them a line of poplars fell flat, the wind whistling over them. Laura directed Vittoria’s eyes to the sight. “See,” she said, and her face was set hard with cold and excitement, so that she looked a witch in the uproar; “would you not say the devil is loose now Angelo is abroad?” Thunder and lightning possessed the vale, and then a vertical rain. At the first gleam of sunlight, Laura and Vittoria walked up to the Laubengasse—the street of the arcades, where they made purchases of numerous needless articles, not daring to enter the Italian’s shop. A woman at a fruitstall opposite to it told them that no carriage could have driven up there. During their great perplexity, mud and rain-stained soldiers, the same whom they had seen borne to earth by the flying curtain, marched before the shop; the shop and the house were searched; the Italian and his old liming wife were carried away.

“Tell me now, that storm was not Angelo’s friend!” Laura muttered.

“Can he have escaped?” said Vittoria.

“He is ‘on horseback.’” Laura quoted the Italian proverb to signify that he had flown; how, she could not say, and none could inform her. The joy of their hearts rose in one fountain.

“I shall feel better blood in my body from this moment,” Laura said; and Vittoria, “Oh! we can be strong, if we only resolve.”

“You want to sing?”

“我做。”

“I shall find pleasure in your voice now.”

“The wicked voice!”

“Yes, the very wicked voice! But I shall be glad to hear it. You can sing to-night, and drown those Lenkensteins.”

“If my Carlo could hear me!”

“Ah!” sighed the signora, musing. “He is in prison now. I remember him, the dearest little lad, fencing with my husband for exercise after they had been writing all day. When Giacomo was imprisoned, Carlo sat outside the prison walls till it was time for him to enter; his chin and upper lip were smooth as a girl’s. Giacomo said to him, ‘May you always have the power of going out, or not have a wife waiting for you.’ Here they come.” (She spoke of tears.) “It’s because I am joyful. The channel for them has grown so dry that they prick and sting. Oh, Sandra! it would be pleasant to me if we might both be buried for seven days, and have one long howl of weakness together. A little bite of satisfaction makes me so tired. I believe there’s something very bad for us in our always being at war, and never, never gaining ground. Just one spark of triumph intoxicates us. Look at all those people pouring out again. They are the children of fair weather. I hope the state of their health does not trouble them too much. Vienna sends consumptive patients here. If you regard them attentively, you will observe that they have an anxious air. Their constitutions are not sound; they fear they may die.”

Laura’s irony was unforced; it was no more than a subtle discord naturally struck from the scene by a soul in contrast with it.

They beheld the riding forth of troopers and a knot of officers hotly conversing together. At another point the duchess and the Lenkenstein ladies, Count Lenkenstein, Count Serabiglione, and Wilfrid paced up and down, waiting for music. Laura left the public places and crossed an upper bridge over the Passeyr, near the castle, by which route she skirted vines and dropped over sloping meadows to some shaded boulders where the Passeyr found a sandy bay, and leaped in transparent green, and whitened and swung twisting in a long smooth body down a narrow chasm, and noised below. The thundering torrent stilled their sensations: and the water, making battle against great blocks of porphyry and granite, caught their thoughts. So strong was the impression of it on Vittoria’s mind, that for hours after, every image she conceived seemed proper to the inrush and outpour; the elbowing, the tossing, the foaming, the burst on stones, and silvery bubbles under and silvery canopy above, the chattering and huzzaing; all working on to the one-toned fall beneath the rainbow on the castle-rock.

Next day, the chasseur Jacob Baumwalder Feckelwitz deposed in full company at Sonnenberg, that, obeying Count Serabiglione’s instructions, he had gone down to the city, and had there seen Lieutenant Pierson with the ladies in front of the hotel; he had followed the English carriage, which took up a man who was standing ready on crutches at the corner of the Laubengasse, and drove rapidly out of the North-western gate, leading to Schlanders and Mals and the Engadine. He had witnessed the transfer of the crippled man from one carriage to another, and had raised shouts and given hue and cry, but the intervention of the storm had stopped his pursuit.

He was proceeding to say what his suppositions were. Count Lenkenstein lifted his finger for Wilfrid to follow him out of the room. Count Serabiglione went at their heels. Then Count Lenkenstein sent for his wife, whom Anna and Lena accompanied.

“How many persons are you going to ruin in the course of your crusade, my dear?” the duchess said to Laura.

“Dearest, I am penitent when I succeed,” said Laura.

“If that young man has been assisting you, he is irretrievably ruined.”

“I am truly sorry for him.”

“As for me, the lectures I shall get in Vienna are terrible to think of. This is the consequence of being the friend of both parties, and a peace-maker.”

Count Serabiglione returned alone from the scene at the examination, rubbing his hands and nodding affably to his daughter. He maliciously declined to gratify the monster of feminine curiosity in the lump, and doled out the scene piecemeal. He might state, he observed, that it was he who had lured Beppo to listen at the door during the examination of the prisoners; and who had then planted a spy on him—following the dictation of precepts exceedingly old. “We are generally beaten, duchess; I admit it; and yet we generally contrive to show the brain. As I say, wed brains to brute force!—but my Laura prefers to bring about a contest instead of an union, so that somebody is certain to be struck, and”—the count spread out his arms and bowed his head—“deserves the blow.” He informed them that Count Lenkenstein had ordered Lieutenant Pierson down to Meran, and that the lieutenant might expect to be cashiered within five days. “What does it matter?” he addressed Vittoria. “It is but a shuffling of victims; Lieutenant Pierson in the place of Guidascarpi! I do not object.”

Count Lenkenstein withdrew his wife and sisters from Sonnenberg instantly. He sent an angry message of adieu to the duchess, informing her that he alone was responsible for the behaviour of the ladies of his family. The poor duchess wept. “This means that I shall be summoned to Vienna for a scolding, and have to meet my husband,” she said to Laura, who permitted herself to be fondled, and barely veiled her exultation in her apology for the mischief she had done. An hour after the departure of the Lenkensteins, the castle was again officially visited by Colonel Zofel. Vittoria and Laura received an order to quit the district of Meran before sunset. The two firebrands dropped no tears. “I really am sorry for others when I succeed,” said Laura, trying to look sad upon her friend.

“No; the heart is eaten out of you both by excitement,” said the duchess.

Her tender parting, “Love me,” in the ear of Vittoria, melted one heart of the two.

Count Serabiglione continued to be buoyed up by his own and his daughter’s recent display of a superior intellectual dexterity until the carriage was at the door and Laura presented her cheek to him. He said, “You will know me a wise man when I am off the table.” His gesticulations expressed “Ruin, headlong ruin!” He asked her how she could expect him to be for ever repairing her follies. He was going to Vienna; how could he dare to mention her name there? Not even in a trifle would she consent to be subordinate to authority. Laura checked her replies—the surrendering, of a noble Italian life to the Austrians was such a trifle! She begged only that a poor wanderer might depart with a father’s blessing. The count refused to give it; he waved her off in a fury of reproof; and so got smoothly over the fatal moment when money, or the promise of money, is commonly extracted from parental sources, as Laura explained his odd behaviour to her companion. The carriage-door being closed, he regained his courtly composure; his fury was displaced by a chiding finger, which he presently kissed. Father. Bernardus was on the steps beside the duchess, and his blessing had not been withheld from Vittoria, though he half confessed to her that she was a mystery in his mind, and would always be one.

“He can understand robust hostility,” Laura said, when Vittoria recalled the look of his benevolent forehead and drooping eyelids; “but robust ductility does astonish him. He has not meddled with me; yet I am the one of the two who would be fair prey for an enterprising spiritual father, as the destined roan of heaven will find out some day.”

She bent and smote her lap. “How little they know us, my darling! They take fever for strength, and calmness for submission. Here is the world before us, and I feel that such a man, were he to pounce on me now, might snap me up and lock me in a praying-box with small difficulty. And I am the inveterate rebel! What is it nourishes you and keeps you always aiming straight when you are alone? Once in Turin, I shall feel that I am myself. Out of Italy I have a terrible craving for peace. It seems here as if I must lean down to him, my beloved, who has left me.”

Vittoria was in alarm lest Wilfrid should accost her while she drove from gate to gate of the city. They passed under the archway of the gate leading up to Schloss Tyrol, and along the road bordered by vines. An old peasant woman stopped them with the signal of a letter in her hand. “Here it is,” said Laura, and Vittoria could not help smiling at her shrewd anticipation of it.

“May I follow?”

Nothing more than that was written.

But the bearer of the missive had been provided with a lead pencil to obtain the immediate reply.

“An admirable piece of foresight!” Laura’s honest exclamation burst forth.

Vittoria had to look in Laura’s face before she could gather her will to do the cruel thing which was least cruel. She wrote firmly:—“Never follow me.”

The same hand which brought Rinaldo’s letter to his brother delivered a message from Barto Rizzo, bidding Angelo to start at once and head a stout dozen or so of gallant Swiss. The letter and the message appeared to be grievous contradictions: one was evidently a note of despair, while the other sang like a trumpet. But both were of a character to draw him swiftly on to Milan. He sent word to his Lugano friends, naming a village among the mountains between Como and Varese, that they might join him there if they pleased.

Toward nightfall, on the nineteenth of the month, he stood with a small band of Ticinese and Italian fighting lads two miles distant from the city. There was a momentary break in long hours of rain; the air was full of inexplicable sounds, that floated over them like a toning of multitudes wailing and singing fitfully behind a swaying screen. They bent their heads. At intervals a sovereign stamp on the pulsation of the uproar said, distinct as a voice in the ear—Cannon. “Milan’s alive!” Angelo cried, and they streamed forward under the hurry of stars and scud, till thumping guns and pattering musket-shots, the long big boom of surgent hosts, and the muffled voluming and crash of storm-bells, proclaimed that the insurrection was hot. A rout of peasants bearing immense ladders met them, and they joined with cheers, and rushed to the walls. As yet no gate was in the possession of the people. The walls showed bayonet-points: a thin edge of steel encircled a pit of fire. Angelo resolved to break through at once. The peasants hesitated, but his own men were of one mind to follow, and, planting his ladder in the ditch, he rushed up foremost. The ladder was full short; he called out in German to a soldier to reach his hand down, and the butt-end of a musket was dropped, which he grasped, and by this aid sprang to the parapet, and was seized. “Stop,” he said, “there’s a fellow below with my brandy-flask and portmanteau.” The soldiers were Italians; they laughed, and hauled away at man after man of the mounting troop, calling alternately “brandy-flask!—portmanteau!” as each one raised a head above the parapet. “The signor has a good supply of spirits and baggage,” they remarked. He gave them money for porterage, saying, “You see, the gates are held by that infernal people, and a quiet traveller must come over the walls. Viva l'Italia！ who follows me?” He carried away three of those present. The remainder swore that they and their comrades would be on his side on the morrow. Guided by the new accession to his force, Angelo gained the streets. All shots had ceased; the streets were lighted with torches and hand-lamps; barricades were up everywhere, like a convulsion of the earth. Tired of receiving challenges and mounting the endless piles of stones, he sat down at the head of the Corso di Porta Nuova, and took refreshments from the hands of ladies. The house-doors were all open. The ladies came forth bearing wine and minestra, meat and bread, on trays; and quiet eating and drinking, and fortifying of the barricades, went on. Men were rubbing their arms and trying rusty gun-locks. Few of them had not seen Barto Rizzo that day; but Angelo could get no tidings of his brother. He slept on a door-step, dreaming that he was blown about among the angels of heaven and hell by a glorious tempest. Near morning an officer of volunteers came to inspect the barricade defences. Angelo knew him by sight; it was Luciano Romara. He explained the position of the opposing forces. The Marshal, he said, was clearly no street-fighter. Estimating the army under his orders in Milan at from ten to eleven thousand men of all arms, it was impossible for him to guard the gates and then walls, and at the same time fight the city. Nor could he provision his troops. Yesterday the troops had made one: charge and done mischief, but they had immediately retired. “And if they take to cannonading us to-day, we shall know what that means,” Romara concluded. Angelo wanted to join him. “No, stay here,” said Romara.

Rain and cannon filled the weary space of that day. Some of the barricades fronting the city gates had been battered down by nightfall; they were restored within an hour. Their defenders entered the houses right and left during the cannonade, waiting to meet the charge; but the Austrians held off. “They have no plan,” Romara said on his second visit of inspection; “they are waiting on Fortune, and starve meanwhile. We can beat them at that business.”

Romara took Angelo and his Swiss away with him. The interior of the city was abandoned by the Imperialists, who held two or three of the principal buildings and the square of the Duomo. Clouds were driving thick across the cold-gleaming sky when the storm-bells burst out with the wild Jubilee-music of insurrection—a carol, a jangle of all discord, savage as flame. Every church of the city lent its iron tongue to the peal; and now they joined and now rolled apart, now joined again and clanged like souls shrieking across the black gulfs of an earthquake; they swam aloft with mournful delirium, tumbled together, were scattered in spray, dissolved, renewed, died, as a last worn wave casts itself on an unfooted shore, and rang again as through rent doorways, became a clamorous host, an iron body, a pressure as of a down-drawn firmament, and once more a hollow vast, as if the abysses of the Circles were sounded through and through. To the Milanese it was an intoxication; it was the howling of madness to the Austrians—a torment and a terror: they could neither sing, nor laugh, nor talk under it. Where they stood in the city, the troops could barely hear their officers’ call of command. No sooner had the bells broken out than the length of every street and Corso flashed with the tri-coloured flag; musket-muzzles peeped from the windows; men with great squares of pavement lined the roofs. Romara mounted a stiff barricade and beheld a scattered regiment running the gauntlet of storms of shot and missiles, in full retreat upon the citadel. On they came, officers in front for the charge, as usual with the Austrians; fire on both flanks, a furious mob at their heels, and the barricade before them. They rushed at Romara, and were hurled back, and stood in a riddled lump. Suddenly Romara knocked up the rifles of the couching Swiss; he yelled to the houses to stop firing. “Surrender your prisoners,—you shall pass,” he called. He had seen one dear head in the knot of the soldiery. No answer was given. Romara, with Angelo and his Swiss and the ranks of the barricade, poured over and pierced the streaming mass, steel for steel.

“Ammiani! Ammiani!” Romara cried; a roar from the other side, “Barto! Barto! the Great Cat!” met the cry. The Austrians struck up a cheer under the iron derision of the bells; it was ludicrous, it was as if a door had slammed on their mouths, ringing tremendous echoes in a vaulted roof. They stood sweeping fire in two oblong lines; a show of military array was preserved like a tattered robe, till Romara drove at their centre and left the retreat clear across the barricade. Then the whitecoats were seen flowing over, the motley surging hosts from the city in pursuit—foam of a storm-torrent hurled forward by the black tumult of precipitous waters. Angelo fell on his brother’s neck; Romara clasped Carlo Ammiani. These two were being marched from the prison to the citadel when Barto Rizzo, who had prepared to storm the building, assailed the troops. To him mainly they were indebted for their rescue.

Even in that ecstasy of meeting, the young men smiled at the preternatural transport on his features as he bounded by them, mad for slaughter, and mounting a small brass gun on the barricade, sent the charges of shot into the rear of the enemy. He kissed the black lip of his little thunderer in, a rapture of passion; called it his wife, his naked wife; the best of mistresses, who spoke only when he charged her to speak; raved that she was fair, and liked hugging; that she was true, and the handsomest daughter of Italy; that she would be the mother of big ones—none better than herself, though they were mountains of sulphur big enough to make one gulp of an army.

His wife in the flesh stood at his feet with a hand-grenade and a rifle, daggers and pistols in her belt. Her face was black with powder-smoke as the muzzle of the gun. She looked at Rinaldo once, and Rinaldo at her; both dropped their eyes, for their joy at seeing one another alive was mighty.

Dead Austrians were gathered in a heap. Dead and wounded Milanese were taken into the houses. Wine was brought forth by ladies and household women. An old crutched beggar, who had performed a deed of singular intrepidity in himself kindling a fire at the door of one of the principal buildings besieged by the people, and who showed perforated rags with a comical ejaculation of thanks to the Austrians for knowing how to hit a scarecrow and make a beggar holy, was the object of particular attention. Barto seated him on his gun, saying that his mistress and beauty was honoured; ladies were proud in waiting on the fine frowzy old man. It chanced during that morning that Wilfrid Pierson had attached himself to Lieutenant Jenna’s regiment as a volunteer. He had no arms, nothing but a huge white umbrella, under which he walked dry in the heavy rain, and passed through the fire like an impassive spectator of queer events. Angelo’s Swiss had captured them, and the mob were maltreating them because they declined to shout for this valorous ancient beggarman. “No doubt he’s a capital fellow,” said Jenna; “but ‘Viva Scottocorni’ is not my language;” and the spirited little subaltern repeated his “Excuse me,” with very good temper, while one knocked off his shako, another tugged at his coat-skirts. Wilfrid sang out to the Guidascarpi, and the brothers sprang to him and set them free; but the mob, like any other wild beast gorged with blood, wanted play, and urged Barto to insist that these victims should shout the viva in exaltation of their hero.

“Is there a finer voice than mine?” said Barto, and he roared the ‘viva’ like a melodious bull. Yet Wilfrid saw that he had been recognized. In the hour of triumph Barto Rizzo had no lust for petty vengeance. The magnanimous devil plumped his gorge contentedly on victory. His ardour blazed from his swarthy crimson features like a blown fire, when scouts came running down with word that all about the Porta Camosina, Madonna del Carmine, and the Gardens, the Austrians were reaping the white flag of the inhabitants of that district. Thitherward his cry of “Down with the Tedeschi!” led the boiling tide. Rinaldo drew Wilfrid and Jenna to an open doorway, counselling the latter to strip the gold from his coat and speak his Italian in monosyllables. A woman of the house gave her promise to shelter and to pass them forward. Romara, Ammiani, and the Guidascarpi, went straight to the Casa Gonfalonieri, where they hoped to see stray members of the Council of War, and hear a correction of certain unpleasant rumours concerning the dealings of the Provisional Government with Charles Albert.

The first crack of a division between the patriot force and the aristocracy commenced this day; the day following it was a breach.

A little before dusk the bells of the city ceased their hammering, and when they ceased, all noises of men and musketry seemed childish. The woman who had promised to lead Wilfrid and Jenna to the citadel, feared no longer either for herself or them, and passed them on up the Corso Francesco past the Contrada del Monte. Jenna pointed out the Duchess of Graatli’s house, saying, “By the way, the Lenkensteins are here; they left Venice last week. Of course you know, or don’t you?—and there they must stop, I suppose.” Wilfrid nodded an immediate good-bye to him, and crossed to the house-door. His eccentric fashion of acting had given him fame in the army, but Jenna stormed at it now, and begged him to come on and present himself to General Schoneck, if not to General Pierson. Wilfrid refused even to look behind him. In fact, it was a part of the gallant fellow’s coxcombry (or nationality) to play the Englishman. He remained fixed by the housedoor till midnight, when a body of men in the garb of citizens, volubly and violently Italian in their talk, struck thrice at the door. Wilfrid perceived Count Lenkenstein among them. The ladies Bianca, Anna, and Lena issued mantled and hooded between the lights of two barricade watchfires. Wilfrid stepped after them. They had the password, for the barricades were crossed. The captain of the head-barricade in the Corso demurred, requiring a counter-sign. Straightway he was cut down. He blew an alarm-call, when up sprang a hundred torches. The band of Germans dashed at the barricade as at the tusks of a boar. They were picked men, most of them officers, but a scanty number in the thick of an armed populace. Wilfrid saw the lighted passage into the great house, and thither, throwing out his arms, he bore the affrighted group of ladies, as a careful shepherd might do. Returning to Count Lenkenstein’s side, “Where are they?” the count said, in mortal dread. “Safe,” Wilfrid replied. The count frowned at him inquisitively. “Cut your way through, and on!” he cried to three or four who hung near him; and these went to the slaughter.

“Why do you stand by me, sir?” said the count. Interior barricades were pouring their combatants to the spot; Count Lenkenstein was plunged upon the door-steps. Wilfrid gained half-a-minute’s parley by shouting in his foreign accent, “Would you hurt an Englishman?” Some one took him by the arm, and helping to raise the count, hurried them both into the house.

“You must make excuses for popular fury in times like these,” the stranger observed.

The Austrian nobleman asked him stiffly for his name. The name of Count Ammiani was given. “I think you know it,” Carlo added.

“You escaped from your lawful imprisonment this day, did you not?—you and your cousin, the assassin. I talk of law! I might as justly talk of honour. Who lives here?” Carlo contained himself to answer, “The present occupant is, I believe, if I have hit the house I was seeking, the Countess d’Isorella.”

“My family were placed here, sir?” Count Lenkenstein inquired of Wilfrid. But Wilfrid’s attention was frozen by the sight of Vittoria’s lover. A wifely call of “Adalbert” from above quieted the count’s anxiety.

“Countess d’Isorella,” he said. “I know that woman. She belongs to the secret cabinet of Carlo Alberto—a woman with three edges. Did she not visit you in prison two weeks ago? I speak to you, Count Ammiani. She applied to the Archduke and the Marshal for permission to visit you. It was accorded. To the devil with our days of benignity! She was from Turin. The shuffle has made her my hostess for the nonce. I will go to her. You, sir,” the count turned to Wilfrid—“you will stay below. Are you in the pay of the insurgents?”

Wilfrid, the weakest of human beings where women were involved with him, did one of the hardest things which can task a young man’s fortitude: he looked his superior in the face, and neither blenched, nor frowned, nor spoke.

Ammiani spoke for him. “There is no pay given in our ranks.”

“The licence to rob is supposed to be an equivalent,” said the count.

Countess d’Isorella herself came downstairs, with profuse apologies for the absence of all her male domestics, and many delicate dimples about her mouth in uttering them. Her look at Ammiani struck Wilfrid as having a peculiar burden either of meaning or of passion in it. The count grimaced angrily when he heard that his sister Lena was not yet able to bear the fatigue of a walk to the citadel. “I fear you must all be my guests, for an hour at least,” said the countess.

Wilfrid was left pacing the hall. He thought he had never beheld so splendid a person, or one so subjugatingly gracious. Her speech and manner poured oil on the uncivil Austrian nobleman. What perchance had stricken Lena?

He guessed; and guessed it rightly. A folded scrap of paper signed by the Countess of Lenkenstein was brought to him.

It said:—“Are you making common cause with the rebels? Reply. One asks who should be told.”

He wrote:—“I am an outcast of the army. I fight as a volunteer with the K. K. troops. Could I abandon them in their peril?”

The touch of sentiment he appended for Lena’s comfort. He was too strongly impressed by the new vision of beauty in the house for his imagination to be flushed by the romantic posture of his devotion to a trailing flag.

No other message was delivered. Ammiani presently descended and obtained a guard from the barricade; word was sent on to the barricades in advance toward the citadel. Wilfrid stood aside as Count Lenkenstein led the ladies to the door, bearing Lena on his arm. She passed her lover veiled. The count said, “You follow.” He used the menial second person plural of German, and repeated it peremptorily.

“I follow no civilian,” said Wilfrid.

“Remember, sir, that if you are seen with arms in your hands, and are not in the ranks, you run the chances of being hanged.”

Lena broke loose from her brother; in spite of Anna’s sharp remonstrance and the count’s vexed stamp of the foot, she implored her lover:—“Come with us; pardon us; protect me—me! You shall not be treated harshly. They shall not Oh! be near me. I have been ill; I shrink from danger. Be near me!”

Such humble pleading permitted Wilfrid’s sore spirit to succumb with the requisite show of chivalrous dignity. He bowed, and gravely opened his enormous umbrella, which he held up over the heads of the ladies, while Ammiani led the way. All was quiet near the citadel. A fog of plashing rain hung in red gloom about the many watchfires of the insurgents, but the Austrian head-quarters lay sombre and still. Close at the gates, Ammiani saluted the ladies. Wilfrid did the same, and heard Lena’s call to him unmoved.

“May I dare to hint to you that it would be better for you to join your party?” said Ammiani.

Wilfrid walked on. After appearing to weigh the matter, he answered, “The umbrella will be of no further service to them to-night.”

Ammiani laughed, and begged to be forgiven; but he could have done nothing more flattering.

Sore at all points, tricked and ruined, irascible under the sense of his injuries, hating everybody and not honouring himself, Wilfrid was fast growing to be an eccentric by profession. To appear cool and careless was the great effort of his mind.

“We were introduced one day in the Piazza d’Armi,” said Ammiani. “I would have found means to convey my apologies to you for my behaviour on that occasion, but I have been at the mercy of my enemies. Lieutenant Pierson, will you pardon me? I have learnt how dear you and your family should be to me. Pray, accept my excuses and my counsel. The Countess Lena was my friend when I was a boy. She is in deep distress.”

“I thank you, Count Ammiani, for your extremely disinterested advice,” said Wilfrid; but the Italian was not cut to the quick by his irony; and he added: “I have hoisted, you perceive, the white umbrella instead of wearing the white coat. It is almost as good as an hotel in these times; it gives as much shelter and nearly as much provision, and, I may say, better attendance. Good-night. You will be at it again about daylight, I suppose?”

“Possibly a little before,” said Ammiani, cooled by the false ring of this kind of speech.

“It’s useless to expect that your infernal bells will not burst out like all the lunatics on earth?”

“Quite useless, I fear. Good-night.”

Ammiani charged one of the men at an outer barricade to follow the white umbrella and pass it on.

He returned to the Countess d’Isorella, who was awaiting him, and alone.

This glorious head had aroused his first boyish passion. Scandal was busy concerning the two, when Violetta d’Asola, the youthfullest widow in Lombardy and the loveliest woman, gave her hand to Count d’Isorella, who took it without question of the boy Ammiani. Carlo’s mother assisted in that arrangement; a maternal plot, for which he could thank her only after he had seen Vittoria, and then had heard the buzz of whispers at Violetta’s name. Countess d’Isorella proved her friendship to have survived the old passion, by travelling expressly from Turin to obtain leave to visit him in prison. It was a marvellous face to look upon between prison walls. Rescued while the soldiers were marching him to the citadel that day, he was called by pure duty to pay his respects to the countess as soon as he had heard from his mother that she was in the city. Nor was his mother sorry that he should go. She had patiently submitted to the fact of his betrothal to Vittoria, which was his safeguard in similar perils; and she rather hoped for Violetta to wean him from his extreme republicanism. By arguments? By influence, perhaps. Carlo’s republicanism was preternatural in her sight, and she presumed that Violetta would talk to him discreetly and persuasively of the noble designs of the king.

Violetta d’Isorella received him with a gracious lifting of her fingers to his lips; congratulating him on his escape, and on the good fortune of the day. She laughed at the Lenkensteins and the singular Englishman; sat down to a little supper-tray, and pouted humorously as she asked him to feed on confects and wine; the huge appetites of the insurgents had devoured all her meat and bread.

“Why are you here?” he said.

She did well in replying boldly, “For the king.”

“Would you tell another that it is for the king?”

“Would I speak to another as I speak to you?”

Ammiani inclined his head.

They spoke of the prospects of the insurrection, of the expected outbreak in Venice, the eruption of Paris and Vienna, and the new life of Italy; touching on Carlo Alberto to explode the truce in a laughing dissension. At last she said seriously, “I am a born Venetian, you know; I am not Piedmontese. Let me be sure that the king betrays the country, and I will prefer many heads to one. Excuse me if I am more womanly just at present. The king has sent his accredited messenger Tartini to the Provisional Government, requesting it to accept his authority. Why not? why not? on both sides. Count Medole gives his adhesion to the king, but you have a Council of War that rejects the king’s overtures—a revolt within a revolt.

“It is deplorable. You must have an army. The Piedmontese once over the Ticino, how can you act in opposition to it? You must learn to take a master. The king is only, or he appears, tricksy because you compel him to wind and counterplot. I swear to you, Italy is his foremost thought. The Star of Italy sits on the Cross of Savoy.”

Ammiani kept his eyelids modestly down. “Ten thousand to plead for him, such as you!” he said. “But there is only one!”

“If you had been headstrong once upon a time, and I had been weak, you see, my Carlo, you would have been a domestic tyrant, I a rebel. You will not admit the existence of a virtue in an opposite opinion. Wise was your mother when she said ‘No’ to a wilful boy!”

Violetta lit her cigarette and puffed the smoke lightly.

“I told you in that horrid dungeon, my Carlo Amaranto—I call you by the old name—the old name is sweet!—I told you that your Vittoria is enamoured of the king. She blushes like a battle-flag for the king. I have heard her ‘Viva il Re!’ It was musical.”

“So I should have thought.”

“Ay, but my amaranto-innamorato, does it not foretell strife? Would you ever—ever take a heart with a king’s head stamped on it into your arms?”

“Give me the chance!”

He was guilty of this ardent piece of innocence though Violetta had pitched her voice in the key significant of a secret thing belonging to two memories that had not always flowed dividedly.

“Like a common coin?” she resumed.

“A heart with a king’s head stamped on it like a common coin.”

He recollected the sentence. He had once, during the heat of his grief for Giacomo Piaveni, cast it in her teeth.

Violetta repeated it, as to herself, tonelessly; a method of making an old unkindness strike back on its author with effect.

“Did we part good friends? I forget,” she broke the silence.

“We meet, and we will be the best of friends,” said Ammiani.

“Tell your mother I am not three years older than her son,—I am thirty. Who will make me young again? Tell her, my Carlo, that the genius for intrigue, of which she accuses me, develops at a surprising rate. As regards my beauty,” the countess put a tooth of pearl on her soft under lip.

Ammiani assured her that he would find words of his own for her beauty.

“I hear the eulogy, I know the sonnet,” said Violetta, smiling, and described the points of a brunette: the thick black banded hair, the full brown eyes, the plastic brows couching over them;—it was Vittoria’s face: Violetta was a flower of colour, fair, with but one shade of dark tinting on her brown eye-brows and eye-lashes, as you may see a strip of night-cloud cross the forehead of morning. She was yellow-haired, almost purple-eyed, so rich was the blue of the pupils. Vittoria could be sallow in despondency; but this Violetta never failed in plumpness and freshness. The pencil which had given her aspect the one touch of discord, endowed it with a subtle harmony, like mystery; and Ammiani remembered his having stood once on the Lido of Venice, and eyed the dawn across the Adriatic, and dreamed that Violetta was born of the loveliness and held in her bosom the hopes of morning. He dreamed of it now, feeling the smooth roll of a torrent.

A cry of “Arms!” rang down the length of the Corso.

He started to his feet thankfully.

“Take me to your mother,” she said. “I loathe to hear firing and be alone.”

Ammiani threw up the window. There was a stir of lamps and torches below, and the low sky hung red. Violetta stood quickly thick-shod and hooded.

“Your mother will admit my companionship, Carlo?”

“She desires to thank you.”

“She has no longer any fear of me?”

“You will find her of one mind with you.”

“Concerning the king!”

“I would say, on most subjects.”

“But that you do not know my mind! You are modest. Confess that you are thinking the hour you have passed with me has been wasted.”

“I am, now I hear the call to arms.”

“If I had all the while entertained you with talk of your Vittoria! It would not have been wasted then, my amaranto. It is not wasted for me. If a shot should strike you—”

“Tell her I died loving her with all my soul!” cried Ammiani.

Violetta’s frame quivered as if he had smitten her.

They left the house. Countess Ammiani’s door was the length of a barricade distant: it swung open to them, like all the other house-doors which were, or wished to be esteemed, true to the cause, and hospitable toward patriots.

“Remember, when you need a refuge, my villa is on Lago Maggiore,” Violetta said, and kissed her finger-tips to him.

An hour after, by the light of this unlucky little speech, he thought of her as a shameless coquette. “When I need a refuge? Is not Milan in arms?—Italy alive? She considers it all a passing epidemic; or, perhaps, she is to plead for me to the king!”

That set him thinking moodily over the things she had uttered of Vittoria’s strange and sudden devotion to the king.

Rainy dawn and the tongues of the churches ushered in the last day of street fighting. Ammiani found Romara and Colonel Corte at the head of strong bodies of volunteers, well-armed, ready to march for the Porta ‘rosa. All three went straight to the house where the Provisional Government sat, and sword in hand denounced Count Medole as a traitor who sold his country to the king. Corte dragged him to the window to hear the shouts for the Republic. Medole wrote their names down one by one, and said, “Shall I leave the date vacant?” They put themselves at the head of their men, and marched in the ringing of the bells. The bells were their sacro-military music. Barto Rizzo was off to make a spring at the Porta Ticinese. Students, peasants, noble youths of the best blood, old men and young women, stood ranged in the drenching rain, eager to face death for freedom. At mid-day the bells were answered by cannon and the blunt snap of musketry volleys; dull, savage responses, as of a wounded great beast giving short howls and snarls by the interminable over-roaring of a cataract. Messengers from the gates came running to the quiet centre of the city, where cool men discoursed and plotted. Great news, big lies, were shouted:—Carlo Alberto thundered in the plains; the Austrians were everywhere retiring; the Marshal was a prisoner; the flag of surrender was on the citadel! These things were for the ears of thirsty women, diplomatists, and cripples.

Countess Ammiani and Countess d’Isorella sat together throughout the agitation of the day.

The life prayed for by one seemed a wisp of straw flung on this humming furnace.

Countess Ammiani was too well used to defeat to believe readily in victory, and had shrouded her head in resignation too long to hope for what she craved. Her hands were joined softly in her lap. Her visage had the same unmoved expression when she conversed with Violetta as when she listened to the ravings of the Corso.

Darkness came, and the bells ceased not rolling by her open windows: the clouds were like mists of conflagration.

She would not have the windows closed. The noise of the city had become familiar and akin to the image of her boy. She sat there cloaked.

Her heart went like a time-piece to the two interrogations to heaven: “Alive?—or dead?”

The voice of Luciano Romara was that of an angel’s answering. He entered the room neat and trim as a cavalier dressed for social evening duty, saying with his fine tact, “We are all well;” and after talking like a gazette of the Porta Tosa taken by the volunteers, Barto Rizzo’s occupation of the gate opening on the Ticino, and the bursting of the Porta Camosina by the freebands of the plains, he handed a letter to Countess Ammiani.

“Carlo is on the march to Bergamo and Brescia, with Corte, Sana, and about fifty of our men,” he said.

“And is wounded—where?” asked Violetta.

“Slightly in the hand—you see, he can march,” Romara said, laughing at her promptness to suspect a subterfuge, until he thought, “Now, what does this mean, madam?”

A lamp was brought to Countess Ammiani. She read:

“MY MOTHER!

“Cotton-wool on the left fore-finger. They deigned to give me no
other memorial of my first fight. I am not worthy of papa’s two
bullets. I march with Corte and Sana to Brescia. We keep the
passes of the Tyrol. Luciano heads five hundred up to the hills
to-morrow or next day. He must have all our money. Then go from
door to door and beg subscriptions. Yes, my Chief! it is to be
like God, and deserving of his gifts to lay down all pride, all
wealth. This night send to my betrothed in Turin. She must be with
no one but my mother. It is my command. Tell her so. I hold
imperatively to it.

“I breathe the best air of life. Luciano is a fine leader in
action, calm as in a ball-room. What did I feel? I will talk of it
with you by-and-by;—my father whispered in my ears; I felt him at
my right hand. He said, ‘I died for this day.’ I feel now that I
must have seen him. This is imagination. We may say that anything
is imagination. I certainly heard his voice. Be of good heart, my
mother, for I can swear that the General wakes up when I strike
Austrian steel. He loved Brescia; so I go there. God preserve my
mother! The eyes of heaven are wide enough to see us both.
Vittoria by your side, remember! It is my will.

“CARLO.”

Countess Ammiani closed her eyes over the letter, as in a dead sleep. “He is more his father than himself, and so suddenly!” she said. She was tearless. Violetta helped her to her bed-room under the pretext of a desire to hear the contents of the letter.

That night, which ended the five days of battle in Milan, while fires were raging at many gates, bells were rolling over the roof-tops, the army of Austria coiled along the North-eastern walls of the city, through rain and thick obscurity, and wove its way like a vast worm into the outer land.

Countess d’Isorella’s peculiar mission to Milan was over with the victory of the city. She undertook personally to deliver Carlo’s injunction to Vittoria on her way to the king. Countess Ammiani deemed it sufficient that her son’s wishes should be repeated verbally; and as there appeared to be no better messenger than one who was bound for Turin and knew Vittoria’s place of residence, she entrusted the duty to Violetta.

The much which hangs on little was then set in motion:

Violetta was crossing the Ticino when she met a Milanese nobleman who had received cold greeting from the king, and was returning to Milan with word that the Piedmontese declaration of war against Austria had been signed. She went back to Milan, saw and heard, and gathered a burden for the royal ears. This was a woman, tender only to the recollection of past days, who used her beauty and her arts as weapons for influence. She liked kings because she saw neither master nor dupe in a republic; she liked her early lover because she could see nothing but a victim in any new one. She was fond of Carlo, as greatly occupied minds may be attached to an old garden where they have aforetime sown fair seed. Jealousy of a rival in love that was disconnected with political business and her large expenditure, had never yet disturbed the lady’s nerves.

At Turin she found Vittoria singing at the opera, and winning marked applause from the royal box. She thought sincerely that to tear a prima donna from her glory would be very much like dismissing a successful General to his home and gabbling family. A most eminent personage agreed with her. Vittoria was carelessly informed that Count Ammiani had gone to Brescia, and having regard for her safety, desired her to go to Milan to be under the protection of his mother, and that Countess Ammiani was willing to receive her.

Now, with her mother, and her maid Giacinta, and Beppo gathered about her, for three weeks Vittoria had been in full operatic career, working, winning fame, believing that she was winning influence, and establishing a treasury. The presence of her lover in Milan would have called her to the noble city; but he being at Brescia, she asked herself why she should abstain from labours which contributed materially to the strength of the revolution and made her helpful. It was doubtful whether Countess Ammiani would permit her to sing at La Scala; or whether the city could support an opera in the throes of war. And Vittoria was sending money to Milan. The stipend paid to her by the impresario, the jewels, the big bouquets—all flowed into the treasury of the insurrection. Antonio-Pericles advanced her a large sum on the day when the news of the Milanese uprising reached Turin: the conditions of the loan had simply been that she should continue her engagement to sing in Turin. He was perfectly slavish to her, and might be trusted to advance more. Since the great night at La Scala, she had been often depressed by a secret feeling that there was divorce between her love of her country and devotion to her Art. Now that both passions were in union, both active, each aiding the fire of the other, she lived a consummate life. She could not have abandoned her path instantly though Carlo had spoken his command to her in person. Such were her first spontaneous seasonings, and Laura Piaveni seconded them; saying, “Money, money! we must be Jews for money. We women are not allowed to fight, but we can manage to contribute our lire and soldi; we can forge the sinews of war.”

Vittoria wrote respectfully to Countess Ammiani stating why she declined to leave Turin. The letter was poorly worded. While writing it she had been taken by a sentiment of guilt and of isolation in presuming to disobey her lover. “I am glad he will not see it,” she remarked to Laura, who looked rapidly across the lines, and said nothing. Praise of the king was in the last sentence. Laura’s eyes lingered on it half-a-minute.

“Has he not drawn his sword? He is going to march,” said Vittoria.

“Oh, yes,” Laura replied coolly; “but you put that to please Countess Ammiani.”

Vittoria confessed she had not written it purposely to defend the king. “What harm?” she asked.

“None. Only this playing with shades allows men to call us hypocrites.”

The observation angered Vittoria. She had seen the king of late; she had breathed Turin incense and its atmosphere; much that could be pleaded on the king’s behalf she had listened to with the sympathetic pity which can be woman’s best judgement, and is the sentiment of reason. She had also brooded over the king’s character, and had thought that if the Chief could have her opportunities for studying this little impressible, yet strangely impulsive royal nature, his severe condemnation of him would be tempered. In fact, she was doing what makes a woman excessively tender and opinionated; she was petting her idea of the misunderstood one: she was thinking that she divined the king’s character by mystical intuition; I will dare to say, maternally apprehended it. And it was a character strangely open to feminine perceptions, while to masculine comprehension it remained a dead blank, done either in black or in white.

Vittoria insisted on praising the king to Laura.

“With all my heart,” Laura said, “so long as he is true to Italy.”

“How, then, am I hypocritical?”

“My Sandra, you are certainly perverse. You admitted that you did something for the sake of pleasing Countess Ammiani.”

“I did. But to be hypocritical one must be false.”

“Oh!” went Laura.

“And I write to Carlo. He does not care for the king; therefore it is needless for me to name the king to him; and I shall not.”

Laura said, “Very well.” She saw a little deeper than the perversity, though she did not see the springs. In Vittoria’s letter to her lover, she made no allusion to the Sword of Italy.

Countess Ammiani forwarded both letters on to Brescia.

When Carlo had finished reading them, he heard all Brescia clamouring indignantly at the king for having disarmed volunteers on Lago Maggiore and elsewhere in his dominions. Milan was sending word by every post of the overbearing arrogance of the Piedmontese officers and officials, who claimed a prostrate submission from a city fresh with the ardour of the glory it had won for itself, and that would fain have welcomed them as brothers. Romara and others wrote of downright visible betrayal. It was a time of passions;—great readiness for generosity, equal promptitude for undiscriminating hatred. Carlo read Vittoria’s praise of the king with insufferable anguish. “You—you part of me, can write like this!” he struck the paper vehemently. The fury of action transformed the gentle youth. Countess Ammiani would not have forwarded the letter addressed to herself had she dreamed the mischief it might do. Carlo saw double-dealing in the absence of any mention of the king in his own letter.

“Quit Turin at once,” he dashed hasty lines to Vittoria; “and no
‘Viva il Re’ till we know what he may merit. Old delusions are
pardonable; but you must now look abroad with your eyes. Your words
should be the echoes of my soul. Your acts are mine. For the sake
of the country, do nothing to fill me with shame. The king is a
traitor. I remember things said of him by Agostino; I subscribe to
them every one. Were you like any other Italian girl, you might cry
for him—who would care! But you are Vittoria. Fly to my mother’s
arms, and there rest. The king betrays us. Is a stronger word
necessary? I am writing too harshly to you;—and here are the lines
of your beloved letter throbbing round me while I write; but till
the last shot is fired I try to be iron, and would hold your hand
and not kiss it—not be mad to fall between your arms—not wish for
you—not think of you as a woman, as my beloved, as my Vittoria; I
hope and pray not, if I thought there was an ace of work left to do
for the country. Or if one could say that you cherished a shred of
loyalty for him who betrays it. Great heaven! am I to imagine that
royal flatteries—My hand is not my own! You shall see all that
it writes. I will seem to you no better than I am. I do not tell
you to be a Republican, but an Italian. If I had room for myself in
my prayers—oh! one half-instant to look on you, though with chains
on my limbs. The sky and the solid ground break up when I think of
you. I fancy I am still in prison. Angelo was music to me for two
whole days (without a morning to the first and a night to the
second). He will be here to-morrow and talk of you again. I long
for him more than for battle—almost long for you more than for
victory for our Italy.

“This is Brescia, which my father said he loved better than his
妻子。

“General Paolo Ammiani is buried here. I was at his tombstone this
morning. I wish you had known him.

“You remember, we talked of his fencing with me daily. ‘I love the
fathers who do that.’ You said it. He will love you. Death is the
shadow—not life. I went to his tomb. It was more to think of
Brescia than of him. Ashes are only ashes; tombs are poor places.
My soul is the power.

“If I saw the Monte Viso this morning, I saw right over your head
when you were sleeping.

“Farewell to journalism—I hope, for ever. I jump at shaking off
the journalistic phraseology Agostino laughs at. Yet I was right in
printing my ‘young nonsense.’ I did, hold the truth, and that was
felt, though my vehicle for delivering it was rubbish.

“In two days Corte promises to sing his song, ‘Avanti.’ I am at his
left hand. Venice, the passes of the Adige, the Adda, the Oglio are
ours. The room is locked; we have only to exterminate the reptiles
inside it. Romara, D’Arci, Carnischi march to hold the doors.
Corte will push lower; and if I can get him to enter the plains and
join the main army I shall rejoice.”

The letter concluded with a postscript that half an Italian regiment, with white coats swinging on their bayonet-points, had just come in.

It reached Vittoria at a critical moment.

Two days previously, she and Laura Piaveni had talked with the king. It was an unexpected honour. Countess, d’Isorella conducted them to the palace. The lean-headed sovereign sat booted and spurred, his sword across his knees; he spoke with a peculiar sad hopefulness of the prospects of the campaign, making it clear that he was risking more than anyone risked, for his stake was a crown. The few words he uttered of Italy had a golden ring in them; Vittoria knew not why they had it. He condemned the Republican spirit of Milan more regretfully than severely. The Republicans were, he said, impracticable. Beyond the desire for change, they knew not what they wanted. He did not state that he should avoid Milan in his march. On the contrary, he seemed to indicate that he was about to present himself to the people of Milan. “To act against the enemy successfully, we must act as one, under one head, with one aim.” He said this, adding that no heart in Italy had yearned more than his own for the signal to march for the Mincio and the Adige.

Vittoria determined to put him to one test. She summoned her boldness to crave grace for Agostino Balderini to return to Piedmont. The petition was immediately granted. Alluding to the libretto of Camilla, the king complimented Vittoria for her high courage on the night of the Fifteenth of the foregoing year. “We in Turin were prepared, though we had only then the pleasure of hearing of you,” he said.

“I strove to do my best to help. I wish to serve our cause now,” she replied, feeling an inexplicable new sweetness running in her blood.

He asked her if she did not know that she had the power to move multitudes.

“Sire, singing appears so poor a thing in time of war.”

He remarked that wine was good for soldiers, singing better, such a voice as hers best of all.

For hours after the interview, Vittoria struggled with her deep blushes. She heard the drums of the regiments, the clatter of horses, the bugle-call of assembly, as so many confirmatory notes that it was a royal hero who was going forth.

“He stakes a crown,” she said to Laura.

“Tusk! it tumbles off his head if he refuses to venture something,” was Laura’s response.

Vittoria reproached her for injustice.

“No,” Laura said; “he is like a young man for whom his mother has made a match. And he would be very much in love with his bride if he were quite certain of winning her, or rather, if she would come a little more than halfway to meet him. Some young men are so composed. Genoa and Turin say, ‘Go and try.’ Milan and Venice say, ‘Come and have faith in us.’ My opinion is that he is quite as much propelled as attracted.”

“This is shameful,” said Vittoria.

“No; for I am quite willing to suspend my judgement. I pray that fortune may bless his arms. I do think that the stir of a campaign, and a certain amount of success will make him in earnest.”

“Can you look on his face and not see pure enthusiasm?”

“I see every feminine quality in it, my dear.”

“What can it be that he is wanting in?”

“Masculine ambition.”

“I am not defending him,” said Vittoria hastily.

“Not at all; and I am not attacking him. I can excuse his dread of Republicanism. I can fancy that there is reason for him just now to fear Republicanism worse than Austria. Paris and Milan are two grisly phantoms before him. These red spectres are born of earthquake, and are more given to shaking thrones than are hostile cannonshot. Earthquakes are dreadfuller than common maladies to all of us. Fortune may help him, but he has not the look of one who commands her. The face is not aquiline. There’s a light over him like the ray of a sickly star.”

“For that reason!” Vittoria burst out.

“Oh, for that reason we pity men, assuredly, my Sandra, but not kings. Luckless kings are not generous men, and ungenerous men are mischievous kings.”

“But if you find him chivalrous and devoted; if he proves his noble intentions, why not support him?”

“Dandle a puppet, by all means,” said Laura.

Her intellect, not her heart, was harsh to the king; and her heart was not mistress of her intellect in this respect, because she beheld riding forth at the head of Italy one whose spirit was too much after the pattern of her supple, springing, cowering, impressionable sex, alternately ardent and abject, chivalrous and treacherous, and not to be confided in firmly when standing at the head of a great cause.

Aware that she was reading him very strictly by the letters of his past deeds, which were not plain history to Vittoria, she declared that she did not countenance suspicion in dealing with the king, and that it would be a delight to her to hear of his gallant bearing on the battle-field. “Or to witness it, my Sandra, if that were possible;—we two! For, should he prove to be no General, he has the courage of his family.”

Vittoria took fire at this. “What hinders our following the army?”

“The less baggage the better, my dear.”

“But the king said that my singing—I have no right to think it myself.” Vittoria concluded her sentence with a comical intention of humility.

“It was a pretty compliment,” said Laura. “You replied that singing is a poor thing in time of war, and I agree with you. We might serve as hospital nurses.”

“Why do we not determine?”

“We are only considering possibilities.”

“Consider the impossibility of our remaining quiet.”

“Fire that goes to flame is a waste of heat, my Sandra.”

The signora, however, was not so discreet as her speech. On all sides there was uproar and movement. High-born Italian ladies were offering their hands for any serviceable work. Laura and Vittoria were not alone in the desire which was growing to be resolution to share the hardships of the soldiers, to cherish and encourage them, and by seeing, to have the supreme joy of feeling the blows struck at the common enemy.

The opera closed when the king marched. Carlo Ammiani’s letter was handed to Vittoria at the fall of the curtain on the last night.

Three paths were open to her: either that she should obey her lover, or earn an immense sum of money from Antonio-Pericles by accepting an immediate engagement in London, or go to the war. To sit in submissive obedience seemed unreasonable; to fly from Italy impossible. Yet the latter alternative appealed strongly to her sense of duty, and as it thereby threw her lover’s commands into the background, she left it to her heart to struggle with Carlo, and thought over the two final propositions. The idea of being apart from Italy while the living country streamed forth to battle struck her inflamed spirit like the shock of a pause in martial music. Laura pretended to take no part in Vittoria’s decision, but when it was reached, she showed her a travelling-carriage stocked with lint and linen, wine in jars, chocolate, cases of brandy, tea, coffee, needles, thread, twine, scissors, knives; saying, as she displayed them, “there, my dear, all my money has gone in that equipment, so you must pay on the road.”

“This doesn’t leave me a choice, then,” said Victoria, joining her humour.

“Ah, but think over it,” Laura suggested.

“No! not think at all,” cried Vittoria.

“You do not fear Carlo’s anger?”

“If I think, I am weak as water. Let us go.”

Countess d’Isorella wrote to Carlo: “Your Vittoria is away after the king to Pavia. They tell me she stood up in her carriage on the Ponte del Po-’Viva il Re d’Italia!’ waving the cross of Savoy. As I have previously assured you, no woman is Republican. The demonstration was a mistake. Public characters should not let their personal preferences betrumpeted: a diplomatic truism:—but I must add, least of all a cantatrice for a king. The famous Greek amateur—the prop of failing finances—is after her to arrest her for breach of engagement. You wished to discover an independent mind in a woman, my Carlo; did you not? One would suppose her your wife—or widow. She looked a superb thing the last night she sang. She is not, in my opinion, wanting in height. If, behind all that innocence and candour, she has any trained artfulness, she will beat us all. Heaven bless your arms!”

The demonstration mentioned by the countess had not occurred.

Vittoria’s letter to her lover missed him. She wrote from Pavia, after she had taken her decisive step.

Carlo Ammiani went into the business of the war with the belief that his betrothed had despised his prayer to her.

He was under Colonel Corte, operating on the sub-Alpine range of hills along the line of the Chiese South-eastward. Here the volunteers, formed of the best blood of Milan, the gay and brave young men, after marching in the pride of their strength to hold the Alpine passes and bar Austria from Italy while the fight went on below, were struck by a sudden paralysis. They hung aloft there like an arm cleft from the body. Weapons, clothes, provisions, money, the implements of war, were withheld from them. The Piedmontese officers despatched to watch their proceedings laughed at them like exasperating senior scholars examining the accomplishments of a lower form. It was manifest that Count Medole and the Government of Milan worked everywhere to conquer the people for the king before the king had done a stroke to conquer the Austrians for the people; while, in order to reduce them to the condition of Piedmontese soldiery, the flame of their patriotic enthusiasm was systematically damped, and instead of apprentices in war, who possessed at any rate the elementary stuff of soldiers, miserable dummies were drafted into the royal service. The Tuscans and the Romans had good reason to complain on behalf of their princes, as had the Venetians and the Lombards for the cause of their Republic. Neither Tuscans, Romans, Venetians, nor Lombards were offering up their lives simply to obtain a change of rulers; though all Italy was ready to bow in allegiance to a king of proved kingly quality. Early in the campaign the cry of treason was muttered, and on all sides such became the temper of the Alpine volunteers, that Angelo and Rinaldo Guidascarpi were forced to join their cousin under Corte, by the dispersion of their band, amounting to something more than eighteen hundred fighting lads, whom a Piedmontese superior officer summoned peremptorily to shout for the king. They thundered as one voice for the Italian Republic, and instantly broke up and disbanded. This was the folly of the young: Carlo Ammiani confessed that it was no better; but he knew that a breath of generous confidence from the self-appointed champion of the national cause would have subdued his impatience at royalty and given heart and cheer to his sickening comrades. He began to frown angrily when he thought of Vittoria. “Where is she now?—where now?” he asked himself in the season of his most violent wrath at the king. Her conduct grew inseparable in his mind from the king’s deeds. The sufferings, the fierce irony, the very deaths of the men surrounding him in aims, rose up in accusation against the woman he loved.

THE TREACHERY OF PERICLES—THE WHITE UMBRELLA—THE DEATH OF RINALDO GUIDASCARPI

The king crossed the Mincio. The Marshal, threatened on his left flank, drew in his line from the farther Veronese heights upon a narrowed battle front before Verona. Here they manoeuvred, and the opening successes fell to the king. Holding Peschiera begirt, with one sharp passage of arms he cleared the right bank of the Adige and stood on the semicircle of hills, master of the main artery into Tyrol.

The village of Pastrengo has given its name to the day. It was a day of intense heat coming after heavy rains. The arid soil steamed; the white powder-smoke curled in long horizontal columns across the hazy ring of the fight. Seen from a distance it was like a huge downy ball, kicked this way and that between the cypresses by invisible giants. A pair of eager-eyed women gazing on a battle-field for the first time could but ask themselves in bewilderment whether the fate of countries were verily settled in such a fashion. Far in the rear, Vittoria and Laura heard the cannon-shots; a sullen dull sound, as of a mallet striking upon rotten timber. They drove at speed. The great thumps became varied by musketry volleys, that were like blocks of rockboulder tumbled in the roll of a mountain torrent. These, then, were the voices of Italy and Austria speaking the devilish tongue of the final alternative. Cannon, rockets, musketry, and now the run of drums, now the ring of bugles, now the tramp of horses, and the field was like a landslip. A joyful bright black death-wine seemed to pour from the bugles all about. The women strained their senses to hear and see; they could realize nothing of a reality so absolute; their feelings were shattered, and crowded over them in patches;—horror, glory, panic, hope, shifted lights within their bosoms. The fascination and repulsion of the image of Force divided them. They feared; they were prostrate; they sprang in praise. The image of Force was god and devil to their souls. They strove to understand why the field was marked with blocks of men who made a plume of vapour here, and hurried thither. The action of their intellects resolved to a blank marvel at seeing an imminent thing—an interrogation to almighty heaven treated with method, not with fury streaming forward. Cleave the opposing ranks! Cry to God for fire? Cut them through! They had come to see the Song of Deborah performed before their eyes, and they witnessed only a battle. Blocks of infantry gathered densely, thinned to a line, wheeled in column, marched: blocks of cavalry changed posts: artillery bellowed from one spot and quickly selected another. Infantry advanced in the wake of tiny smokepuffs, halted, advanced again, rattled files of shots, became struck into knots, faced half about as from a blow of the back of a hand, retired orderly. Cavalry curved like a flickering scimetar in their rear; artillery plodded to its further station. Innumerable tiny smoke-puffs then preceded a fresh advance of infantry. The enemy were on the hills and looked mightier, for they were revealed among red flashes of their guns, and stood partly visible above clouds of hostile smoke and through clouds of their own, which grasped viscously by the skirts of the hills. Yet it seemed a strife of insects, until, one by one, soldiers who had gone into yonder white pit for the bloody kiss of death, and had got it on their faces, were borne by Vittoria and Laura knelt in this horrid stream of mortal anguish to give succour from their stores in the carriage. Their natural emotions were distraught. They welcomed the sight of suffering thankfully, for the poor blotted faces were so glad at sight of them. Torture was their key to the reading of the battle.

The hill behind Pastrengo was twice stormed. When the bluecoats first fell back, a fine charge of Piedmontese horse cleared the slopes for a second effort, and they went up and on, driving the enemy from hill to hill. The Adige was crossed by the Austrians under cover of Tyrolese rifleshots.

Then, with Beppo at their heels, bearing water, wine, and brandy, the women walked in the paths of carnage, and saw the many faces of death. Laura whispered strangely, “How light-hearted they look!” The wounded called their comforters sweet names. Some smoked and some sang, some groaned; all were quick to drink. Their jokes at the dead were universal. They twisted their bodies painfully to stick a cigar between dead lips, and besprinkle them with the last drops of liquor in their cups, laughing a benediction. These scenes put grievous chains on Vittoria’s spirit, but Laura evidently was not the heavier for them. Glorious Verona shone under the sunset as their own to come; Peschiera, on the blue lake, was in the hollow of their hands. “Prizes worth any quantity of blood,” said Laura. Vittoria confessed that she had seen enough of blood, and her aspect provoked Laura to utter, “For God’s sake, think of something miserable;—cry, if you can!”

Vittoria’s underlip dropped sickly with the question, “Why?”

Laura stated the physical necessity with Italian naivete.

“If I can,” said Vittoria, and blinked to get a tear; but laughter helped as well to relieve her, and it came on their return to the carriage. They found the spy Luigi sitting beside the driver. He informed them that Antonio-Pericles had been in the track of the army ever since their flight from Turin; daily hurrying off with whip of horses at the sound of cannon-shot, and gradually stealing back to the extreme rear. This day he had flown from Oliosi to Cavriani, and was, perhaps, retracing his way already as before, on fearful toe-tips. Luigi acted the caution of one who stepped blindfolded across hot iron plates. Vittoria, without a spark of interest, asked why the Signor Antonio should be following the army.

“Why, it’s to find you, signorina.”

Luigi’s comical emphasis conjured up in a jumbled picture the devotion, the fury, the zeal, the terror of Antonio-Pericles—a mixture of demoniacal energy and ludicrous trepidation. She imagined his long figure, fantastical as a shadow, off at huge strides, and back, with eyes sliding swiftly to the temples, and his odd serpent’s head raised to peer across the plains and occasionally to exclaim to the reasonable heavens in anger at men and loathing of her. She laughed ungovernably. Luigi exclaimed that, albeit in disgrace with the signor Antonio, he had been sent for to serve him afresh, and had now been sent forward to entreat the gracious signorina to grant her sincerest friend and adorer an interview. She laughed at Pericles, but in truth she almost loved the man for his worship of her Art, and representation of her dear peaceful practice of it.

The interview between them took place at Oliosi. There, also, she met Georgiana Ford, the half-sister of Merthyr Powys, who told her that Merthyr and Augustus Gambier were in the ranks of a volunteer contingent in the king’s army, and might have been present at Pastrengo. Georgiana held aloof from battle-fields, her business being simply to serve as Merthyr’s nurse in case of wounds, or to see the last of him in case of death. She appeared to have no enthusiasm. She seconded strongly the vehement persuasions addressed by Pericles to Vittoria. Her disapproval of the presence of her sex on fields of battle was precise. Pericles had followed the army to give Vittoria one last chance, he said, and drag her away from this sick country, as he called it, pointing at the dusty land from the windows of the inn. On first seeing her he gasped like one who has recovered a lost thing. To Laura he was a fool; but Vittoria enjoyed his wildest outbursts, and her half-sincere humility encouraged him to think that he had captured her at last. He enlarged on the perils surrounding her voice in dusty bellowing Lombardy, and on the ardour of his friendship in exposing himself to perils as tremendous, that he might rescue her. While speaking he pricked a lively ear for the noise of guns, hearing a gun in everything, and jumping to the window with horrid imprecations. His carriage was horsed at the doors below. Let the horses die, he said, let the coachman have sun-stroke. Let hundreds perish, if Vittoria would only start in an hour-in two—to-night—to-morrow.

“Because, do you see,”—he turned to Laura and Georgiana, submitting to the vexatious necessity of seeming reasonable to these creatures,—“she is a casket for one pearl. It is only one, but it is ONE, mon Dieu! and inscrutable heaven, mesdames, has made the holder of it mad. Her voice has but a sole skin; it is not like a body; it bleeds to death at a scratch. A spot on the pearl, and it is perished—pfoof! Ah, cruel thing! impious, I say. I have watched, I have reared her. Speak to me of mothers! I have cherished her for her splendid destiny—to see it go down, heels up, among quarrels of boobies! Yes; we have war in Italy. Fight! Fight in this beautiful climate that you may be dominated by a blue coat, not by a white coat. We are an intelligent race; we are a civilized people; we will fight for that. What has a voice of the very heavens to do with your fighting? I heard it first in England, in a firwood, in a month of Spring, at night-time, fifteen miles and a quarter from the city of London—oh, city of peace! Sandra you will come there. I give you thousands additional to the sum stipulated. You have no rival. Sandra Belloni! no rival, I say”—he invoked her in English, “and you hear—you, to be a draggle-tail vivandiere wiz a brandy-bottle at your hips and a reputation going like ze brandy. Ah! pardon, mesdames; but did mankind ever see a frenzy like this girl’s? Speak, Sandra. I could cry it like Michiella to Camilla—Speak!”

Vittoria compelled him to despatch his horses to stables. He had relays of horses at war-prices between Castiglione and Pavia, and a retinue of servants; nor did he hesitate to inform the ladies that, before entrusting his person to the hazards of war, he had taken care to be provided with safe-conduct passes for both armies, as befitted a prudent man of peace—“or sense; it is one, mesdames.”

Notwithstanding his terror at the guns, and disgust at the soldiery and the bad fare at the inn, Vittoria’s presence kept him lingering in this wretched place, though he cried continually, “I shall have heart-disease.” He believed at first that he should subdue her; then it became his intention to carry her off.

It was to see Merthyr that she remained. Merthyr came there the day after the engagement at Santa Lucia. They had not met since the days at Meran. He was bronzed, and keen with strife, and looked young, but spoke not over-hopefully. He scolded her for wishing to taste battle, and compared her to a bad swimmer on deep shores. Pericles bounded with delight to hear him, and said he had not supposed there was so much sense in Powys. Merthyr confessed that the Austrians had as good as beaten them at Santa Lucia. The tactical combinations of the Piedmontese were wretched. He was enamoured of the gallantly of the Duke of Savoy, who had saved the right wing of the army from rout while covering the backward movement. Why there had been any fight at all at Santa Lucia, where nothing was to be gained, much to be lost, he was incapable of telling; but attributed it to an antique chivalry on the part of the king, that had prompted the hero to a trial of strength, a bout of blood-letting.

“You do think he is a hero?” said Vittoria.

“He is; and he will march to Venice.”

“And open the opera at Venice,” Pericles sneered. “Powys, mon cher, cure her of this beastly dream. It is a scandal to you to want a woman’s help. You were defeated at Santa Lucia. I say bravo to anything that brings you to reason. Bravo! You hear me.”

The engagement at Santa Lucia was designed by the king to serve as an instigating signal for the Veronese to rise in revolt; and this was the secret of Charles Albert’s stultifying manoeuvres between Peschiera and Mantua. Instead of matching his military skill against the wary old Marshal’s, he was offering incentives to conspiracy. Distrusting the revolution, which was a force behind him, he placed such reliance on its efforts in his front as to make it the pivot of his actions.

“The volunteers North-east of Vicenza are doing the real work for us, I believe,” said Merthyr; and it seemed so then, as it might have been indeed, had they not been left almost entirely to themselves to do it.

These tidings of a fight lost set Laura and Vittoria quivering with nervous irritation. They had been on the field of Pastrengo, and it was won. They had been absent from Santa Lucia. What was the deduction? Not such as reason would have made for them; but they were at the mercy of the currents of the blood. “Let us go on,” said Laura. Merthyr refused to convoy them. Pericles drove with him an hour on the road, and returned in glee, to find Vittoria and Laura seated in their carriage, and Luigi scuffling with Beppo.

“Padrone, see how I assist you,” cried Luigi.

Upon this Beppo instantly made a swan’s neck of his body and trumpeted: “A sally from the fortress for forage.”

“Whip! whip!” Pericles shouted to his coachman, and the two carriages parted company at the top of their speed.

Pericles fell a victim to a regiment of bersaglieri that wanted horses, and unceremoniously stopped his pair and took possession of them on the route for Peschiera. He was left in a stranded carriage between a dusty ditch and a mulberry bough. Vittoria and Laura were not much luckier. They were met by a band of deserters, who made no claim upon the horses, but stood for drink, and having therewith fortified their fine opinion of themselves, petitioned for money. A kiss was their next demand. Money and good humour saved the women from indignity. The band of rascals went off with a ‘Viva l’Italia.’ Such scum is upon every popular rising, as Vittoria had to learn. Days of rain and an incomprehensible inactivity of the royal army kept her at a miserable inn, where the walls were bare, the cock had crowed his last. The guns of Peschiera seemed to roam over the plain like an echo unwillingly aroused that seeks a hollow for its further sleep. Laura sat pondering for hours, harsh in manner, as if she hated her. “I think,” she said once, “that women are those persons who have done evil in another world:” The “why?” from Vittoria was uttered simply to awaken friendly talk, but Laura relapsed into her gloom. A village priest, a sleek gentle creature, who shook his head to earth when he hoped, and filled his nostrils with snuff when he desponded, gave them occasional companionship under the title of consolation. He wished the Austrians to be beaten, remarking, however, that they were good Catholics, most fervent Catholics. As the Lord decided, so it would end! “Oh, delicious creed!” Laura broke out: “Oh, dear and sweet doctrine! that results and developments in a world where there is more evil than good are approved by heaven.” She twisted the mild man in supple steel of her irony so tenderly that Vittoria marvelled to hear her speak of him in abhorrence when they quitted the village. “Not to be born a woman, and voluntarily to be a woman!” ejaculated Laura. “How many, how many are we to deduct from the male population of Italy? Cross in hand, he should be at the head of our arms, not whimpering in a corner for white bread. Wretch! he makes the marrow in my bones rage at him. He chronicled pig that squeaked.”

“Why had she been so gentle with him?”

“Because, my dear, when I loathe a thing I never care to exhaust my detestation before I can strike it,” said the true Italian.

They were on the field of Goito; it was won. It was won against odds. At Pastrengo they witnessed an encounter; this was a battle. Vittoria perceived that there was the difference between a symphony and a lyric song. The blessedness of the sensation that death can be light and easy dispossessed her of the meaner compassion, half made up of cowardice, which she had been nearly borne down by on the field of Pastrengo. At an angle on a height off the left wing of the royal army the face of the battle was plain to her: the movements of the troops were clear as strokes on a slate. Laura flung her life into her eyes, and knelt and watched, without summing one sole thing from what her senses received.

Vittoria said, “We are too far away to understand it.”

“No,” said Laura, “we are too far away to feel it.”

The savage soul of the woman was robbed of its share of tragic emotion by having to hold so far aloof. Flashes of guns were but flashes of guns up there where she knelt. She thirsted to read the things written by them; thirsted for their mystic terrors, somewhat as souls of great prophets have craved for the full revelation of those fitful underlights which inspired their mouths.

Charles Albert’s star was at its highest when the Piedmontese drums beat for an advance of the whole line at Goito.

Laura stood up, white as furnace-fire. “Women can do some good by praying,” she said. She believed that she had been praying. That was her part in the victory.

Rain fell as from the forehead of thunder. From black eve to black dawn the women were among dead and dying men, where the lanterns trailed a slow flame across faces that took the light and let it go. They returned to their carriage exhausted. The ways were almost impassable for carriage-wheels. While they were toiling on and exchanging their drenched clothes, Vittoria heard Merthyr’s voice speaking to Beppo on the box. He was saying that Captain Gambier lay badly wounded; brandy was wanted for him. She flung a cloak over Laura, and handed out the flask with a naked arm. It was not till she saw him again that she remembered or even felt that he had kissed the arm. A spot of sweet fire burned on it just where the soft fulness of a woman’s arm slopes to the bend. He chid her for being on the field and rejoiced in a breath, for the carriage and its contents helped to rescue his wounded brother in arms from probable death. Gambier, wounded in thigh and ankle by rifle-shot, was placed in the carriage. His clothes were saturated with the soil of Goito; but wounded and wet, he smiled gaily, and talked sweet boyish English. Merthyr gave the driver directions to wind along up the Mincio. “Georgiana will be at the nearest village—she has an instinct for battle-fields, or keeps spies in her pay,” he said.

“Tell her I am safe. We march to cut them (the enemy) off from Verona, and I can’t leave. The game is in our hands. We shall give you Venice.”

Georgiana was found at the nearest village. Gambier’s wounds had been dressed by an army-surgeon. She looked at the dressing, and said that it would do for six hours. This singular person had fully qualified herself to attend on a soldier-brother. She had studied medicine for that purpose, and she had served as nurse in a London hospital. Her nerves were completely under control. She could sit in attendance by a sick-bed for hours, hearing distant cannon, and the brawl of soldiery and vagabonds in the street, without a change of countenance. Her dress was plain black from throat to heel, with a skull cap of white, like a Moravian sister. Vittoria reverenced her; but Georgiana’s manner in return was cold aversion, so much more scornful than disdain that it offended Laura, who promptly put her finger on the blot in the fair character with the word ‘Jealousy;’ but a single word is too broad a mark to be exactly true. “She is a perfect example of your English,” Laura said. “Brave, good, devoted, admirable—ice at the heart. The judge of others, of course. I always respected her; I never liked her; and I should be afraid of a comparison with her. Her management of the household of this inn is extraordinary.”

Georgiana condescended to advise Vittoria once more not to dangle after armies.

“I wish to wait here to assist you in nursing our friend,” said Vittoria.

Georgiana replied that her strength was unlikely to fail.

After two days of incessant rain, sunshine blazed over ‘the watery Mantuan flats. Laura drove with Beppo to see whether the army was in motion, for they were distracted by rumours. Vittoria clung to her wounded friend, whose pleasure was the hearing her speak. She expected Laura’s return by set of sun. After dark a messenger came to her, saying that the signora had sent a carriage to fetch her to Valeggio. Her immediate supposition was that Merthyr might have fallen. She found Luigi at the carriage-door, and listened to his mysterious directions and remarks that not a minute must be lost, without suspicion. He said that the signora was in great trouble, very anxious to see the signorina instantly; there was but a distance of five miles to traverse.

She thought it strange that the carriage should be so luxuriously fitted with lights and silken pillows, but her ideas were all of Merthyr, until she by chance discovered a packet marked I chocolate, which told her at once that she was entrapped by Antonio-Pericles. Luigi would not answer her cry to him. After some fruitless tremblings of wrath, she lay back relieved by the feeling that Merthyr was safe, come what might come to herself. Things could lend to nothing but an altercation with Pericles, and for this scene she prepared her mind. The carriage stopped while she was dozing. Too proud to supplicate in the darkness, she left it to the horses to bear her on, reserving her energies for the morning’s interview, and saying, “The farther he takes me the angrier I shall be.” She dreamed of her anger while asleep, but awakened so frequently during the night that morning was at her eyelids before they divided. To her amazement, she saw the carriage surrounded by Austrian troopers. Pericles was spreading cigars among them, and addressing them affably. The carriage was on a good road, between irrigated flats, that flashed a lively green and bright steel blue for miles away. She drew down the blinds to cry at leisure; her wings were clipped, and she lost heart. Pericles came round to her when the carriage had drawn up at an inn. He was egregiously polite, but modestly kept back any expressions of triumph. A body of Austrians, cavalry and infantry, were breaking camp. Pericles accorded her an hour of rest. She perceived that he was anticipating an outbreak of the anger she had nursed overnight, and baffled him so far by keeping dumb. Luigi was sent up to her to announce the expiration of her hour of grace.

“Ah, Luigi!” she said. “Signorina, only wait, and see how Luigi can serve two,” he whispered, writhing under the reproachfulness of her eyes. At the carriage-door she asked Pericles whither he was taking her. “Not to Turin, not to London, Sandra Belloni!” he replied; “not to a place where you are wet all night long, to wheeze for ever after it. Go in.” She entered the carriage quickly, to escape from staring officers, whose laughter rang in her ears and humbled her bitterly; she felt herself bringing dishonour on her lover. The carriage continued in the track of the Austrians. Pericles was audibly careful to avoid the border regiments. He showered cigars as he passed; now and then he exhibited a paper; and on one occasion he brought a General officer to the carriage-door, opened it and pointed in. A white-helmeted dragoon rode on each side of the carriage for the remainder of the day. The delight of the supposition that these Austrians were retreating before the invincible arms of King Carlo Alberto kept her cheerful; but she heard no guns in the rear. A blocking of artillery and waggons compelled a halt, and then Pericles came and faced her. He looked profoundly ashamed of himself, ready as he was for an animated defence of his proceedings.

“Where are you taking me, sir?” she said in English.

“Sandra, will you be a good child? It is anywhere you please, if you will promise—”

“I will promise nothing.”

“Zen, I lock you up in Verona.”

“In Verona!”

“Sandra, will you promise to me?”

“I will promise nothing.”

“Zen I lock you up in Verona. It is settled. No more of it. I come to say, we shall not reach a village. I am sorry. We have soldiers for a guard. You draw out a board and lodge in your carriage as in a bed. Biscuits, potted meats, prunes, bon-bona, chocolate, wine—you shall find all at your right hand and your left. I am desolate in offending you. Sandra, if you will promise—”

“I will promise—this is what I will promise,” said Vittoria.

Pericles thrust his ear forward, and withdrew it as if it had been slapped.

She promised to run from him at the first opportunity, to despise him ever after, and never to sing again in his hearing. With the darkness Luigi appeared to light her lamp; he mouthed perpetually, “To-morrow, to-morrow.” The watch-fires of Austrians encamped in the fields encircled her; and moving up and down, the cigar of Antonio-Pericles was visible. He had not eaten or drunk, and he was out there sleepless; he walked conquering his fears in the thick of war troubles: all for her sake. She watched critically to see whether the cigar-light was puffed in fretfulness. It burned steadily; and the thought of Pericles supporting patience quite overcame her. In a fit of humour that was almost tears, she called to him and begged him to take a place in the carriage and have food. “If it is your pleasure,” he said; and threw off his cloak. The wine comforted him. Thereupon he commenced a series of strange gesticulations, and ended by blinking at the window, saying, “No, no; it is impossible to explain. I have no voice; I am not, gifted. It is,” he tapped at his chest, “it is here. It is, imprisoned in me.”

“What?” said Vittoria, to encourage him.

“It can never be explained, my child. Am I not respectful to you? Am I not worshipful to you? But, no! it can never be explained. Some do call me mad. I know it; I am laughed at. Oh! do I not know zat? Perfectly well. My ancestors adored Goddesses. I discover ze voice of a Goddess: I adore it. So you call me mad; it is to me what you call me—juste ze same. I am possessed wiz passion for her voice. So it will be till I go to ashes. It is to me ze one zsing divine in a pig, a porpoise world. It is to me—I talk! It is unutterable—impossible to tell.”

“But I understand it; I know you must feel it,” said Vittoria.

“But you hate me, Sandra. You hate your Pericles.”

“No, I do not; you are my good friend, my good Pericles.”

“I am your good Pericles? So you obey me?”

“在什么？”

“You come to London?”

“我不会。”

“You come to Turin?”

“I cannot promise.”

“To Milan?”

“不; 还没有。”

“Ungrateful little beast! minx! temptress! You seduce me into your carriage to feed me, to fill me, for to coax me,” cried Pericles.

“Am I the person to have abuse poured on me?” Vittoria rejoined, and she frowned. “Might I not have called you a wretched whimsical money-machine, without the comprehension of a human feeling? You are doing me a great wrong—to win my submission, as I see, and it half amuses me; but the pretence of an attempt to carry me off from my friends is an offence that I should take certain care to punish in another. I do not give you any promise, because the first promise of all—the promise to keep one—is not in my power. Shut your eyes and sleep where you are, and in the morning think better of your conduct!”

“Of my conduct, mademoiselle!” Pericles retained this sentence in his head till the conclusion of her animated speech,—“of my conduct I judge better zan to accept of such a privilege as you graciously offer to me;” and he retired with a sour grin, very much subdued by her unexpected capacity for expression. The bugles of the Austrians were soon ringing. There was a trifle of a romantic flavour in the notes which Vittoria tried not to feel; the smart iteration of them all about her rubbed it off, but she was reduced to repeat them, and take them in various keys. This was her theme for the day.

They were in the midst of mulberries, out of sight of the army; green mulberries, and the green and the bronze young vine-leaf. It was a delicious day, but she began to fear that she was approaching Verona, and that Pericles was acting seriously. The bronze young vine-leaf seemed to her like some warrior’s face, as it would look when beaten by weather, burned by the sun. They came now to inns which had been visited by both armies. Luigi established communication with the innkeepers before the latter had stated the names of villages to Pericles, who stood map in hand, believing himself at last to be no more conscious of his position than an atom in a whirl of dust. Vittoria still refused to give him any promise, and finally, on a solitary stretch of the road, he appealed to her mercy. She was the mistress of the carriage, he said; he had never meant to imprison her in Verona; his behaviour was simply dictated by his adoration—alas! This was true or not true, but it was certain that the ways were confounded to them. Luigi, despatched to reconnoitre from a neighbouring eminence, reported a Piedmontese encampment far ahead, and a walking tent that was coming on their route. The walking tent was an enormous white umbrella. Pericles advanced to meet it; after an interchange of opening formalities, he turned about and clapped hands. The umbrella was folded. Vittoria recognized the last man she would then have thought of meeting; he seemed to have jumped out of an ambush from Meran in Tyrol:—it was Wilfrid. Their greeting was disturbed by the rushing up of half-a-dozen troopers. The men claimed him as an Austrian spy. With difficulty Vittoria obtained leave to drive him on to their commanding officer. It appeared that the white umbrella was notorious for having been seen on previous occasions threading the Piedmontese lines into and out of Peschiera. These very troopers swore to it; but they could not swear to Wilfrid, and white umbrellas were not absolutely uncommon. Vittoria declared that Wilfrid was an old English friend; Pericles vowed that Wilfrid was one of their party. The prisoner was clearly an Englishman. As it chanced, the officer before whom Wilfrid was taken had heard Vittoria sing on the great night at La Scala. “Signorina, your word should pass the Austrian Field-Marshal himself,” he said, and merely requested Wilfrid to state on his word of honour that he was not in the Austrian service, to which Wilfrid unhesitatingly replied, “I am not.”

Permission was then accorded to him to proceed in the carriage.

Vittoria held her hand to Wilfrid. He took the fingers and bowed over them.

He was perfectly self-possessed, and cool even under her eyes. Like a pedlar he carried a pack on his back, which was his life; for his business was a combination of scout and spy.

“You have saved me from a ditch to-day,” he said; “every fellow has some sort of love for his life, and I must thank you for the odd luck of your coming by. I knew you were on this ground somewhere. If the rascals had searched me, I should not have come off so well. I did not speak falsely to that officer; I am not in the Austrian service. I am a volunteer spy. I am an unpaid soldier. I am the dog of the army—fetching and carrying for a smile and a pat on the head. I am ruined, and I am working my way up as best I can. My uncle disowns me. It is to General Schoneck that I owe this chance of re-establishing myself. I followed the army out of Milan. I was at Melegnano, at Pastrengo, at Santa Lucia. If I get nothing for it, the Lenkensteins at least shall not say that I abandoned the flag in adversity. I am bound for Rivoli. The fortress (Peschiera) has just surrendered. The Marshal is stealing round to make a dash on Vicenza.” So far he spoke like one apart from her, but a flush crossed his forehead. “I have not followed you. I have obeyed your brief directions. I saw this carriage yesterday in the ranks of our troops. I saw Pericles. I guessed who might be inside it. I let it pass me. Could I do more?”

“Not if you wanted to punish me,” said Vittoria.

She was afflicted by his refraining from reproaches in his sunken state.

Their talk bordered the old life which they had known, like a rivulet, coming to falls where it threatens to be e, torrent and a flood; like flame bubbling the wax of a seal. She was surprised to find herself expecting tenderness from him: and, startled by the languor in her veins, she conceived a contempt for her sex and her own weak nature. To mask that, an excessive outward coldness was assumed. “You can serve as a spy, Wilfrid!”

The answer was ready: “Having twice served as a traitor, I need not be particular. It is what my uncle and the Lenkensteins call me. I do my best to work my way up again. Despise me for it, if you please.”

On the contrary, she had never respected him so much. She got herself into opposition to him by provoking him to speak with pride of his army; but the opposition was artificial, and she called to Carlo Ammiani in heart. “I will leave these places, cover up my head, and crouch till the struggle is decided.”

The difficulty was now to be happily rid of Wilfrid by leaving him in safety. Piedmontese horse scoured the neighbourhood, and any mischance that might befall him she traced to her hand. She dreaded at every instant to hear him speak of his love for her; yet how sweet it would have been to hear it,—to hear him speak of passionate love; to shape it in deep music; to hear one crave for what she gave to another! “I am sinking: I am growing degraded,” she thought. But there was no other way for her to quicken her imagination of her distant and offended lover. The sights on the plains were strange contrasts to these conflicting inner emotions: she seemed to be living in two divided worlds.

Pericles declared anew that she was mistress of the carriage. She issued orders: “The nearest point to Rivoli, and then to Brescia.”

Pericles broke into shouts. “She has arrived at her reason! Hurrah for Brescia! I beheld you,” he confessed to Wilfrid,—“it was on ze right of Mincio, my friend. I did not know you were so true for Art, or what a hand I would have reached to you! Excuse me now. Let us whip on. I am your banker. I shall desire you not to be shot or sabred. You are deserving of an effigy on a theatral grand stair-case!” His gratitude could no further express itself. In joy he whipped the horses on. Fools might be fighting—he was the conqueror. From Brescia, one leap took him in fancy to London. He composed mentally a letter to be forwarded immediately to a London manager, directing him to cause the appearance of articles in the journals on the grand new prima donna, whose singing had awakened the people of Italy.

Another day brought them in view of the Lago di Garda. The flag of Sardinia hung from the walls of Peschiera. And now Vittoria saw the Pastrengo hills—dear hills, that drove her wretched languor out of her, and made her soul and body one again. The horses were going at a gallop. Shots were heard. To the left of them, somewhat in the rear, on higher ground, there was an encounter of a body of Austrians and Italians: Tyrolese riflemen and the volunteers. Pericles was raving. He refused to draw the reins till they had reached the village, where one of the horses dropped. From the windows of the inn, fronting a clear space, Vittoria beheld a guard of Austrians surrounding two or more prisoners. A woman sat near them with her head buried in her lap. Presently an officer left the door of the inn and spoke to the soldiers. “That is Count Karl von Lenkenstein,” Wilfrid said in a whisper. Pericles had been speaking with Count Karl and came up to the room, saying, “We are to observe something; but we are safe; it is only fortune of war.” Wilfrid immediately went out to report himself. He was seen giving his papers, after which Count Karl waved his finger back to the inn, and he returned. Vittoria sprang to her feet at the words he uttered. Rinaldo Guidascarpi was one of the prisoners. The others Wilfrid professed not to know. The woman was the wife of Barto Rizzo.

In the great red of sunset the Tyrolese riflemen and a body of Italians in Austrian fatigue uniform marched into the village. These formed in the space before the inn. It seemed as if Count Karl were declaiming an indictment. A voice answered, “I am the man.” It was clear and straight as a voice that goes up in the night. Then a procession walked some paces on. The woman followed. She fell prostrate at the feet of Count Karl. He listened to her and nodded. Rinaldo Guidascarpi stood alone with bandaged eyes. The woman advanced to him; she put her mouth on his ear; there she hung.

Vittoria heard a single shot. Rinaldo Guidascarpi lay stretched upon the ground and the woman stood over him.

COUNT KARL LENKENSTEIN—THE STORY OF THE GUIDASCARPI—THE VICTORY OF THE VOLUNTEERS

The smoke of a pistol-shot thinned away while there was yet silence.

“It is a saving of six charges of Austrian ammunition,” said Pericles.

Vittoria stared at the scene, losing faith in her eyesight. She could in fact see no distinct thing beyond what appeared as an illuminated copper medallion, held at a great distance from her, with a dead man and a towering female figure stamped on it.

The events following were like a rush of water on her senses. There was fighting up the street of the village, and a struggle in the space where Rinaldo had fallen; successive yellowish shots under the rising moonlight, cries from Italian lips, quick words of command from German in Italian, and one sturdy bull’s roar of a voice that called across the tumult to the Austro-Italian soldiery, “Venite fratelli!—come, brothers, come under our banner!” She heard “Rinaldo!” called.

This was a second attack of the volunteers for the rescue of their captured comrades. They fought more desperately than on the hill outside the village: they fought with steel. Shot enfiladed them; yet they bore forward in a scattered body up to that spot where Rinaldo lay, shouting for him. There they turned,—they fled.

Then there was a perfect stillness, succeeding the strife as quickly, Vittoria thought, as a breath yielded succeeds a breath taken.

She accused the heavens of injustice.

Pericles, prostrate on the floor, moaned that he was wounded. She said, “Bleed to death!”

“It is my soul, it is my soul is wounded for you, Sandra.”

“Dreadful craven man!” she muttered.

“When my soul is shaking for your safety, Sandra Belloni!” Pericles turned his ear up. “For myself—not; it is for you, for you.”

Assured of the cessation of arms by delicious silence he jumped to his feet.

“Ah! brutes to fight. It is ‘immonde;’ it is unnatural!”

He tapped his finger on the walls for marks of shot, and discovered a shot-hole in the wood-work, that had passed an arm’s length above her head, into which he thrust his finger in an intense speculative meditation, shifting eyes from it to her, and throwing them aloft.

He was summoned to the presence of Count Karl, with whom he found Captain Weisspriess, Wilfrid, and officers of jagers and the Italian battalion. Barto Rizzo’s wife was in a corner of the room. Weisspriess met him with a very civil greeting, and introduced him to Count Karl, who begged him to thank Vittoria for the aid she had afforded to General Schoneck’s emissary in crossing the Piedmontese lines. He spoke in Italian. He agreed to conduct Pericles to a point on the route of his march, where Pericles and his precious prima donna—“our very good friend,” he said, jovially—could escape the risk of unpleasant mishaps, and arrive at Trent and cities of peace by easy stages. He was marching for the neighbourhood of Vicenza.

A little before dawn Vittoria came down to the carriage. Count Karl stood at the door to hand her in. He was young and handsome, with a soft flowing blonde moustache and pleasant eyes, a contrast to his brother Count Lenkenstein. He repeated his thanks to her, which Pericles had not delivered; he informed her that she was by no means a prisoner, and was simply under the guardianship of friends—“though perhaps, signorina, you will not esteem this gentleman to be one of your friends.” He pointed to Weisspriess. The officer bowed, but kept aloof. Vittoria perceived a singular change in him: he had become pale and sedate. “Poor fellow! he has had his dose,” Count Karl said. “He is, I beg to assure you, one of your most vehement admirers.”

A piece of her property that flushed her with recollections, yet made her grateful, was presently handed to her, though not in her old enemy’s presence, by a soldier. It was the silver-hilted dagger, Carlo’s precious gift, of which Weisspriess had taken possession in the mountain-pass over the vale of Meran, when he fought the duel with Angelo. Whether intended as a peace-offering, or as a simple restitution, it helped Vittoria to believe that Weisspriess was no longer the man he had been.

The march was ready, but Barto Rizzo’s wife refused to move a foot. The officers consulted. She, was brought before them. The soldiers swore with jesting oaths that she had been carefully searched for weapons, and only wanted a whipping. “She must have it,” said Weisspriess. Vittoria entreated that she might have a place beside her in the carriage. “It is more than I would have asked of you; but if you are not afraid of her,” said Count Karl, with an apologetic shrug.

Her heart beat fast when she found herself alone with the terrible woman.

Till then she had never seen a tragic face. Compared with this tawny colourlessness, this evil brow, this shut mouth, Laura, even on the battle-field, looked harmless. It was like the face of a dead savage. The eyeballs were full on Vittoria, as if they dashed at an obstacle, not embraced an image. In proportion as they seemed to widen about her, Vittoria shrank. The whole woman was blood to her gaze.

When she was capable of speaking, she said entreatingly:

“I knew his brother.”

Not a sign of life was given in reply.

Companionship with this ghost of broad daylight made the flattering Tyrolese feathers at both windows a welcome sight.

Precautions had been taken to bind the woman’s arms. Vittoria offered to loosen the cords, but she dared not touch her without a mark of assent.

“I know Angelo Guidascarpi, Rinaldo’s brother,” she spoke again.

The woman’s nostrils bent inward, as when the breath we draw is keen as a sword to the heart. Vittoria was compelled to look away from her.

At the mid-day halt Count Karl deigned to justify to her his intended execution of Rinaldo—the accomplice in the slaying of his brother Count Paula. He was evidently eager to obtain her good opinion of the Austrian military. “But for this miserable spirit of hatred against us,” he said, “I should have espoused an Italian lady;” and he asked, “Why not? For that matter, in all but blood we Lenkensteins are half Italian, except when Italy menaces the empire. Can you blame us for then drawing the sword in earnest?”

He proffered his version of the death of Count Paul. She kept her own silent in her bosom.

Clelia Guidascarpi, according to his statement, had first been slain by her brothers. Vittoria believed that Clelia had voluntarily submitted to death and died by her own hand. She was betrothed to an Italian nobleman of Bologna, the friend of the brothers. They had arranged the marriage; she accepted the betrothal. “She loved my brother, poor thing!” said Count Karl. “She concealed it, and naturally. How could she take a couple of wolves into her confidence? If she had told the pair of ruffians that she was plighted to an Austrian, they would have quieted her at an earlier period. A woman! a girl—signorina! The intolerable cowardice amazes me. It amazes me that you or anyone can uphold the character of such brutes. And when she was dead they lured my brother to the house and slew him; fell upon him with daggers, stretched him at the foot of her coffin, and then—what then?—ran! ran for their lives. One has gone to his account. We shall come across the other. He is among that volunteer party which attacked us yesterday. The body was carried off by them; it is sufficient testimony that Angelo Guidascarpi is in the neighbourhood. I should be hunting him now but that I am under orders to march South-east.”

The story, as Vittoria knew it, had a different, though yet a dreadful, colour.

“I could have hanged Rinaldo,” Count Karl said further. “I suppose the rascals feared I should use my right, and that is why they sent their mad baggage of a woman to spare any damage to the family pride. If I had been a man to enjoy vengeance, the rope would have swung for him. In spite of provocation, I shall simply shoot the other; I pledge my word to it. They shall be paid in coin. I demand no interest.”

Weisspriess prudently avoided her. Wilfrid held aloof. She sat in garden shade till the bugle sounded. Tyrolese and Italian soldiers were gibing at her haggard companion when she entered the carriage. Fronting this dumb creature once more, Vittoria thought of the story of the brothers. She felt herself reading it from the very page. The woman looked that evil star incarnate which Laura said they were born under.

This is in brief the story of the Guidascarpi.

They were the offspring of a Bolognese noble house, neither wealthy nor poor. In her early womanhood, Clelia was left to the care of her brothers. She declined the guardianship of Countess Ammiani because of her love for them; and the three, with their passion of hatred to the Austrians inherited from father and mother, schemed in concert to throw off the Austrian yoke. Clelia had soft features of no great mark; by her colouring she was beautiful, being dark along the eyebrows, with dark eyes, and a surpassing richness of Venetian hair. Bologna and Venice were married in her aspect. Her brothers conceived her to possess such force of mind that they held no secrets from her. They did not know that the heart of their sister was struggling with an image of Power when she uttered hatred of it. She was in truth a woman of a soft heart, with a most impressionable imagination.

There were many suitors for the hand of Clelia Guidascarpi, though her dowry was not the portion of a fat estate. Her old nurse counselled the brothers that they should consent to her taking a husband. They fulfilled this duty as one that must be done, and she became sorrowfully the betrothed of a nobleman of Bologna; from which hour she had no cheerfulness. The brothers quitted Bologna for Venice, where there was the bed of a conspiracy. On their return they were shaken by rumours of their sister’s misconduct. An Austrian name was allied to hers in busy mouths. A lady, their distant relative, whose fame was light, had withdrawn her from the silent house, and made display of her. Since she had seen more than an Italian girl should see, the brothers proposed to the nobleman her betrothed to break the treaty; but he was of a mind to hurry on the marriage, and recollecting now that she was but a woman, the brothers fixed a day for her espousals, tenderly, without reproach. She had the choice of taking the vows or surrendering her hand. Her old nurse prayed for the day of her espousals to come with a quicker step.

One night she surprised Count Paul Lenkenstein at Clelia’s window. Rinaldo was in the garden below. He moved to the shadow of a cypress, and was seen moving by the old nurse. The lover took the single kiss he had come for, was led through the chamber, and passed unchallenged into the street. Clelia sat between locked doors and darkened windows, feeling colder to the brothers she had been reared with than to all other men upon the earth. They sent for her after a lapse of hours. Her old nurse was kneeling at their feet. Rinaldo asked for the name of her lover. She answered with it. Angelo said, “It will be better for you to die: but if you cannot do so easy a thing as that, prepare widow’s garments.” They forced her to write three words to Count Paul, calling him to her window at midnight. Rinaldo fetched a priest: Angelo laid out two swords. An hour before the midnight, Clelia’s old nurse raised the house with her cries. Clelia was stretched dead in her chamber. The brothers kissed her in turn, and sat, one at her head, one at her feet. At midnight her lover stood among them. He was gravely saluted, and bidden to look upon the dead body. Angelo said to him, “Had she lived you should have wedded her hand. She is gone of her own free choice, and one of us follows her.” With the sweat of anguish on his forehead, Count Paul drew sword. The window was barred; six male domestics of the household held high lights in the chamber; the priest knelt beside one corpse, awaiting the other.

Vittoria’s imagination could not go beyond that scene, but she looked out on the brother of the slain youth with great pity, and with a strange curiosity. The example given by Clelia of the possible love of an Italian girl for the white uniform, set her thinking whether so monstrous a fact could ever be doubled in this world. “Could it happen to me?” she asked herself, and smiled, as she half-fashioned the words on her lips, “It is a pretty uniform.”

Her reverie was broken by a hiss of “Traitress!” from the woman opposite.

She coloured guiltily, tried to speak, and sat trembling. A divination of intense hatred had perhaps read the thought within her breast: or it was a mere outburst of hate. The woman’s face was like the wearing away of smoke from a spot whence shot has issued. Vittoria walked for the remainder of the day. That fearful companion oppressed her. She felt that one who followed armies should be cast in such a frame, and now desired with all her heart to render full obedience to Carlo, and abide in Brescia, or even in Milan—a city she thought of shyly.

The march was hurried to the slopes of the Vicentino, for enemies were thick in this district. Pericles refused to quit the soldiers, though Count Karl used persuasion. The young nobleman said to Vittoria, “Be on your guard when you meet my sister Anna. I tell you, we can be as revengeful as any of you: but you will exonerate me. I do my duty; I seek to do no more.”

At an inn that they reached toward evening she saw the innkeeper shoot a little ball of paper at an Italian corporal, who put his foot on it and picked it up. The soldier subsequently passed through the ranks of his comrades, gathering winks and grins. They were to have rested at the inn, but Count Karl was warned by scouts, which was sufficient to make Pericles cling to him in avoidance of the volunteers, of whom mainly he was in terror. He looked ague-stricken. He would not listen to her, or to reason in any shape. “I am on the sea—shall I trust a boat? I stick to a ship,” he said. The soldiers marched till midnight. It was arranged that the carriage should strike off for Schio at dawn. The soldiers bivouacked on the slope of one of the low undulations falling to the Vicentino plain. Vittoria spread her cloak, and lay under bare sky, not suffering the woman to be ejected from the carriage. Hitherto Luigi had avoided her. Under pretence of doubling Count Karl’s cloak as a pillow for her head, he whispered, “If the signorina hears shots let her lie on the ground flat as a sheet.” The peacefulness surrounding her precluded alarm. There was brilliant moonlight, and the host of stars, all dim; and first they beckoned her up to come away from trouble, and then, through long gazing, she had the fancy that they bent and swam about her, making her feel that she lay in the hollows of a warm hushed sea. She wished for her lover.

Men and officers were lying at a stone’s-throw distant. The Tyrolese had lit a fire for cooking purposes, by which four of them stood, and, lifting hands, sang one of their mountain songs, that seemed to her to spring like clear water into air, and fall wavering as a feather falls, or the light about a stone in water. It lulled her to a half-sleep, during which she fancied hearing a broad imitation of a cat’s-call from the mountains, that was answered out of the camp, and a talk of officers arose in connection with the response, and subsided. The carriage was in the shadows of the fire. In a little while Luigi and the driver began putting the horses to, and she saw Count Karl and Weisspriess go up to Luigi, who declared loudly that it was time. The woman inside was aroused. Weisspriess helped to drag her out. Luigi kept making much noise, and apologized for it by saying that he desired to awaken his master, who was stretched in a secure circle among the Tyrolese. Presently Vittoria beheld the woman’s arms thrown out free; the next minute they were around the body of Weisspriess, and a shrewd cry issued from Count Karl. Shots rang from the outposts; the Tyrolese sprang to arms; “Sandra!” was shouted by Pericles; and once more she heard the ‘Venite fratelli!’ of the bull’s voice, and a stream of volunteers dashed at the Tyrolese with sword and dagger and bayonet. The Austro-Italians stood in a crescent line—the ominous form of incipient military insubordination. Their officers stormed at them, and called for Count Karl and for Weisspriess. The latter replied like a man stifling, but Count Karl’s voice was silent.

“Weisspriess! here, to me!” the captain sang out in Italian.

“Ammiani! here, to me!” was replied.

Vittoria struck her hands together in electrical gladness at her lover’s voice and name. It rang most cheerfully. Her home was in the conflict where her lover fought, and she muttered with ecstasy, “We have met! we have met!” The sound of the keen steel, so exciting to dream of, paralyzed her nerves in a way that powder, more terrible for a woman’s imagination, would not have done, and she could only feebly advance. It was a spacious moonlight, but the moonlight appeared to have got of a brassy hue to her eyes, though the sparkle of the steel was white; and she felt too, and wondered at it, that the cries and the noise went to her throat, as if threatening to choke her. Very soon she found herself standing there, watching for the issue of the strife, almost as dead as a weight in scales, incapable of clear vision.

Matched against the Tyrolese alone, the volunteers had an equal fight in point of numbers, and the advantage of possessing a leader; for Count Karl was down, and Weisspriess was still entangled in the woman’s arms. When at last Wilfrid got him free, the unsupported Tyrolese were giving ground before Carlo Ammiani and his followers. These fought with stern fury, keeping close up to their enemy, rarely shouting. They presented something like the line of a classic bow, with its arrow-head; while the Tyrolese were huddled in groups, and clubbed at them, and fell back for space, and ultimately crashed upon their betraying brothers in arms, swinging rifles and flying. The Austro-Italians rang out a Viva for Italy, and let them fly: they were swept from the scene.

Vittoria heard her lover addressing his followers. Then he and Angelo stood over Count Karl, whom she had forgotten. Angelo ran up to her, but gave place the moment Carlo came; and Carlo drew her by the hand swiftly to an obscure bend of the rolling ground, and stuck his sword in the earth, and there put his arms round her and held her fast.

“Obey me now,” were his first words.

“是的。”她回答。

He was harsh of eye and tongue, not like the gentle youth she had been torn from at the door of La Scala.

“Return; make your way to Brescia. My mother is in Brescia. Milan is hateful. I throw myself into Vicenza. Can I trust you to obey?”

“Carlo, what evil have you heard of me?”

“I listen to no tales.”

“Let me follow you to Vicenza and be your handmaid, my beloved.”

“Say that you obey.”

“我已经说过了。”

He seemed to shut her in his heart, so closely was she enfolded.

“Since La Scala,” she murmured; and he bent his lips to her ear, whispering, “Not one thought of another woman! and never till I die.”

“And I only of you, Carlo, and for you, my lover, my lover!”

“You love me absolutely?”

“I belong to you.”

“I could be a coward and pray for life to live to hear you say it.”

“I feel I breathe another life when you are away from me.”

“You belong to me; you are my own?”

“You take my voice, beloved.”

“And when I claim you, I am to have you?”

“Am I not in your hands?”

“The very instant I make my claim you will say yes?”

“I shall not have strength for more than to nod.”

Carlo shuddered at the delicious image of her weakness.

“My Sandra! Vittoria, my soul! my bride!”

“O my Carlo! Do you go to Vicenza? And did you know I was among these people?”

“You will hear everything from little Leone Rufo, who is wounded and accompanies you to Brescia. Speak of nothing. Speak my name, and look at me. I deserve two minutes of blessedness.”

“Ah! my dearest, if I am sweet to you, you might have many!”

“No; they begin to hum a reproach at me already, for I must be marching. Vicenza will soon bubble on a fire, I suspect. Comfort my mother; she wants a young heart at her elbow. If she is alone, she feeds on every rumour; other women scatter in emotions what poisons her. And when my bride is with her, I am between them.”

“Yes, Carlo, I will go,” said Vittoria, seeing her duty at last through tenderness.

Carlo sprang from her side to meet Angelo, with whom he exchanged some quick words. The bugle was sounding, and Barto Rizzo audible. Luigi came to, her, ruefully announcing that the volunteers had sacked the carriage behaved worse than the Austrians; and that his padrone, the signor Antonio-Pericles, was off like a gossamer. Angelo induced her to remain on the spot where she stood till the carriage was seen on the Schio road, when he led her to it, saying that Carlo had serious work to do. Count Karl Lenkenstein was lying in the carriage, supported by Wilfrid and by young Leone Rufo, who sat laughing, with one eye under a cross-bandage and an arm slung in a handkerchief. Vittoria desired to wait that she might see her lover once more; but Angelo entreated her that she should depart, too earnestly to leave her in doubt of there being good reason for it and for her lover’s absence. He pointed to Wilfrid: “Barto Rizzo captured this man; Carlo has released him. Take him with you to attend on his superior officer.” She drew Angelo’s observation to the first morning colours over the peaks. He looked up, and she knew that he remembered that morning of their flight from the inn. Perhaps he then had the image of his brother in his mind, for the colours seemed to be plucking at his heart, and he said, “I have lost him.”

“God help you, my friend!” said Vittoria, her throat choking.

Angelo pointed at the insensible nobleman: “These live. I do not grudge him his breath or his chances; but why should these men take so much killing? Weisspriess has risen, as though I struck the blow of a babe. But we one shot does for us! Nevertheless, signorina,” Angelo smiled firmly, “I complain of nothing while we march forward.”

He kissed his hand to her, and turned back to his troop. The carriage was soon under the shadows of the mountains.

The fall of Vicenza turned a tide that had overflowed its barriers with force enough to roll it to the Adriatic. From that day it was as if a violent wind blew East over Lombardy; flood and wind breaking here and there a tree, bowing everything before them. City, fortress, and battle-field resisted as the eddy whirls. Venice kept her brave colours streaming aloft in a mighty grasp despite the storm, but between Venice and Milan there was this unutterable devastation,—so sudden a change, so complete a reversal of the shield, that the Lombards were at first incredulous even in their agony, and set their faces against it as at a monstrous eclipse, as though the heavens were taking false oath of its being night when it was day. From Vicenza and Rivoli, to Sommacampagna, and across Monte Godio to Custozza, to Volta on the right of the Mincio, up to the gates of Milan, the line of fire travelled, with a fantastic overbearing swiftness that, upon the map, looks like the zig-zag elbowing of a field-rocket. Vicenza fell on the 11th of June; the Austrians entered Milan on the 6th of August. Within that short time the Lombards were struck to the dust.

Countess Ammiani quitted Brescia for Bergamo before the worst had happened; when nothing but the king’s retreat upon the Lombard capital, after the good fight at Volta, was known. According to the king’s proclamation the Piedmontese army was to defend Milan, and hope was not dead. Vittoria succeeded in repressing all useless signs of grief in the presence of the venerable lady, who herself showed none, but simply recommended her accepted daughter to pray daily. “I can neither confess nor pray,” Vittoria said to the priest, a comfortable, irritable ecclesiastic, long attached to the family, and little able to deal with this rebel before Providence, that would not let her swollen spirit be bled. Yet she admitted to him that the countess possessed resources which she could find nowhere; and she saw the full beauty of such inimitable grave endurance. Vittoria’s foolish trick of thinking for herself made her believe, nevertheless, that the countess suffered more than she betrayed, was less consoled than her spiritual comforter imagined. She continued obstinate and unrepentant, saying, “If my punishment is to come, it will at least bring experience with it, and I shall know why I am punished. The misery now is that I do not know, and do not see, the justice of the sentence.”

Countess Ammiani thought better of her case than the priest did; or she was more indulgent, or half indifferent. This girl was Carlo’s choice;—a strange choice, but the times were strange, and the girl was robust. The channels of her own and her husband’s house were drying on all sides; the house wanted resuscitating. There was promise that the girl would bear children of strong blood. Countess Ammiani would not for one moment have allowed the spiritual welfare of the children to hang in dubitation, awaiting their experience of life; but a certain satisfaction was shown in her faint smile when her confessor lamented over Vittoria’s proud stony state of moral revolt. She said to her accepted daughter, “I shall expect you to be prepared to espouse my son as soon as I have him by my side;” nor did Vittoria’s silent bowing of her face assure her that strict obedience was implied. Precise words—“I will,” and “I will not fail”—were exacted. The countess showed some emotion after Vittoria had spoken. “Now, may God end this war quickly, if it is to go against us,” she exclaimed, trembling in her chair visibly a half-minute, with dropped eyelids and lips moving.

Carlo had sent word that he would join his mother as early as he was disengaged from active service, and meantime requested her to proceed to a villa on Lago Maggiore. Vittoria obtained permission from the countess to order the route of the carriage through Milan, where she wished to take up her mother and her maid Giacinta. For other reasons she would have avoided the city. The thought of entering it was painful with the shrewdest pain. Dante’s profoundly human line seemed branded on the forehead of Milan.

The morning was dark when they drove through the streets of Bergamo. Passing one of the open places, Vittoria beheld a great concourse of volunteer youth and citizens, all of them listening to the voice of one who stood a few steps above them holding a banner. She gave an outcry of bitter joy. It was the Chief. On one side of him was Agostino, in the midst of memorable heads that were unknown to her. The countess refused to stay, though Vittoria strained her hands together in extreme entreaty that she might for a few moments hear what the others were hearing. “I speak for my son, and I forbid it,” Countess Ammiani said. Vittoria fell back and closed her eyes to cherish the vision. All those faces raised to the one speaker under the dark sky were beautiful. He had breathed some new glory of hope in them, making them shine beneath the overcast heavens, as when the sun breaks from an evening cloud and flushes the stems of a company of pine-trees.

Along the road to Milan she kept imagining his utterance until her heart rose with music. A delicious stream of music, thin as poor tears, passed through her frame, like a life reviving. She reached Milan in a mood to bear the idea of temporary defeat. Music had forsaken her so long that celestial reassurance seemed to return with it.

Her mother was at Zotti’s, very querulous, but determined not to leave the house and the few people she knew. She had, as she told her daughter, fretted so much on her account that she hardly knew whether she was glad to see her. Tea, of course, she had given up all thoughts of; but now coffee was rising, and the boasted sweet bread of Lombardy was something to look at! She trusted that Emilia would soon think of singing no more, and letting people rest: she might sing when she wanted money. A letter recently received from Mr. Pericles said that Italy was her child’s ruin, and she hoped Emilia was ready to do as he advised, and hurry to England, where singing did not upset people, and people lived like real Christians, not——Vittoria flapped her hand, and would not hear of the unchristian crimes of the South. As regarded the expected defence of Milan, the little woman said, that if it brought on a bombardment, she would call it unpardonable wickedness, and only hoped that her daughter would repent.

Zotti stood by, interpreting the English to himself by tones. “The amiable donnina is not of our persuasion,” he observed. “She remains dissatisfied with patriotic Milan. I have exhibited to her my dabs of bread through all the processes of making and baking. It is in vain. She rejects analogy. She is wilful as a principessina: ‘Tis so! ‘tis not so! ‘tis my will! be silent, thou! Signora, I have been treated in that way by your excellent mother.”

“Zotti has not been paid for three weeks, and he certainly has not mentioned it or looked it, I will say, Emilia.”

“Zotti has had something to think of during the last three weeks,” said Vittoria, touching him kindly on the arm.

The confectioner lifted his fingers and his big brown eyes after them, expressive of the unutterable thoughts. He informed her that he had laid in a stock of flour, in the expectation that Carlo Alberto would defend the city: The Milanese were ready to aid him, though some, as Zotti confessed, had ceased to effervesce; and a great number who were perfectly ready to fight regarded his tardy appeal to Italian patriotism very coldly. Zotti set out in person to discover Giacinta. The girl could hardly fetch her breath when she saw her mistress. She was in Laura’s service, and said that Laura had brought a wounded Englishman from the field of Custozza. Vittoria hurried to Laura, with whom she found Merthyr, blue-white as a corpse, having been shot through the body. His sister was in one of the Lombard hamlets, unaware of his fall; Beppo had been sent to her.

They noticed one another’s embrowned complexions, but embraced silently. “Twice widowed!” Laura said when they sat together. Laura hushed all speaking of the war or allusion to a single incident of the miserable campaign, beyond the bare recital of Vittoria’s adventures; yet when Vicenza by chance was mentioned, she burst out: “They are not cities, they are living shrieks. They have been made impious for ever. Burn them to ashes, that they may not breathe foul upon heaven!” She had clung to the skirts of the army as far as the field of Custozza. “He,” she said, pointing to the room where Merthyr lay,—“he groans less than the others I have nursed. Generally, when they looked at me, they appeared obliged to recollect that it was not I who had hurt them. Poor souls! some ended in great torment. ‘I think of them as the happiest; for pain is a cloak that wraps you about, and I remember one middle-aged man who died softly at Custozza, and said, ‘Beaten!’ To take that thought as your travelling companion into the gulf, must be worse than dying of agony; at least, I think so.”

Vittoria was too well used to Laura’s way of meeting disaster to expect from her other than this ironical fortitude, in which the fortitude leaned so much upon the irony. What really astonished her was the conception Laura had taken of the might of Austria. Laura did not directly speak of it, but shadowed it in allusive hints, much as if she had in her mind the image of an iron roller going over a field of flowers—hateful, imminent, irresistible. She felt as a leaf that has been flying before the gale.

Merthyr’s wound was severe: Vittoria could not leave him. Her resolution to stay in Milan brought her into collision with Countess Ammiani, when the countess reminded her of her promise, sedately informing her that she was no longer her own mistress, and had a primary duty to fulfil. She offered to wait three days, or until the safety of the wounded man was medically certified to. It was incomprehensible to her that Vittoria should reject her terms; and though it was true that she would not have listened to a reason, she was indignant at not hearing one given in mitigation of the offence. She set out alone on her journey, deeply hurt. The reason was a feminine sentiment, and Vittoria was naturally unable to speak it. She shrank with pathetic horror from the thought of Merthyr’s rising from his couch to find her a married woman, and desired most earnestly that her marriage should be witnessed by him. Young women will know how to reconcile the opposition of the sentiment. Had Merthyr been only slightly wounded, and sound enough to seem to be able to bear a bitter shock, she would not have allowed her personal feelings to cause chagrin to the noble lady. The sight of her dear steadfast friend prostrate in the cause of Italy, and who, if he lived to rise again, might not have his natural strength to bear the thought of her loss with his old brave firmness, made it impossible for her to act decisively in one direct line of conduct.

Countess Ammiani wrote brief letters from Luino and Pallanza on Lago Maggiore. She said that Carlo was in the Como mountains; he would expect to find his bride, and would accuse his mother; “but his mother will be spared those reproaches,” she added, “if the last shot fired kills, as it generally does, the bravest and the dearest.”

“If it should!”—the thought rose on a quick breath in Vittoria’s bosom, and the sentiment which held her away dispersed like a feeble smoke, and showed her another view of her features. She wept with longing for love and dependence. She was sick of personal freedom, tired of the exercise of her will, only too eager to give herself to her beloved. The blessedness of marriage, of peace and dependence, came on her imagination like a soft breeze from a hidden garden, like sleep. But this very longing created the resistance to it in the depths of her soul. ‘There was a light as of reviving life, or of pain comforted, when it was she who was sitting by Merthyr’s side, and when at times she saw the hopeless effort of his hand to reach to hers, or during the long still hours she laid her head on his pillow, and knew that he breathed gratefully. The sweetness of helping him, and of making his breathing pleasant to him, closed much of the world which lay beyond her windows to her thoughts, and surprised her with an unknown emotion, so strange to her that when it first swept up her veins she had the fancy of her having been touched by a supernatural hand, and heard a flying accord of instruments. She was praying before she knew what prayer was. A crucifix hung over Merthyr’s head. She had looked on it many times, and looked on it still, without seeing more than the old sorrow. In the night it was dim. She found herself trying to read the features of the thorn-crowned Head in the solitary night. She and it were alone with a life that was faint above the engulphing darkness. She prayed for the life, and trembled, and shed tears, and would have checked them; they seemed to be bearing away her little remaining strength. The tears streamed. No answer was given to her question, “Why do I weep?” She wept when Merthyr had passed the danger, as she had wept when the hours went by, with shrouded visages; and though she felt the difference m the springs of her tears, she thought them but a simple form of weakness showing shade and light.

These tears were a vanward wave of the sea to follow; the rising of her voice to heaven was no more than a twitter of the earliest dawn before the coming of her soul’s outcry.

“I have had a weeping fit,” she thought, and resolved to remember it tenderly, as being associated with her friend’s recovery, and a singular masterful power absolutely to look on the Austrians marching up the streets of Milan, and not to feel the surging hatred, or the nerveless despair, which she had supposed must be her alternatives.

It is a mean image to say that the entry of the Austrians into the reconquered city was like a river of oil permeating a lake of vinegar, but it presents the fact in every sense. They demanded nothing more than submission, and placed a gentle foot upon the fallen enemy; and wherever they appeared they were isolated. The deepest wrath of the city was, nevertheless, not directed against them, but against Carlo Alberto, who had pledged his honour to defend it, and had forsaken it. Vittoria committed a public indiscretion on the day when the king left Milan to its fate: word whereof was conveyed to Carlo Ammiani, and he wrote to her.

“It is right that I should tell you what I have heard,” the letter said. “I have heard that my bride drove up to the crowned traitor, after he had unmasked himself, and when he was quitting the Greppi palace, and that she kissed his hand before the people—poor bleeding people of Milan! This is what I hear in the Val d’Intelvi:—that she despised the misery and just anger of the people, and, by virtue of her name and mine, obtained a way for him. How can she have acted so as to give a colour to this infamous scandal? True or false, it does not affect my love for her. Still, my dearest, what shall I say? You keep me divided in two halves. My heart is out of me; and if I had a will, I think I should be harsh with you. You are absent from my mother at a time when we are about to strike another blow. Go to her. It is kindness; it is charity: I do not say duty. I remember that I did write harshly to you from Brescia. Then our march was so clear in view that a little thing ruffled me. Was it a little thing? But to applaud the Traitor now! To uphold him who has spilt our blood only to hand the country over to the old gaolers! He lent us his army like a Jew, for huge interest. Can you not read him? If not, cease, I implore you, to think at all for yourself.

“Is this a lover’s letter? I know that my beloved will see the love in it. To me your acts are fair and good as the chronicle of a saint. I find you creating suspicion—almost justifying it in others, and putting your name in the mouth of a madman who denounces you. I shall not speak more of him. Remember that my faith in you is unchangeable, and I pray you to have the same in me.

“I sent you a greeting from the Chief. He marched in the ranks from Bergamo. I saw him on the line of march strip off his coat to shelter a young lad from the heavy rain. He is not discouraged; none are who have been near him.

“Angelo is here, and so is our Agostino; and I assure you he loads and fires a carbine much more deliberately than he composes a sonnet. I am afraid that your adored Antonio-Pericles fared badly among our fellows, but I could gather no particulars.

“Oh! the bright two minutes when I held you right in my heart. That spot on the Vicentino is alone unclouded. If I live I will have that bit of ground. I will make a temple of it. I could reach it blindfolded.”

A townsman of Milan brought this letter to Vittoria. She despatched Luigi with her reply, which met the charge in a straightforward affirmative.

“I was driving to Zotti’s by the Greppi palace, when I saw the king come forth, and the people hooted him. I stood up, and petitioned to kiss his hand. The people knew me. They did not hoot any more for some time.

“So that you have heard the truth, and you must judge me by it. I cannot even add that I am sorry, though I strive to wish that I had not been present. I might wish it really, if I did not feel it to be a cowardly wish.

“Oh, my Carlo! my lover! my husband! you would not have me go against my nature? I have seen the king upon the battle-field. He has deigned to speak to me of Italy and our freedom. I have seen him facing our enemy; and to see him hooted by the people, and in misfortune and with sad eyes!—he looked sad and nothing else—and besides, I am sure I know the king. I mean that I understand him. I am half ashamed to write so boldly, even to you. I say to myself you should know me, at least; and if I am guilty of a piece of vanity, you should know that also. Carlo Alberto is quite unlike other men. He worships success as, much; but they are not, as he is, so much bettered by adversity. Indeed I do not believe that he has exact intentions of any sort, or ever had the intention to betray us, or has done so in reality, that is, meaningly, of his own will. Count Medole and his party did, as you know, offer Lombardy to him; and Venice gave herself—brave, noble Venice! Oh! if we two were there—Venice has England’s sea-spirit. But, did we not flatter the king? And ask yourself, my Carlo, could a king move in such an enterprise as a common person? Ought we not to be in union with Sardinia? How can we be if we reject her king? Is it not the only positive army that, we can look to—I mean regular army? Should we not; make some excuses for one who is not in our position?

“I feel that I push my questions like waves that fall and cannot get beyond—they crave so for answers agreeing to them. This should make me doubt myself, perhaps; but they crowd again, and seem so conclusive until I have written them down. I am unworthy to struggle with your intellect; but I say to myself, how unworthy of you I should be if I did not use my own, such as it is! The poor king; had to conclude an armistice to save his little kingdom. Perhaps we ought to think of that sternly. My heart is; filled with pity.

“It cannot but be right that you should know the worst; of me. I call you my husband, and tremble to be permitted to lean my head on your bosom for hours, my sweet lover! And yet my cowardice, if I had let the king go by without a reverential greeting from me, in his adversity, would have rendered me insufferable to myself. You are hearing me, and I am compelled to say, that rather than behave so basely I would forfeit your love, and be widowed till death should offer us for God to join us. Does your face change to me?

“Dearest, and I say it when the thought of you sets me almost swooning. I find my hands clasped, and I am muttering I know not what, and I am blushing. The ground seems to rock; I can barely breathe; my heart is like a bird caught in the hands of a cruel boy: it will not rest. I fear everything. I hear a whisper, ‘Delay not an instant!’ and it is like a furnace; ‘Hasten to him! Speed!’ and I seem to totter forward and drop—I think I have lost you—I am like one dead.

“I remain here to nurse our dear friend Merthyr. For that reason I am absent from your mother. It is her desire that we should be married.

“Soon, soon, my own soul!

“I seem to be hanging on a tree for you, swayed by such a teazing wind.

“Oh, soon! or I feel that I shall hate any vestige of will that I have in this head of mine. Not in the heart—it is not there!

“And sometimes I am burning to sing. The voice leaps to my lips; it is quite like a thing that lives apart—my prisoner.

“It is true, Laura is here with Merthyr.

“Could you come at once?—not here, but to Pallanza? We shall both make our mother happy. This she wishes, this she lives for, this consoles her—and oh, this gives me peace! Yes, Merthyr is recovering! I can leave him without the dread I had; and Laura confesses to the feminine sentiment, if her funny jealousy of a rival nurse is really simply feminine. She will be glad of our resolve, I am sure. And then you will order all my actions; and I shall be certain that they are such as I would proudly call mine; and I shall be shut away from the world. Yes; let it be so! Addio. I reserve all sweet names for you. Addio. In Pallanza:—no not Pallanza—Paradise!

“Hush! and do not smile at me:—it was not my will, I discover, but my want of will, that distracted me.

“See my last signature of—not Vittoria; for I may sign that again and still be Emilia Alessandra Ammiani.

“SANDRA BELLONI”

The letter was sealed; Luigi bore it away, and a brief letter to Countess Ammiani, in Pallanza, as well.

Vittoria was relieved of her anxiety concerning Merthyr by the arrival of Georgiana, who had been compelled to make her way round by Piacenza and Turin, where she had left Gambier, with Beppo in attendance on him. Georgiana at once assumed all the duties of head-nurse, and the more resolutely because of her brother’s evident moral weakness in sighing for the hand of a fickle girl to smooth his pillow. “When he is stronger you can sit beside him a little,” she said to Vittoria, who surrendered her post without a struggle, and rarely saw him, though Laura told her that his frequent exclamation was her name, accompanied by a soft look at his sister—“which would have stirred my heart like poor old Milan last March,” Laura added, with a lift of her shoulders.

Georgiana’s icy manner appeared infinitely strange to Vittoria when she heard from Merthyr that his sister had become engaged to Captain Gambier.

“Nothing softens these women,” said Laura, putting Georgiana in a class.

“I wish you could try the effect of your winning Merthyr,” Vittoria suggested.

“I remember that when I went to my husband, I likewise wanted every woman of my acquaintance to be married.” Laura sighed deeply. “What is this poor withered body of mine now? It feels like an old volcano, cindery, with fire somewhere:—a charming bride! My dear, if I live till my children make me a grandmother, I shall look on the love of men and women as a toy that I have played with. A new husband? I must be dragged through the Circles of Dante before I can conceive it, and then I should loathe the stranger.”

News came that the volunteers were crushed. It was time for Vittoria to start for Pallanza, and she thought of her leave-taking; a final leave-taking, in one sense, to the friends who had cared too much for her. Laura delicately drew Georgiana aside in the sick-room, which she would not quit, and alluded to the necessity for Vittoria’s departure without stating exactly wherefore: but Georgiana was a Welshwoman. Partly to show her accurate power of guessing, and chiefly that she might reprove Laura’s insulting whisper, which outraged and irritated her as much as if “Oh! your poor brother!” had been exclaimed, she made display of Merthyr’s manly coldness by saying aloud, “You mean, that she is going to her marriage.” Laura turned her face to Merthyr. He had striven to rise on his elbow, and had dropped flat in his helplessness. Big tears were rolling down his cheeks. His articulation failed him, beyond a reiterated “No, no,” pitiful to hear, and he broke into childish sobs. Georgiana hurried Laura from the room. By-and-by the doctor was promptly summoned, and it was Georgiana herself, miserably humbled, who obtained Vittoria’s sworn consent to keep the life in Merthyr by lingering yet awhile.

Meantime Luigi brought a letter from Pallanza in Carlo’s handwriting. This was the burden of it:

“I am here, and you are absent. Hasten!”

The Lenkenstein ladies returned to Milan proudly in the path of the army which they had followed along the city walls on the black March midnight. The ladies of the Austrian aristocracy generally had to be exiles from Vienna, and were glad to flock together even in an alien city. Anna and Lena were aware of Vittoria’s residence in Milan, through the interchange of visits between the Countess of Lenkenstein and her sister Signora Piaveni. They heard also of Vittoria’s prospective and approaching marriage to Count Ammiani. The Duchess of Graatli, who had forborne a visit to her unhappy friends, lest her Austrian face should wound their sensitiveness, was in company with the Lenkensteins one day, when Irma di Karski called on them. Irma had come from Lago Maggiore, where she had left her patron, as she was pleased to term Antonio-Pericles. She was full of chatter of that most worthy man’s deplorable experiences of Vittoria’s behaviour to him during the war, and of many things besides. According to her account, Vittoria had enticed him from place to place with promises that the next day, and the next day, and the day after, she would be ready to keep her engagement to go to London, and at last she had given him the slip and left him to be plucked like a pullet by a horde of volunteer banditti, out of whose hands Antonio-Pericles-“one of our richest millionaires in Europe, certainly our richest amateur,” said Irma—escaped in fit outward condition for the garden of Eden.

Count Karl was lying on the sofa, and went into endless invalid’s laughter at the picture presented by Irma of the ‘wild man’ wanderings of poor infatuated Pericles, which was exaggerated, though not intentionally, for Irma repeated the words and gestures of Pericles in the recital of his tribulations. Being of a somewhat similar physical organization, she did it very laughably. Irma declared that Pericles was cured of his infatuation. He had got to Turin, intending to quit Italy for ever, when—“he met me,” said Irma modestly.

“And heard that the war was at an end,” Count Karl added.

“And he has taken the superb Villa Ricciardi, on Lago Maggiore, where he will have a troupe of singers, and perform operas, in which I believe I may possibly act as prima donna. The truth is, I would do anything to prevent him from leaving the country.”

But Irma had more to say; with “I bear no malice,” she commenced it. The story she had heard was that Count Ammiani, after plighting himself to a certain signorina, known as Vittoria Campa, had received tidings that she was one of those persons who bring discredit on Irma’s profession. “Gifted by nature, I can acknowledge,” said Irma; “but devoured by vanity—a perfect slave to the appetite for praise; ready to forfeit anything for flattery! Poor signor Antonio-Pericles!—he knows her.” And now Count Ammiani, persuaded to reason by his mother, had given her up. There was nothing more positive, for Irma had seen him in the society of Countess Violetta d’Isorella.

Anna and Lena glanced at their brother Karl.

“I should not allude to what is not notorious,” Irma pursued. “They are always together. My dear Antonio-Pericles is most amusing in his expressions of delight at it. For my part, though she served me an evil turn once,—you will hardly believe, ladies, that in her jealousy of me she was guilty of the most shameful machinations to get me out of the way on the night of the first performance of Camilla,—but, for my part, I bear no malice. The creature is an inveterate rebel, and I dislike her for that, I do confess.”

“The signorina Vittoria Campa is my particular and very dear friend,” said the duchess.

“She is not the less an inveterate rebel,” said Anna.

Count Karl gave a long-drawn sigh. “Alas, that she should have brought discredit on Fraulein di Karski’s profession!”

The duchess hurried straightway to Laura, with whom was Count Serabiglione, reviewing the present posture of affairs from the condescending altitudes of one that has foretold it. Laura and Amalia embraced and went apart. During their absence Vittoria came down to the count and listened to a familiar illustration of his theory of the relations which should exist between Italy and Austria, derived from the friendship of those two women.

“What I wish you to see, signorina, is that such an alliance is possible; and, if we supply the brains, as we do, is by no means likely to be degrading. These bears are absolutely on their knees to us for good fellowship. You have influence, you have amazing wit, you have unparalleled beauty, and, let me say it with the utmost sadness, you have now had experience. Why will you not recognize facts? Italian unity! I have exposed the fatuity—who listens? Italian freedom! I do not attempt to reason with my daughter. She is pricked by an envenomed fly of Satan. Yet, behold her and the duchess! It is the very union I preach; and I am, I declare to you, signorina, in great danger. I feel it, but I persist. I am in danger” (Count Serabiglione bowed his head low) “of the transcendent sin of scorn of my species.”

The little nobleman swayed deploringly in his chair. “Nothing is so perilous for a soul’s salvation as that. The one sane among madmen! The one whose reason is left to him among thousands who have forsaken it! I beg you to realize the idea. The Emperor, as I am given to understand, is about to make public admission of my services. I shall be all the more hated. Yet it is a considerable gain. I do not deny that I esteem it as a promotion for my services. I shall not be the first martyr in this world, signorina.”

Count Serabiglione produced a martyr’s smile.

“The profits of my expected posts will be,” he was saying, with a reckoning eye cast upward into his cranium for accuracy, when Laura returned, and Vittoria ran out to the duchess. Amalia repeated Irma’s tattle. A curious little twitching of the brows at Violetta d’Isorella’s name marked the reception of it.

“She is most lovely,” Vittoria said.

“And absolutely reckless.”

“She is an old friend of Count Ammiani’s.”

“And you have an old friend here. But the old friend of a young woman—I need not say further than that it is different.”

The duchess used the privilege of her affection, and urged Vittoria not to trifle with her lover’s impatience.

Admitted to the chamber where Merthyr lay, she was enabled to make allowance for her irresolution. The face of the wounded man was like a lake-water taking light from Vittoria’s presence.

“This may go on for weeks,” she said to Laura.

Three days later, Vittoria received an order from the Government to quit the city within a prescribed number of hours, and her brain was racked to discover why Laura appeared so little indignant at the barbarous act of despotism. Laura undertook to break the bad news to Merthyr. The parting was as quiet and cheerful as, in the opposite degree, Vittoria had thought it would be melancholy and regretful. “What a Government!” Merthyr said, and told her to let him hear of any changes. “All changes that please my friends please me.”

Vittoria kissed his forehead with one grateful murmur of farewell to the bravest heart she had ever known. The going to her happiness seemed more like going to something fatal until she reached the Lago Maggiore. There she saw September beauty, and felt as if the splendour encircling her were her bridal decoration. But no bridegroom stood to greet her on the terrace-steps between the potted orange and citron-trees. Countess Ammiani extended kind hands to her at arms’ length.

“You have come,” she said. “I hope that it is not too late.”

Vittoria was a week without sight of her lover: nor did Countess Ammiani attempt to explain her words, or speak of other than common daily things. In body and soul Vittoria had taken a chill. The silent blame resting on her in this house called up her pride, so that she would not ask any questions; and when Carlo came, she wanted warmth to melt her. Their meeting was that of two passionless creatures. Carlo kissed her loyally, and courteously inquired after her health and the health of friends in Milan, and then he rallied his mother. Agostino had arrived with him, and the old man, being in one of his soft moods, unvexed by his conceits, Vittoria had some comfort from him of a dull kind. She heard Carlo telling his mother that he must go in the morning. Agostino replied to her quick look at him, “I stay;” and it seemed like a little saved from the wreck, for she knew that she could speak to Agostino as she could not to the countess. When his mother prepared to retire, Carlo walked over to his bride, and repeated rapidly and brightly his inquiries after friends in Milan. She, with a pure response to his natural-unnatural manner, spoke of Merthyr Powys chiefly: to which he said several times, “Dear fellow!” and added, “I shall always love Englishmen for his sake.”

This gave her one throb. “I could not leave him, Carlo.”

“Certainly not, certainly not,” said Carlo. “I should have been happy to wait on him myself. I was busy; I am still. I dare say you have guessed that I have a new journal in my head: the Pallanza Iris is to be the name of it;—to be printed in three colours, to advocate three principles, in three styles. The Legitimists, the Moderates, and the Republicans are to proclaim themselves in its columns in prose, poetry, and hotch-potch. Once an editor, always an editor. The authorities suspect that something of the sort is about to be planted, so I can only make occasional visits here:—therefore, as you will believe,”—Carlo let his voice fall—“I have good reason to hate them still. They may cease to persecute me soon.”

He insisted upon lighting his mother to her room. Vittoria and Agostino sat talking of the Chief and the minor events of the war—of Luciano, Marco, Giulio, and Ugo Corte—till the conviction fastened on them that Carlo would not return, when Agostino stood up and said, yawning wearily, “I’ll talk further to you, my child, tomorrow.”

She begged that it might be now.

“No; to-morrow,” said he.

“Now, now!” she reiterated, and brought down a reproof from his fore-finger.

“The poetic definition of ‘now’ is that it is a small boat, my daughter, in which the female heart is constantly pushing out to sea and sinking. ‘To-morrow’ is an island in the deeps, where grain grows. When I land you there, I will talk to you.”

She knew that he went to join Carlo after he had quitted her.

Agostino was true to his promise next day. He brought her nearer to what she had to face, though he did not help her vision much. Carlo had gone before sunrise.

They sat on the terrace above the lake, screened from the sunlight by thick myrtle bushes. Agostino smoked his loosely-rolled cigarettes, and Vittoria sipped chocolate and looked upward to the summit of Motterone, with many thoughts and images in her mind.

He commenced by giving her a love-message from Carlo. “Hold fast to it that he means it: conduct is never a straight index where the heart’s involved,” said the chuckling old man; “or it is not in times like ours. You have been in the wrong, and your having a good excuse will not help you before the deciding fates. Woman that you are! did you not think that because we were beaten we were going to rest for a very long while, and that your Carlo of yesterday was going to be your Carlo of to-day?”

Vittoria tacitly confessed to it.

“Ay,” he pursued, “when you wrote to him in the Val d’Intelvi, you supposed you had only to say, ‘I am ready,’ which was then the case. You made your summer and left the fruits to hang, and now you are astounded that seasons pass and fruits drop. You should have come to this place, if but for a pair of days, and so have fixed one matter in the chapter. This is how the chapter has run on. I see I talk to a stunned head; you are thinking that Carlo’s love for you can’t have changed: and it has not, but occasion has gone and times have changed. Now listen. The countess desired the marriage. Carlo could not go to you in Milan with the sword in his hand. Therefore you had to come to him. He waited for you, perhaps for his own preposterous lover’s sake as much as to make his mother’s heart easy. If she loses him she loses everything, unless he leaves a wife to her care and the hope that her House will not be extinct, which is possibly not much more the weakness of old aristocracy than of human nature.

“Meantime, his brothers in arms had broken up and entered Piedmont, and he remained waiting for you still. You are thinking that he had not waited a month. But if four months finished Lombardy, less than one month is quite sufficient to do the same for us little beings. He met the Countess d’Isorella here. You have to thank her for seeing him at all, so don’t wrinkle your forehead yet. Luciano Romara is drilling his men in Piedmont; Angelo Guidascarpi has gone there. Carlo was considering it his duty to join Luciano, when he met this lady, and she has apparently succeeded in altering his plans. Luciano and his band will go to Rome. Carlo fancies that another blow will be struck for Lombardy. This lady should know; the point is, whether she can be trusted. She persists in declaring that Carlo’s duty is to remain, and—I cannot tell how, for I am as a child among women—she has persuaded him of her sincerity. Favour me now with your clearest understanding, and deliver it from feminine sensations of any description for just two minutes.”

Agostino threw away the end of a cigarette and looked for firmness in Vittoria’s eyes.

“This Countess d’Isorella is opposed to Carlo’s marriage at present. She says that she is betraying the king’s secrets, and has no reliance on a woman. As a woman you will pardon her, for it is the language of your sex. You are also denounced by Barto Rizzo, a madman—he went mad as fire, and had to be chained at Varese. In some way or other Countess d’Isorella got possession of him; she has managed to subdue him. A sword-cut he received once in Verona has undoubtedly affected his brain, or caused it to be affected under strong excitement. He is at her villa, and she says—perhaps with some truth—that Carlo would in several ways lose his influence by his immediate marriage with you. The reason must have weight; otherwise he would fulfil his mother’s principal request, and be at the bidding of his own desire. There; I hope I have spoken plainly.”

Agostino puffed a sigh of relief at the conclusion of his task.

Vittoria had been too strenuously engaged in defending the steadiness of her own eyes to notice the shadow of an assumption of frankness in his.

She said that she understood.

She got away to her room like an insect carrying a load thrice its own size. All that she could really gather from Agostino’s words was, that she felt herself rocking in a tower, and that Violetta d’Isorella was beautiful. She had striven hard to listen to him with her wits alone, and her sensations subsequently revenged themselves in this fashion. The tower rocked and struck a bell that she discovered to be her betraying voice uttering cries of pain. She was for hours incapable of meeting Agostino again. His delicate intuition took the harshness off the meeting. He led her even to examine her state of mind, and to discern the fancies from the feelings by which she was agitated. He said shrewdly and bluntly, “You can master pain, but not doubt. If you show a sign of unhappiness, remember that I shall know you doubt both what I have told you, and Carlo as well.”

Vittoria fenced: “But is there such a thing as happiness?”

“I should imagine so,” said Agostino, touching her cheek, “and slipperiness likewise. There’s patience at any rate; only you must dig for it. You arrive at nothing, but the eternal digging constitutes the object gained. I recollect when I was a raw lad, full of ambition, in love, and without a franc in my pockets, one night in Paris, I found myself looking up at a street lamp; there was a moth in it. He couldn’t get out, so he had very little to trouble his conscience. I think he was near happiness: he ought to have been happy. My luck was not so good, or you wouldn’t see me still alive, my dear.”

Vittoria sighed for a plainer speaker.

Carlo’s hours were passed chiefly across the lake, in the Piedmontese valleys. When at Pallanza he was restless, and he shunned the two or three minutes of privacy with his betrothed which the rigorous Italian laws besetting courtship might have allowed him to take. He had perpetually the look of a man starting from wine. It was evident that he and Countess d’Isorella continued to hold close communication, for she came regularly to the villa to meet him. On these occasions Countess Ammiani accorded her one ceremonious interview, and straightway locked herself in her room. Violetta’s grace of ease and vivacity soared too high to be subject to any hostile judgement of her character. She seemed to rely entirely on the force of her beauty, and to care little for those who did not acknowledge it. She accepted public compliments quite royally, nor was Agostino backward in offering them. “And you have a voice, you know,” he sometimes said aside to Vittoria; but she had forgotten how easily she could swallow great praise of her voice; she had almost forgotten her voice. Her delight was to hang her head above inverted mountains in the lake, and dream that she was just something better than the poorest of human creatures. She could not avoid putting her mind in competition with this brilliant woman’s, and feeling eclipsed; and her weakness became pitiable. But Countess d’Isorella mentioned once that Pericles was at the Villa Ricciardi, projecting magnificent operatic entertainments. The reviving of a passion to sing possessed Vittoria like a thirst for freedom, and instantly confused all the reflected images within her, as the fury of a sudden wind from the high Alps scourges the glassy surface of the lake. She begged Countess Ammiani’s permission that she might propose to Pericles to sing in his private operatic company, in any part, at the shortest notice.

“You wish to leave me?” said the countess, and resolutely conceived it.

Speaking to her son on this subject, she thought it necessary to make some excuse for a singer’s instinct, who really did not live save on the stage. It amused Carlo; he knew when his mother was really angry with persons she tried to shield from the anger of others; and her not seeing the wrong on his side in his behaviour to his betrothed was laughable. Nevertheless she had divined the case more correctly than he: the lover was hurt. After what he had endured, he supposed, with all his forgiveness, that he had an illimitable claim upon his bride’s patience. He told his another to speak to her openly.

“Why not you, my Carlo?” said the countess.

“Because, mother, if I speak to her, I shall end by throwing out my arms and calling for the priest.”

“I would clap hands to that.”

“We will see; it may be soon or late, but it can’t be now.”

“How much am I to tell her, Carlo?”

“Enough to keep her from fretting.”

The countess then asked herself how much she knew. Her habit of receiving her son’s word and will as supreme kept her ignorant of anything beyond the outline of his plans; and being told to speak openly of them to another, she discovered that her acquiescing imagination supplied the chief part of her knowledge. She was ashamed also to have it thought, even by Carlo, that she had not gathered every detail of his occupation, so that she could not argue against him, and had to submit to see her dearest wishes lightly swept aside.

“I beg you to tell me what you think of Countess d’Isorella; not the afterthought,” she said to Vittoria.

“She is beautiful, dear Countess Ammiani.”

“Call me mother now and then. Yes; she is beautiful. She has a bad name.”

“Envy must have given it, I think.”

“Of course she provokes envy. But I say that her name is bad, as envy could not make it. She is a woman who goes on missions, and carries a husband into society like a passport. You have only thought of her beauty?”

“I can see nothing else,” said Vittoria, whose torture at the sight of the beauty was appeased by her disingenuous pleading on its behalf.

“In my time Beauty was a sinner,” the countess resumed. “My confessor has filled my ears with warnings that it is a net to the soul, a weapon for devils. May the saints of Paradise make bare the beauty of this woman. She has persuaded Carlo that she is serving the country. You have let him lie here alone in a fruitless bed, silly girl. He stayed for you while his comrades called him to Vercelli, where they are assembled. The man whom he salutes as his Chief gave him word to go there. They are bound for Rome. Ah me! Rome is a great name, but Lombardy is Carlo’s natal home, and Lombardy bleeds. You were absent—how long you were absent! If you could know the heaviness of those days of his waiting for you. And it was I who kept him here! I must have omitted a prayer, for he would have been at Vercelli now with Luciano and Emilio, and you might have gone to him; but he met this woman, who has convinced him that Piedmont will make a Winter march, and that his marriage must be delayed.” The countess raised her face and drooped her hands from the wrists, exclaiming, “If I have lately omitted one prayer, enlighten me, blessed heaven! I am blind; I cannot see for my son; I am quite blind. I do not love the woman; therefore I doubt myself. You, my daughter, tell me your thought of her, tell me what you think. Young eyes observe; young heads are sometimes shrewd in guessing.”

Vittoria said, after a pause, “I will believe her to be true, if she supports the king.” It was hardly truthful speaking on her part.

“How can Carlo have been persuaded!” the countess sighed.

“By me?” Victoria asked herself, and for a moment she was exulting.

She spoke from that emotion when it had ceased to animate her.

“Carlo was angry with the king. He echoed Agostino, but Agostino does not sting as he did, and Carlo cannot avoid seeing what the king has sacrificed. Perhaps the Countess d’Isorella has shown him promises of fresh aid in the king’s handwriting. Suffering has made Carlo Alberto one with the Republicans, if he had other ambitions once. And Carlo dedicates his blood to Lombardy: he does rightly. Dear countess—my mother! I have made him wait for me; I will be patient in waiting for him. I know that Countess d’Isorella is intimate with the king. There is a man named Barto Rizzo, who thinks me a guilty traitress, and she is making use of this man. That must be her reason for prohibiting the marriage. She cannot be false if she is capable of uniting extreme revolutionary agents and the king in one plot, I think; I do not know.” Vittoria concluded her perfect expression of confidence with this atoning doubtfulness.

Countess Ammiani obtained her consent that she would not quit her side.

After Violetta had gone, Carlo, though he shunned secret interviews, addressed his betrothed as one who was not strange to his occupation and the trial his heart was undergoing. She could not doubt that she was beloved, in spite of the colourlessness and tonelessness of a love that appealed to her intellect. He showed her a letter he had received from Laura, laughing at its abuse of Countess d’Isorella, and the sarcasms levelled at himself.

In this letter Laura said that she was engaged in something besides nursing.

Carlo pointed his finger to the sentence, and remarked, “I must have your promise—a word from you is enough—that you will not meddle with any intrigue.”

Vittoria gave the promise, half trusting it to bring the lost bloom of their love to him; but he received it as a plain matter of necessity. Certain of his love, she wondered painfully that it should continue so barren of music.

“Why am I to pledge myself that I will be useless?” she asked. “You mean, my Carlo, that I am to sit still, and watch, and wait.”

He answered, “I will tell you this much: I can be struck vitally through you. In the game I am playing, I am able to defend myself. If you enter it, distraction begins. Stay with my mother.”

“Am I to know nothing?”

“Everything—in good time.”

“I might—might I not help you, my Carlo?”

“Yes; and nobly too. And I show you the way.”

Agostino and Carlo made an expedition to Turin. Before he went, Carlo took her in his arms.

“Is it coming?” she said, shutting her eyelids like a child expecting the report of firearms.

He pressed his lips to the closed eyes. “Not yet; but are you growing timid?”

His voice seemed to reprove her.

She could have told him that keeping her in the dark among unknown terrors ruined her courage; but the minutes were too precious, his touch too sweet. In eyes and hands he had become her lover again. The blissful minutes rolled away like waves that keep the sunshine out at sea.

Her solitude in the villa was beguiled by the arrival of the score of an operatic scena, entitled “HAGAR,” by Rocco Ricci, which she fancied that either Carlo or her dear old master had sent, and she devoured it. She thought it written expressly for her. With HAGAR she communed during the long hours, and sang herself on to the verge of an imagined desert beyond the mountain-shadowed lake and the last view of her beloved Motterone. Hagar’s face of tears in the Brerawas known to her; and Hagar in her ‘Addio’ gave the living voice to that dumb one. Vittoria revelled in the delicious vocal misery. She expanded with the sorrow of poor Hagar, whose tears refreshed her, and parted her from her recent narrowing self-consciousness. The great green mountain fronted her like a living presence. Motterone supplied the place of the robust and venerable patriarch, whom she reproached, and worshipped, but with a fathomless burdensome sense of cruel injustice, deeper than the tears or the voice which spoke of it: a feeling of subjected love that was like a mother’s giving suck to a detested child. Countess Ammiani saw the abrupt alteration of her step and look with a dim surprise. “What do you conceal from me?” she asked, and supplied the answer by charitably attributing it to news that the signora Piaveni was coming.

When Laura came, the countess thanked her, saying, “I am a wretched companion for this boiling head.”

Laura soon proved to her that she had been the best, for after very few hours Vittoria was looking like the Hagar on the canvas.

A woman such as Violetta d’Isorella was of the sort from which Laura shrank with all her feminine power of loathing; but she spoke of her with some effort at personal tolerance until she heard of Violetta’s stipulation for the deferring of Carlo’s marriage, and contrived to guess that Carlo was reserved and unfamiliar with his betrothed. Then she cried out, “Fool that he is! Is it ever possible to come to the end of the folly of men? She has inflamed his vanity. She met him when you were holding him waiting, and no doubt she commenced with lamentations over the country, followed by a sigh, a fixed look, a cheerful air, and the assurance to him that she knew it—uttered as if through the keyhole of the royal cabinet—she knew that Sardinia would break the Salasco armistice in a mouth:—if only, if the king could be sure of support from the youth of Lombardy.”

“Do you suspect the unhappy king?” Vittoria interposed.

“Grasp your colours tight,” said Laura, nodding sarcastic approbation of such fidelity, and smiling slightly. “There has been no mention of the king. Countess d’Isorella is a spy and a tool of the Jesuits, taking pay from all parties—Austria as well, I would swear. Their object is to paralyze the march on Rome, and she has won Carlo for them. I am told that Barto Rizzo is another of her conquests. Thus she has a madman and a fool, and what may not be done with a madman and a fool? However, I have set a watch on her. She must have inflamed Carlo’s vanity. He has it, just as they all have. There’s trickery: I would rather behold the boy charging at the head of a column than putting faith in this base creature. She must have simulated well,” Laura went on talking to herself.

“What trickery?” said Vittoria.

“He was in love with the woman when he was a lad,” Laura replied, and pertinently to Vittoria’s feelings. This threw the moist shade across her features.

Beppo in Turin and Luigi on the lake were the watch set on Countess d’Isorella; they were useless except to fortify Laura’s suspicions. The Duchess of Graatli wrote mere gossip from Milan. She mentioned that Anna of Lenkenstein had visited with her the tomb of her brother Count Paul at Bologna, and had returned in double mourning; and that Madame Sedley—“the sister of our poor ruined Pierson”—had obtained grace, for herself at least, from Anna, by casting herself at Anna’s feet,—and that they were now friends.

Vittoria felt ashamed of Adela.

When Carlo returned, the signora attacked him boldly with all her weapons; reproached him; said, “Would my husband have treated me in such a manner?” Carlo twisted his moustache and stroked his young beard for patience. They passed from room to balcony and terrace, and Laura brought him back into company without cessation of her fire of questions and sarcasms, saying, “No, no; we will speak of these things publicly.” She appealed alternately to Agostino, Vittoria, and Countess Ammiani for support, and as she certainly spoke sense, Carlo was reduced to gloom and silence. Laura then paused. “Surely you have punished your bride enough?” she said; and more softly, “Brother of my Giacomo! you are under an evil spell.”

Carlo started up in anger. Bending to Vittoria, he offered her his hand to lead her out, They went together.

“A good sign,” said the countess.

“A bad sign!” Laura sighed. “If he had taken me out for explanation! But tell me, my Agostino, are you the woman’s dupe?”

“I have been,” Agostino admitted frankly.

“You did really put faith in her?”

“She condescends to be so excessively charming.”

“You could not advance a better reason.”

“It is one of our best; perhaps our very best, where your sex is concerned, signora.”

“You are her dupe no more?”

“No more. Oh, dear no!”

“You understand her now, do you?”

“For the very reason, signora, that I have been her dupe. That is, I am beginning to understand her. I am not yet in possession of the key.”

“Not yet in possession!” said Laura contemptuously; “but, never mind. Now for Carlo.”

“Now for Carlo. He declares that he never has been deceived by her.”

“He is perilously vain,” sighed the signora.

“Seriously”—Agostino drew out the length of his beard—“I do not suppose that he has been—boys, you know, are so acute. He fancies he can make her of service, and he shows some skill.”

“The skill of a fish to get into the net!”

“My dearest signora, you do not allow for the times. I remember”—Agostino peered upward through his eyelashes in a way that he had—“I remember seeing in a meadow a gossamer running away with a spider-thread. It was against all calculation. But, observe: there were exterior agencies at work: a stout wind blew. The ordinary reckoning is based on calms. Without the operation of disturbing elements, the spider-thread would have gently detained the gossamer.”

“Is that meant for my son?” Countess Ammiani asked slowly, with incredulous emphasis.

Agostino and Laura, laughing in their hearts at the mother’s mysterious veneration for Carlo, had to explain that ‘gossamer’ was a poetic, generic term, to embrace the lighter qualities of masculine youth.

A woman’s figure passed swiftly by the window, which led Laura to suppose that the couple outside had parted. She ran forth, calling to one of them, but they came hand in hand, declaring that they had seen neither woman nor man. “And I am happy,” Vittoria whispered. She looked happy, pale though she was.

“It is only my dreadful longing for rest which makes me pale,” she said to Laura, when they were alone. “Carlo has proved to me that he is wiser than I am.”

“A proof that you love Carlo, perhaps,” Laura rejoined.

“Dearest, he speaks more gently of the king.”

“It may be cunning, or it may be carelessness.”

“Will nothing satisfy you, wilful sceptic? He is quite alive to the Countess d’Isorella’s character. He told me how she dazzled him once.”

“Not how she has entangled him now?”

“It is not true. He told me what I should like to dream over without talking any more to anybody. Ah, what a delight! to have known him, as you did, when he was a boy. Can one who knew him then mean harm to him? I am not capable of imagining it. No; he will not abandon poor broken Lombardy, and he is right; and it is my duty to sit and wait. No shadow shall come between us. He has said it, and I have said it. We have but one thing to fear, which is contemptible to fear; so I am at peace.”

“Love-sick,” was Laura’s mental comment. Yet when Carlo explained his position to her next day, she was milder in her condemnation of him, and even admitted that a man must be guided by such brains as he possesses. He had conceived that his mother had a right to claim one month from him at the close of the war; he said this reddening. Laura nodded. He confessed that he was irritated when he met the Countess d’Isorella, with whom, to his astonishment, he found Barto Rizzo. She had picked him up, weak from a paroxysm, on the high-road to Milan. “And she tamed the brute,” said Carlo, in admiration of her ability; “she saw that he was plot-mad, and she set him at work on a stupendous plot; agents running nowhere, and scribblings concentring in her work-basket. You smile at me, as if I were a similar patient, signora. But I am my own agent. I have personally seen all my men in Turin and elsewhere. Violetta has not one grain of love for her country; but she can be made to serve it. As for me, I have gone too far to think of turning aside and drilling with Luciano. He may yet be diverted from Rome, to strike another blow for Lombardy. The Chief, I know, has some religious sentiment about Rome. So might I have; it is the Head of Italy. Let us raise the body first. And we have been beaten here. Great Gods! we will have another fight for it on the same spot, and quickly. Besides, I cannot face Luciano and tell him why I was away from him in the dark hour. How can I tell him that I was lingering to bear a bride to the altar? while he and the rest—poor fellows! Hard enough to have to mention it to you, signora!”

She understood his boyish sense of shame. Making smooth allowances for a feeling natural to his youth and the circumstances, she said, “I am your sister, for you were my husband’s brother in arms, Carlo. We two speak heart to heart: I sometimes fancy you have that voice: you hurt me with it more than you know; gladden me too! My Carlo, I wish to hear why Countess d’Isorella objects to your marriage.”

“She does not object.”

“An answer that begins by quibbling is not propitious. She opposes it.”

“For this reason: you have not forgotten the bronze butterfly?”

“I see more clearly,” said Laura, with a start.

“There appears to be no cure for the brute’s mad suspicion of her,” Carlo pursued: “and he is powerful among the Milanese. If my darling takes my name, he can damage much of my influence, and—you know what there is to be dreaded from a fanatic.”

Laura nodded, as if in full agreement with him, and said, after meditating a minute, “What sort of a lover is this!”

She added a little laugh to the singular interjection.

“Yes, I have also thought of a secret marriage,” said Carlo, stung by her penetrating instinct so that he was enabled to read the meaning in her mind.

“The best way, when you are afflicted by a dilemma of such a character, my Carlo,” the signora looked at him, “is to take a chess-table and make your moves on it. ‘King—my duty;’ ‘Queen—my passion;’ ‘Bishop—my social obligation;’ ‘Knight—my what-you-will and my round-the-corner wishes.’ Then, if you find that queen may be gratified without endangering king, and so forth, why, you may follow your inclinations; and if not, not. My Carlo, you are either enviably cool, or you are an enviable hypocrite.”

“The matter is not quite so easily settled as that,” said Carlo.

On the whole, though against her preconception, Laura thought him an honest lover, and not the player of a double game. She saw that Vittoria should have been with him in the critical hour of defeat, when his passions were down, and heaven knows what weakness of our common manhood, that was partly pride, partly love-craving, made his nature waxen to every impression; a season, as Laura knew, when the mistress of a loyal lover should not withhold herself from him. A nature tender like Carlo’s, and he bearing an enamoured heart, could not, as Luciano Romara had done, pass instantly from defeat to drill. And vain as Carlo was (the vanity being most intricate and subtle, like a nervous fluid), he was very open to the belief that he could diplomatize as well as fight, and lead a movement yet better than follow it. Even so the signora tried to read his case.

They were all, excepting Countess Ammiani (“who will never, I fear, do me this honour,” Violetta wrote, and the countess said, “Never,” and quoted a proverb), about to pass three or four days at the villa of Countess d’Isorella. Before they set out, Vittoria received a portentous envelope containing a long scroll, that was headed “YOUR CRIMES,” and detailing a lest of her offences against the country, from the revelation of the plot in her first letter to Wilfrid, to services rendered to the enemy during the war, up to the departure of Charles Albert out of forsaken Milan.

“B. R.” was the undisguised signature at the end of the scroll.

Things of this description restored her old war-spirit to Vittoria. She handed the scroll to Laura; Laura, in great alarm, passed it on to Carlo. He sent for Angelo Guidascarpi in haste, for Carlo read it as an ante-dated justificatory document to some mischievous design, and he desired that hands as sure as his own, and yet more vigilant eyes, should keep watch over his betrothed.

The villa inhabited by Countess d’Isorella was on the water’s edge, within clear view of the projecting Villa Ricciardi, in that darkly-wooded region of the lake which leads up to the Italian-Swiss canton.

Violetta received here an envoy from Anna of Lenkenstein, direct out of Milan: an English lady, calling herself Mrs. Sedley, and a particular friend of Countess Anna. At the first glance Violetta saw that her visitor had the pretension to match her arts against her own; so, to sound her thoroughly, she offered her the hospitalities of the villa for a day or more. The invitation was accepted. Much to Violetta’s astonishment, the lady betrayed no anxiety to state the exact terms of her mission: she appeared, on the contrary, to have an unbounded satisfaction in the society of her hostess, and prattled of herself and Antonio-Pericles, and her old affection for Vittoria, with the wiliest simplicity, only requiring to be assured at times that she spoke intelligible Italian and exquisite French. Violetta supposed her to feel that she commanded the situation. Patient study of this woman revealed to Violetta the amazing fact that she was dealing with a born bourgeoise, who, not devoid of petty acuteness, was unaffectedly enjoying her noble small-talk, and the prospect of a footing in Italian high society. Violetta smiled at the comedy she had been playing in, scarcely reproaching herself for not having imagined it. She proceeded to the point of business without further delay.

Adela Sedley had nothing but a verbal message to deliver. The Countess Anna of Lenkenstein offered, on her word of honour as a noblewoman, to make over the quarter of her estate and patrimony to the Countess d’Isorella, if the latter should succeed in thwarting—something.

Forced to speak plainly, Adela confessed she thought she knew the nature of that something.

To preclude its being named, Violetta then diverged from the subject.

“We will go round to your friend the signor Antonio-Pericles at Villa Ricciardi,” she said. “You will see that he treats me familiarly, but he is not a lover of mine. I suspect your ‘something’ has something to do with the Jesuits.”

Adela Sedley replied to the penultimate sentence: “It would not surprise me, indeed, to hear of any number of adorers.”

“I have the usual retinue, possibly,” said Violetta.

“Dear countess, I could be one of them myself!” Adela burst out with tentative boldness.

“Then, kiss me.”

And behold, they interchanged that unsweet feminine performance.

Adela’s lips were unlocked by it.

“How many would envy me, dear Countess d’Isorella!”

She really conceived that she was driving into Violetta’s heart by the great high-road of feminine vanity. Violetta permitted her to think as she liked.

“Your countrywomen, madame, do not make large allowances for beauty, I hear.”

“None at all. But they are so stiff! so frigid! I know one, a Miss Ford, now in Italy, who would not let me have a male friend, and a character, in conjunction.”

“You are acquainted with Count Karl Lenkenstein?”

Adela blushingly acknowledged it.

“The whisper goes that I was once admired by him,” said Violetta.

“And by Count Ammiani.”

“By count? by milord? by prince? by king?”

“By all who have good taste.”

“Was it jealousy, then, that made Countess Anna hate me?”

“She could not—or she cannot now.”

“Because I have not taken possession of her brother.”

“I could not—may I say it?—I could not understand his infatuation until Countess Anna showed me the portrait of Italy’s most beautiful living woman. She told me to look at the last of the Borgia family.”

Violetta laughed out clear music. “And now you see her?”

“She said that it had saved her brother’s life. It has a star and a scratch on the left cheek from a dagger. He wore it on his heart, and an assassin struck him there: a true romance. Countess Anna said to me that it had saved one brother, and that it should help to avenge the other. She has not spoken to me of Jesuits.”

“Nothing at all of the Jesuits?” said Violetta carelessly. “Perhaps she wishes to use my endeavours to get the Salaseo armistice prolonged, and tempts me, knowing I am a prodigal. Austria is victorious, you know, but she wants peace. Is that the case? I do not press you to answer.”

Adela replied hesitatingly: “Are you aware, countess, whether there is any truth in the report that Countess Lena has a passion for Count Ammiani?”

“Ah, then,” said Violetta, “Countess Lena’s sister would naturally wish to prevent his contemplated marriage! We may have read the riddle at last. Are you discreet? If you are, you will let it be known that I had the honour of becoming intimate with you in Turin—say, at the Court. We shall meet frequently there during winter, I trust, if you care to make a comparison of the Italian with the Austrian and the English nobility.”

An eloquent “Oh!” escaped from Adela’s bosom. She had certainly not expected to win her way with this estimable Italian titled lady thus rapidly. Violetta had managed her so well that she was no longer sure whether she did know the exact nature of her mission, the words of which she had faithfully transmitted as having been alone confided to her. It was with chagrin that she saw Pericles put his fore-finger on a salient dimple of the countess’s cheek when he welcomed them. He puffed and blew like one working simultaneously at bugle and big drum on hearing an allusion to Victoria. The mention of the name of that abominable traitress was interdicted at Villa Ricciardi, he said; she had dragged him at two armies’ tails to find his right senses at last: Pericles was cured of his passion for her at last. He had been mad, but he was cured—and so forth, in the old strain. His preparations for a private operatic performance diverted him from these fierce incriminations, and he tripped busily from spot to spot, conducting the ladies over the tumbled lower floors of the spacious villa, and calling their admiration on the desolation of the scene. Then they went up to the maestro’s room. Pericles became deeply considerate for the master’s privacy. “He is my slave; the man has ruined himself for la Vittoria; but I respect the impersonation of art,” he said under his breath to the ladies as they stood at the door; “hark!” The piano was touched, and the voice of Irma di Karski broke out in a shrill crescendo. Rocco Ricci within gave tongue to the vehement damnatory dance of Pericles outside. Rocco struck his piano again encouragingly for a second attempt, but Irma was sobbing. She was heard to say: “This is the fifteenth time you have pulled me down in one morning. You hate me; you do; you hate me.” Rocco ran his fingers across the keys, and again struck the octave for Irma. Pericles wiped his forehead, when, impenitent and unteachable, she took the notes in the manner of a cock. He thumped at the door violently and entered.

“Excellent! horrid! brava! abominable! beautiful! My Irma, you have reached the skies. You ascend like a firework, and crown yourself at the top. No more to-day; but descend at your leisure, my dear, and we will try to mount again by-and-by, and not so fast, if you please. Ha! your voice is a racehorse. You will learn to ride him with temper and judgement, and you will go. Not so, my Rocco? Irma, you want repose, my dear. One thing I guarantee to you—you will please the public. It is a minor thing that you should please me.”

Countess d’Isorella led Irma away, and had to bear with many fits of weeping, and to assent to the force of all the charges of vindictive conspiracy and inveterate malice with which the jealous creature assailed Vittoria’s name. The countess then claimed her ear for half-a-minute.

“Have you had any news of Countess Anna lately?”

Irma had not; she admitted it despondently. “There is such a vile conspiracy against me in Italy—and Italy is a poor singer’s fame—that I should be tempted to do anything. And I detest la Vittoria. She has such a hold on this Antonio-Pericles, I don’t see how I can hurt her, unless I meet her and fly at her throat.”

“You naturally detest her,” said the countess. “Repeat Countess Anna’s proposal to you.”

“It was insulting—she offered me money.”

“That you should persuade me to assist you in preventing la Vittoria’s marriage to Count Ammiani?”

“Dear lady, you know I did not try to persuade you.”

“You knew that you would not succeed, my Irma. But Count Ammiani will not marry her; so you will have a right to claim some reward. I do not think that la Vittoria is quite idle. Look out for yourself, my child. If you take to plotting, remember it is a game of two.”

“If she thwarts me in one single step, I will let loose that madman on her,” said Irma, trembling.

“You mean the signor Antonio-Pericles?”

“No; I mean that furious man I saw at your villa, dear countess.”

“Ah! Barto Rizzo. A very furious man. He bellowed when he heard her name, I remember. You must not do it. But, for Count Ammiani’s sake, I desire to see his marriage postponed, at least.”

“Where is she?” Irma inquired.

The countess shrugged. “Even though I knew, I could not prudently tell you in your present excited state.”

She went to Pericles for a loan of money. Pericles remarked that there was not much of it in Turin. “But, countess, you whirl the gold-pieces like dust from your wheels; and a spy, my good soul, a lovely secret emissary, she will be getting underpaid if she allows herself to want money. There is your beauty; it is ripe, but it is fresh, and it is extraordinary. Yes; there is your beauty.” Before she could obtain a promise of the money, Violetta had to submit to be stripped to her character, which was hard; but on the other hand, Pericles exacted no interest on his money, and it was not often that he exacted a return of it in coin. Under these circumstances, ladies in need of money can find it in their hearts to pardon mere brutality of phrase. Pericles promised to send it to the countess on one condition; which condition he cancelled, saying dejectedly, “I do not care to know where she is. I will not know.”

“She has the score of Hagar, wherever she is,” said Violetta, “and when she hears that you have done the scene without her aid, you will have stuck a dagger in her bosom.”

“Not,” Pericles cried in despair, “not if she should hear Irma’s Hagar! To the desert with Irma. It is the place for a crab-apple. Bravo, Abraham! you were wise.”

Pericles added that Montini was hourly expected, and that there was to be a rehearsal in the evening.

When she had driven home, Violetta found Barto Rizzo’s accusatory paper laid on her writing-desk. She gathered the contents in a careless glance, and walked into the garden alone, to look for Carlo.

He was leaning on the balustrade of the terrace, near the water-gate, looking into the deep clear lake-water. Violetta placed herself beside him without a greeting.

“You are watching fish for coolness, my Carlo?”

“Yes,” he said, and did not turn to her face.

“You were very angry when you arrived?”

She waited for his reply.

“Why do you not speak, Carlino?”

“I am watching fish for coolness,” he said.

“Meantime,” said Violetta, “I am scorched.”

He looked up, and led her to an arch of shade, where he sat quite silent.

“Can anything be more vexing than this?” she was reduced to exclaim.

“Ah!” said he, “you would like the catalogue to be written out for you in a big bold hand, possibly, with a terrific initials at the end of the page.”

“Carlo, you have done worse than that. When I saw you first here, what crimes did you not accuse me of? what names did you not scatter on my head? and what things did I not, confess to? I bore the unkindness, for you were beaten, and you wanted a victim. And, my dear friend, considering that I am after all a woman, my forbearance has subsequently been still greater.”

“How?” he asked. Her half-pathetic candour melted him.

“You must, have a lively memory for the uses of forgetfulness, Carlo, When you had scourged me well, you thought it proper to raise me up and give me comfort. I was wicked for serving the king, and therefore the country, as a spy; but I was to persevere, and cancel my iniquities by betraying those whom I served to you. That was your instructive precept. Have I done it or not? Answer, too have I done it for any payment beyond your approbation? I persuaded you to hope for Lombardy, and without any vaunting of my own patriotism. You have seen and spoken to the men I directed you to visit. If their heads master yours, I shall be reprobated for it, I know surely; but I am confident as yet that you can match them. In another month I expect to see the king over the Ticino once more, and Carlo in Brescia with his comrades. You try to penetrate my eyes. That’s foolish; I can make them glass. Read me by what I say and what I do. I do not entreat you to trust me; I merely beg that you will trust your own judgement of me by what I have helped you to do hitherto. You and I, my dear boy, have had some trifling together. Admit that another woman would have refused to surrender you as I did when your unruly Vittoria was at last induced to come to you from Milan. Or, another woman would have had her revenge on discovering that she had been a puppet of soft eyes and a lover’s quarrel with his mistress. Instead of which, I let you go. I am opposed to the marriage, it’s true; and you know why.”

Carlo had listened to Violetta, measuring the false and the true in this recapitulation of her conduct with cool accuracy until she alluded to their personal relations. Thereat his brows darkened.

“We had I some trifling together,” he said, musingly.

“Is it going to be denied in these sweeter days?” Violetta reddened.

“The phrase is elastic. Suppose my bride were to hear it?”

“It was addressed to your ears, Carlo.”

“It cuts two ways. Will you tell me when it was that I last had the happiness of saluting you, lip to lip?”

“In Brescia—before I had espoused an imbecile—two nights before my marriage—near the fountain of the Greek girl with a pitcher.”

Pride and anger nerved the reply. It was uttered in a rapid low breath. Coming altogether unexpectedly, it created an intense momentary revulsion of his feelings by conjuring up his boyish love in a scene more living than the sunlight.

He lifted her hand to his mouth. He was Italian enough, though a lover, to feel that she deserved more. She had reddened deliciously, and therewith hung a dewy rosy moisture on her underlids. Raising her eyes, she looked like a cut orange to a thirsty lip. He kissed her, saying, “Pardon.”

“Keep it secret, you mean?” she retorted. “Yes, I pardon that wish of yours. I can pardon much to my beauty.”

She stood up as majestically as she had spoken.

“You know, my Violetta, that I am madly in love.”

“I have learnt it.”

“You know it:—what else would?… If I were not lost in love, could I see you as I do and let Brescia be the final chapter?”

Violetta sighed. “I should have preferred its being so rather than this superfluous additional line to announce an end, like a foolish staff on the edge of a cliff. You thought that you were saluting a leper, or a saint?”

“Neither. If ever we can talk together again, as we have done,” Carlo said gloomily, “I will tell you what I think of myself.”

“No, but Richelieu might have behaved…. Ah! perhaps not quite in the same way,” she corrected her flowing apology for him. “But then, he was a Frenchman. He could be flighty without losing his head. Dear Italian Carlo! Yes, in the teeth of Barto Rizzo, and for the sake of the country, marry her at once. It will be the best thing for you; really the best. You want to know from me the whereabout of Barto Rizzo. He may be in the mountain over Stresa, or in Milan. He also has thrown off my yoke, such as it was! I do assure you, Carlo, I have no command over him: but, mind, I half doat on the wretch. No man made me desperately in love with myself before he saw me, when I stopped his raving in the middle of the road with one look of my face. There was foam on his beard and round his eyes; the poor wretch took out his handkerchief, and he sobbed. I don’t know how many luckless creatures he had killed on his way; but when I took him into my carriage—king, emperor, orator on stilts, minister of police not one has flattered me as he did, by just gazing at me. Beauty can do as much as music, my Carlo.”

Carlo thanked heaven that Violetta had no passion in her nature. She had none: merely a leaning toward evil, a light sense of shame, a desire for money, and in her heart a contempt for the principles she did not possess, but which, apart from the intervention of other influences, could occasionally sway her actions. Friendship, or rather the shadowy recovery of a past attachment that had been more than friendship, inclined her now and then to serve a master who failed distinctly to represent her interests; and when she met Carlo after the close of the war, she had really set to work in hearty kindliness to rescue him from what she termed “shipwreck with that disastrous Republican crew.” He had obtained greater ascendency over her than she liked; yet she would have forgiven it, as well as her consequent slight deviation from direct allegiance to her masters in various cities, but for Carlo’s commanding personal coolness. She who had tamed a madman by her beauty, was outraged, and not unnaturally, by the indifference of a former lover.

Later in the day, Laura and Vittoria, with Agostino, reached the villa; and Adela put her lips to Vittoria’s ear, whispering: “Naughty! when are you to lose your liberty to turn men’s heads?” and then she heaved a sigh with Wilfrid’s name. She had formed the acquaintance of Countess d’Isorella in Turin, she said, and satisfactorily repeated her lesson, but with a blush. She was little more than a shade to Vittoria, who wondered what she had to live for. After the early evening dinner, when sunlight and the colours of the sun were beyond the western mountains, they pushed out on the lake. A moon was overhead, seeming to drop lower on them as she filled with light.

Agostino and Vittoria fell upon their theme of discord, as usual—the King of Sardinia.

“We near the vesper hour, my daughter,” said Agostino; “you would provoke me to argumentation in heaven itself. I am for peace. I remember looking down on two cats with arched backs in the solitary arena of the Verona amphitheatre. We men, my Carlo, will not, in the decay of time, so conduct ourselves.”

Vittoria looked on Laura and thought of the cannon-sounding hours, whose echoes rolled over their slaughtered hope. The sun fell, the moon shone, and the sun would rise again, but Italy lay face to earth. They had seen her together before the enemy. That recollection was a joy that stood, though the winds beat at it, and the torrents. She loved her friend’s worn eyelids and softly-shut mouth; the after-glow of battle seemed on them; the silence of the field of carnage under heaven;—and the patient turning of Laura’s eyes this way and that to speakers upon common things, covered the despair of her heart as with a soldier’s cloak.

Laura met the tender study of Vittoria’s look, and smiled.

They neared the Villa Ricciardi, and heard singing. The villa was lighted profusely, so that it made a little mock-sunset on the lake.

“Irma!” said Vittoria, astonished at the ring of a well-known voice that shot up in firework fashion, as Pericles had said of it. Incredulous, she listened till she was sure; and then glanced hurried questions at all eyes. Violetta laughed, saying, “You have the score of Rocco Ricci’s Hagar.”

The boat drew under the blazing windows, and half guessing, half hearing, Vittoria understood that Pericles was giving an entertainment here, and had abjured her. She was not insensible to the slight. This feeling, joined to her long unsatisfied craving to sing, led her to be intolerant of Irma’s style, and visibly vexed her.

Violetta whispered: “He declares that your voice is cracked: show him! Burst out with the ‘Addio’ of Hagar. May she not, Carlo? Don’t you permit the poor soul to sing? She cannot contain herself.”

Carlo, Adela, Agostino, and Violetta prompted her, and, catching a pause in the villa, she sang the opening notes of Hagar’s ‘Addio’ with her old glorious fulness of tone and perfect utterance.

The first who called her name was Rocco Ricci, but Pericles was the first to rush out and hang over the boat. “Witch! traitress! infernal ghost! heart of ice!” and in English “humbug!” and in French “coquin!”:—these were a few of the titles he poured on her. Rocco Ricci and Montini kissed hands to her, begging her to come to them. She was very willing outwardly, and in her heart most eager; but Carlo bade the rowers push off. Then it was pitiful to hear the shout of abject supplication from Pericles. He implored Count Ammiani’s pardon, Vittoria’s pardon, for telling her what she was; and as the boat drew farther away, he offered her sums of money to enter the villa and sing the score of Hagar. He offered to bear the blame of her bad behaviour to him, said he would forget it and stamp it out; that he would pay for the provisioning of a regiment of volunteers for a whole month; that he would present her marriage trousseau to her—yes, and let her marry. “Sandra! my dear! my dear!” he cried, and stretched over the parapet speechless, like a puppet slain.

So strongly did she comprehend the sincerity of his passion for her voice that she could or would see nothing extravagant in this demonstration, which excited unrestrained laughter in every key from her companions in the boat. When the boat was about a hundred yards from the shore, and in full moonlight, she sang the great “Addio” of Hagar. At the close of it, she had to feel for her lover’s hand blindly. No one spoke, either at the Villa Ricciardi, or about her. Her voice possessed the mountain-shadowed lake.

The rowers pulled lustily home through chill air.

Luigi and Beppo were at the villa, both charged with news from Milan. Beppo claiming the right to speak first, which Luigi granted with a magnificent sweep of his hand, related that Captain Weisspriess, of the garrison, had wounded Count Medole in a duel severely. He brought a letter to Vittoria from Merthyr, in which Merthyr urged her to prevent Count Ammiani’s visiting Milan for any purpose whatever, and said that he was coming to be present at, her marriage. She was reading this while Luigi delivered his burden; which was, that in a subsequent duel, the slaughtering captain had killed little Leone Rufo, the gay and gallant boy, Carlo’s comrade, and her friend.

Luigi laughed scornfully at his rival, and had edged away—out of sight before he could be asked who had sent him. Beppo ignominiously confessed that he had not heard of this second duel. At midnight he was on horseback, bound for Milan, with a challenge to the captain from Carlo, who had a jealous fear that Luciano at Vercelli might have outstripped him. Carlo requested the captain to guarantee him an hour’s immunity in the city on a stated day, or to name any spot on the borders of Piedmont for the meeting. The challenge was sent with Countess Ammiani’s approbation and Laura’s. Vittoria submitted.

That done, Carlo gave up his heart to his bride. A fight in prospect was the hope of wholesome work after his late indecision and double play. They laughed at themselves, accused hotly, and humbly excused themselves, praying for mutual pardon.

She had behaved badly in disobeying his mandate from Brescia.

Yes, but had he not been over-imperious?

True; still she should have remembered her promise in the Vicentino.

She did indeed; but how could she quit her wounded friend Merthyr?

Perhaps not: then, why had she sent word to him from Milan that she would be at Pallanza?

This question knocked at a sealed chamber. She was silent, and Carlo had to brood over something as well. He gave her hints of his foolish pique, his wrath and bitter baffled desire for her when, coming to Pallanza, he came to an empty house. But he could not help her to see, for he did not himself feel, that he had been spurred by silly passions, pique, and wrath, to plunge instantly into new political intrigue; and that some of his worst faults had become mixed up with his devotion to his country. Had he taken Violetta for an ally in all purity of heart? The kiss he had laid on the woman’s sweet lips had shaken his absolute belief in that. He tried to set his brain travelling backward, in order to contemplate accurately the point of his original weakness. It being almost too severe a task for any young head, Carlo deemed it sufficient that he should say—and this he felt—that he was unworthy of his beloved.

Could Vittoria listen to such stuff? She might have kissed him to stop the flow of it, but kissings were rare between them; so rare, that when they had put mouth to mouth, a little quivering spire of flame, dim at the base, stood to mark the spot in their memories. She moved her hand, as to throw aside such talk. Unfretful in blood, chaste and keen, she at least knew the foolishness of the common form of lovers’ trifling when there is a burning love to keep under, and Carlo saw that she did, and adored her for this highest proof of the passion of her love.

“In three days you will be mine, if I do not hear from Milan? within five, if I do?” he said.

Vittoria gave him the whole beauty of her face a divine minute, and bowed it assenting. Carlo then led her to his mother, before whom he embraced her for the comfort of his mother’s heart. They decided that there should be no whisper of the marriage until the couple were one. Vittoria obtained the countess’s permission to write for Merthyr to attend her at the altar. She had seen Weisspriess fall in combat, and she had perfect faith in her lover’s right hand.

Captain Weisspriess replied to Carlo Ammiani promptly, naming Camerlata by Como, as the place where he would meet him.

He stated at the end of some temperate formal lines, that he had given Count Ammiani the preference over half-a-dozen competitors for the honour of measuring swords with him; but that his adversary must not expect him to be always ready to instruct the young gentlemen of the Lombardo-Venetian province in the arts of fence; and therefore he begged to observe, that his encounter with Count Ammiani would be the last occasion upon which he should hold himself bound to accept a challenge from Count Ammiani’s countrymen.

It was quite possible, the captain said, drawing a familiar illustration from the gaming-table, to break the stoutest Bank in the world by a perpetual multiplication of your bets, and he was modest enough to remember that he was but one man against some thousands, to contend with all of whom would be exhausting.

Consequently the captain desired Count Ammiani to proclaim to his countrymen that the series of challenges must terminate; and he requested him to advertize the same in a Milanese, a Turin, and a Neapolitan journal.

“I am not a butcher,” he concluded. “The task you inflict upon me is scarcely bearable. Call it by what name you will, it is having ten shots to one, which was generally considered an equivalent to murder. My sword is due to you, Count Ammiani; and, as I know you to be an honourable nobleman, I would rather you were fighting in Venice, though your cause is hopeless, than standing up to match yourself against me. Let me add, that I deeply respect the lady who is engaged to be united to you, and would not willingly cross steel either with her lover or her husband. I shall be at Camerlata at the time appointed. If I do not find you there, I shall understand that you have done me the honour to take my humble advice, and have gone where your courage may at least appear to have done better service. I shall sheathe my sword and say no more about it.”

All of this, save the concluding paragraph, was written under the eyes of Countess Anna of Lenkenstein.

He carried it to his quarters, where he appended the as he deemed it—conciliatory passage: after which he handed it to Beppo, in a square of the barracks, with a buon’mano that Beppo received bowing, and tossed to an old decorated regimental dog of many wounds and a veteran’s gravity. For this offence a Styrian grenadier seized him by the shoulders, lifting him off his feet and swinging him easily, while the dog arose from his contemplation of the coin and swayed an expectant tail. The Styrian had dashed Beppo to earth before Weisspriess could interpose, and the dog had got him by the throat. In the struggle Beppo tore off the dog’s medal for distinguished conduct on the field of battle. He restored it as soon as he was free, and won unanimous plaudits from officers and soldiers for his kindly thoughtfulness and the pretty manner with which he dropped on one knee, and assuaged the growls, and attached the medal to the old dog’s neck. Weisspriess walked away. Beppo then challenged his Styrian to fight. The case was laid before a couple of sergeants, who shook their heads on hearing his condition to be that of a serving-man, the Styrian was ready to waive considerations of superiority; but the “judge” pronounced their veto. A soldier in the Imperial Royal service, though he was merely a private in the ranks, could not accept a challenge from civilians below the rank of notary, secretary, hotel- or inn-keeper, and suchlike: servants and tradesmen he must seek to punish in some other way; and they also had their appeal to his commanding officer. So went the decision of the military tribunal, until the Styrian, having contrived to make Beppo understand, by the agency of a single Italian verb, that he wanted a blow, Beppo spun about and delivered a stinging smack on the Styrian’s cheek; which altered the view of the case, for, under peculiar circumstances—supposing that he did not choose to cut him down—a soldier might condescend to challenge his civilian inferiors: “in our regiment,” said the sergeants, meaning that they had relaxed the stringency of their laws.

Beppo met his Styrian outside the city walls, and laid him flat. He declined to fight a second; but it was represented to him, by the aid of an interpreter, that the officers of the garrison were subjected to successive challenges, and that the first trial of his skill might have been nothing finer than luck; and besides, his adversary had a right to call a champion. “We all do it,” the soldiers assured him. “Now your blood’s up you’re ready for a dozen of us;” which was less true of a constitution that was quicker in expending its heat. He stood out against a young fellow almost as limber as himself, much taller, and longer in the reach, by whom he was quickly disabled with cuts on thigh and head. Seeing this easy victory over him, the soldiers, previously quite civil, cursed him for having got the better of their fallen comrade, and went off discussing how he had done the trick, leaving him to lie there. A peasant carried him to a small suburban inn, where he remained several days oppressed horribly by a sense that he had forgotten something. When he recollected what it was, he entrusted the captain’s letter to his landlady;—a good woman, but she chanced to have a scamp of a husband, who snatched it from her and took it to his market. Beppo supposed the letter to be on its Way to Pallauza, when it was in General Schoneck’s official desk; and soon after the breath of a scandalous rumour began to circulate.

Captain Weisspriess had gone down to Camerlata, accompanied by a Colonel Volpo, of an Austro-Italian regiment, and by Lieutenant Jenna. At Camerlata a spectacled officer, Major Nagen, joined them. Weisspriess was the less pleased with his company on hearing that he had come to witness the meeting, in obedience to an express command of a person who was interested in it. Jenna was the captain’s friend: Volpo was seconding him for the purpose of getting Count Ammiani to listen to reason from the mouth of a countryman. There could be no doubt in the captain’s mind that this Major Nagen was Countess Anna’s spy as well as his rival, and he tried to be rid of him; but in addition to the shortness of sight which was Nagen’s plea for pushing his thin transparent nose into every corner, he enjoyed at will an intermittent deafness, and could hear anything without knowing of it. Brother officers said of Major Nagen that he was occasionally equally senseless in the nose, which had been tweaked without disturbing the repose of his features. He waited half-an-hour on the ground after the appointed time, and then hurried to Milan. Weisspriess waited an hour. Satisfied that Count Ammiani was not coming, he exacted from Volpo and from Jenna their word of honour as Austrian officers that they would forbear-to cast any slur on the courage of his adversary, and would be so discreet on the subject as to imply that the duel was a drawn affair. They pledged themselves accordingly. “There’s Nagen, it’s true,” said Weisspriess, as a man will say and feel that he has done his best to prevent a thing inevitable.

Milan, and some of the journals of Milan, soon had Carlo Ammiani’s name up for challenging Weisspriess and failing to keep his appointment. It grew to be discussed as a tremendous event. The captain received fifteen challenges within two days; among these a second one from Luciano Romara, whom he was beginning to have a strong desire to encounter. He repressed it, as quondam drunkards fight off the whisper of their lips for liquor. “No more blood,” was his constant inward cry. He wanted peace; but as he also wanted Countess Anna of Lenkenstein and her estates, it may possibly be remarked of him that what he wanted he did not want to pay for.

At this period Wilfrid had resumed the Austrian uniform as a common soldier in the ranks of the Kinsky regiment. General Schoneck had obtained the privilege for him from the Marshal, General Pierson refusing to lift a finger on his behalf. Nevertheless the uncle was not sorry to hear the tale of his nephew’s exploits during the campaign, or of the eccentric intrepidity of the white umbrella; and both to please him, and to intercede for Wilfrid, the tatter’s old comrades recited his deeds as a part of the treasured familiar history of the army in its late arduous struggle.

General Pierson was chiefly anxious to know whether Countess Lena would be willing to give her hand to Wilfrid in the event of his restoration to his antecedent position in the army. He found her extremely excited about Carlo Ammiani, her old playmate, and once her dear friend. She would not speak of Wilfrid at all. To appease the chivalrous little woman, General Pierson hinted that his nephew, being under the protection of General Schoneck, might get some intelligence from that officer. Lena pretended to reject the notion of her coming into communication with Wilfrid for any earthly purpose. She said to herself, however, that her object was pre-eminently unselfish; and as the General pointedly refused to serve her in a matter that concerned an Italian nobleman, she sent directions to Wilfrid to go before General Schoeneck the moment he was off duty, and ask his assistance, in her name, to elucidate the mystery of Count Ammiani’s behaviour. The answer was a transmission of Captain Weisspriess’s letter to Carlo. Lena caused the fact of this letter having missed its way to be circulated in the journals, and then she carried it triumphantly to her sister, saying:

“There! I knew these reports were abase calumny.”

“Reports, to what effect?” said Anna.

“That Carlo Ammiani had slunk from a combat with your duellist.”

“Oh! I knew that myself,” Anna remarked.

“You were the loudest in proclaiming it.”

“Because I intend to ruin him.”

“Carlo Ammiani? What has he done to you?”

Anna’s eyes had fallen on the additional lines of the letter which she had not dictated. She frowned and exclaimed:

“What is this? Does the man play me false? Read those lines, Lena, and tell me, does the man mean to fight in earnest who can dare to write them? He advises Ammiani to go to Venice. It’s treason, if it is not cowardice. And see here—he has the audacity to say that he deeply respects the lady Ammiani is going to marry. Is Ammiani going to marry her? I think not.”

Anna dashed the letter to the floor.

“But I will make use of what’s within my reach,” she said, picking it up.

“Carlo Ammiani will marry her, I presume,” said Lena.

“Not before he has met Captain Weisspriess, who, by the way, has obtained his majority. And, Lena, my dear, write to inform him that we wish to offer him our congratulations. He will be a General officer in good time.”

“Perhaps you forget that Count Ammiani is a perfect swordsman, Anna.”

“Weisspriess remembers it for me, perhaps;—is that your idea, Lena?”

“He might do so profitably. You have thrown him on two swords.”

“Merely to provoke the third. He is invincible. If he were not, where would his use be?”

“Oh, how I loathe revenge!” cried Lena.

“You cannot love!” her sister retorted. “That woman calling herself Vittoria Campa shall suffer. She has injured and defied me. How was it that she behaved to us at Meran? She is mixed up with assassins; she is insolent—a dark-minded slut; and she catches stupid men. My brother, my country, and this weak Weisspriess, as I saw him lying in the Ultenthal, cry out against her. I have no sleep. I am not revengeful. Say it, say it, all of you! but I am not. I am not unforgiving. I worship justice, and a black deed haunts me. Let the wicked be contrite and washed in tears, and I think I can pardon them. But I will have them on their knees. I hate that woman Vittoria more than I hate Angelo Guidascarpi. Look, Lena. If both were begging for life to me, I would send him to the gallows and her to her bedchamber; and all because I worship justice, and believe it to be the weapon of the good and pious. You have a baby’s heart; so has Karl. He declines to second Weisspriess; he will have nothing to do with duelling; he would behold his sisters mocked in the streets and pass on. He talks of Paul’s death like a priest. Priests are worthy men; a great resource! Give me a priests lap when I need it. Shall I be condemned to go to the priest and leave that woman singing? If I did, I might well say the world’s a snare, a sham, a pitfall, a horror! It’s what I don’t think in any degree. It’s what you think, though. Yes, whenever you are vexed you think it. So do the priests, and so do all who will not exert themselves to chastise. I, on the contrary, know that the world is not made up of nonsense. Write to Weisspriess immediately; I must have him here in an hour.”

Weisspriess, on visiting the ladies to receive their congratulations, was unprepared for the sight of his letter to Carlo Ammiani, which Anna thrust before him after he had saluted her, bidding him read it aloud. He perused it in silence. He was beginning to be afraid of his mistress.

“I called you Austria once, for you were always ready,” Anna said, and withdrew from him, that the sung of her words might take effect.

“God knows, I have endeavoured to earn the title in my humble way,” Weisspriess appealed to Lena.

“Yes, Major Weisspriess, you have,” she said. “Be Austria still, and forbear toward these people as much as you can. To beat them is enough, in my mind. I am rejoiced that you have not met Count Ammiani, for if you had, two friends of mine, equally dear and equally skilful, would have held their lives at one another’s mercy.”

“Equally!” said Weisspriess, and pulled out the length of his moustache.

“Equally courageous,” Lena corrected herself. “I never distrusted Count Ammiani’s courage, nor could distrust yours.”

“Equally dear!” Weisspriess tried to direct a concentrated gaze on her.

Lena evaded an answer by speaking of the rumour of Count Ammiani’s marriage.

Weisspriess was thinking with all the sagacious penetration of the military mind, that perhaps this sister was trying to tell him that she would be willing to usurp the piece of the other in his affections; and if so, why should she not?

“I may cherish the idea that I am dear to you, Countess Lena?”

“When you are formally betrothed to my sister, you will know you are very dear to me, Major Weisspriess.”

“But,” said he, perceiving his error, “how many persons am I to call out before she will consent to a formal betrothal?”

Lena was half smiling at the little tentative bit of sentiment she had so easily turned aside. Her advice to him was to refuse to fight, seeing that he had done sufficient for glory and his good name.

He mentioned Major Nagen as a rival.

Upon this she said: “Hear me one minute. I was in my sister’s bed-room on the first night when she knew of your lying wounded in the Ultenthal. She told you just now that she called you Austria. She adores our Austria in you. The thought that you had been vanquished seemed like our Austria vanquished, and she is so strong for Austria that it is really out of her power to fancy you as defeated without suspecting foul play. So when she makes you fight, she thinks you safe. Many are to go down because you have gone down. Do you not see? And now, Major Weisspriess, I need not expose my sister to you any more, I hope, or depreciate Major Nagen for your satisfaction.”

Weisspriess had no other interview with Anna for several days. She shunned him openly. Her carriage moved off when he advanced to meet her at the parade, or review of arms; and she did not scruple to speak in public with Major Nagen, in the manner of those who have begun to speak together in private. The offender received his punishment gracefully, as men will who have been taught that it flatters them. He refused every challenge. From Carlo Ammiani there came not a word.

It would have been a deadly lull to any fiery temperament engaged in plotting to destroy a victim, but Anna had the patience of hatred—that absolute malignity which can measure its exultation rather by the gathering of its power to harm than by striking. She could lay it aside, or sink it to the bottom of her emotions, at will, when circumstances appeared against it. And she could do this without fretful regrets, without looking to the future. The spirit of her hatred extracted its own nourishment from things, like an organized creature. When foiled she became passive, and she enjoyed—forced herself compliantly to enjoy—her redoubled energy of hatred voluptuously, if ever a turn in events made wreck of her scheming. She hated Vittoria for many reasons, all of them vague within her bosom because the source of them was indefinite and lay in the fact of her having come into collision with an opposing nature, whose rivalry was no visible rivalry, whose triumph was an ignorance of scorn—a woman who attracted all men, who scattered injuries with insolent artlessness, who never appealed to forgiveness, and was a low-born woman daring to be proud. By repute Anna was implacable, but she had, and knew she had, the capacity for magnanimity of a certain kind; and her knowledge of the existence of this unsuspected fund within her justified in some degree her reckless efforts to pull her enemy down on her knees. It seemed doubly right that she should force Vittoria to penitence, as being good for the woman, and an end that exonerated her own private sins committed to effect it.

Yet she did not look clearly forward to the day of Vittoria’s imploring for mercy. She had too many vexations to endure: she was an insufficient schemer, and was too frequently thwarted to enjoy that ulterior prospect. Her only servile instruments were Major Nagen, and Irma, who came to her from the Villa Ricciardi, hot to do her rival any deadly injury; but though willing to attempt much, these were apparently able to perform little more than the menial work of vengeance. Major Nagen wrote in the name of Weisspriess to Count Ammiani, appointing a second meeting at Como, and stating that he would be at the villa of the Duchess of Graatli there. Weisspriess was unsuspectingly taken down to the place by Anna and Lena. There was a gathering of such guests as the duchess alone among her countrywomen could assemble, under the patronage of the conciliatory Government, and the duchess projected to give a series of brilliant entertainments in the saloons of the Union, as she named her house-roof. Count Serabiglione arrived, as did numerous Moderates and priest-party men, Milanese garrison officers and others. Laura Piaveni travelled with Countess d’Isorella and the happy Adela Sedley, from Lago Maggiore.

Laura came, as she cruelly told her friend, for the purpose of making Victoria’s excuses to the duchess. “Why can she not come herself?” Amalia persisted in asking, and began to be afflicted with womanly curiosity. Laura would do nothing but shrug and smile, and repeat her message. A little after sunset, when the saloons were lighted, Weisspriess, sitting by his Countess Anna’s side, had a slip of paper placed in his hands by one of the domestics. He quitted his post frowning with astonishment, and muttered once, “My appointment!” Laura noticed that Anna’s heavy eyelids lifted to shoot an expressive glance at Violetta d’Isorella. She said: “Can that have been anything hostile, do you suppose?” and glanced slyly at her friend.

“No, no,” said Amalia; “the misunderstanding is explained, and Major Weisspriess is just as ready as Count Ammiani to listen to reason. Besides, Count Ammiani is not so unfriendly but that if he came so near he would come up to me, surely.”

Laura brought Amalia’s observation to bear upon Anna and Violetta by turning pointedly from one to the other as she said: “As for reason, perhaps you have chosen the word. If Count Ammiani attended an appointment this time, he would be unreasonable.”

A startled “Why?”—leaped from Anna’s lips. She reddened at her impulsive clumsiness.

Laura raised her shoulders slightly: “Do you not know?” The expression of her face reproved Violetta, as for remissness in transmitting secret intelligence. “You can answer why, countess,” she addressed the latter, eager to exercise her native love of conflict with this doubtfully-faithful countrywoman;—the Austrian could feel that she had beaten her on the essential point, and afford to give her any number of dialectical victories.

“I really cannot answer why,” Violetta said; “unless Count Ammiani is, as I venture to hope, better employed.”

“But the answer is charming and perfect,” said Laura.

“Enigmatical answers are declared to be so when they come from us women,” the duchess remarked; “but then, I fancy, women must not be the hearers, or they will confess that they are just as much bewildered and irritated as I am. Do speak out, my dearest. How is he better employed?”

Laura passed her eyes around the group of ladies. “If any hero of yours had won the woman he loves, he would be right in thinking it folly to be bound by the invitation to fight, or feast, or what you will, within a space of three months or so; do you not agree with me?”

The different emotions on many visages made the scene curious.

“Count Ammiani has married her!” exclaimed the duchess.

“My old friend Carlo is really married!” said Lena.

Anna stared at Violetta.

The duchess, recovering from her wonder, confirmed the news by saying that she now knew why M. Powys had left Milan in haste, three or four days previously, as she was aware that the bride had always wished him to be present at the ceremony of her marriage.

“Signora, may I ask you, were you present?” Violetta addressed Laura.

“I will answer most honestly that I was not,” said Laura.

“The marriage was a secret one; perhaps?”

“Even for friends, you see.”

“Necessarily, no doubt,” Lena said, with an idea of easing her sister’s stupefaction by a sarcasm foreign to her sentiments.

Adela Sedley, later in exactly comprehending what had been spoken, glanced about for some one who would not be unsympathetic to her exclamation, and suddenly beheld her brother entering the room with Weisspriess. “Wilfrid! Wilfrid! do you know she is married?”

“So they tell me,” Wilfrid replied, while making his bow to the duchess. He was much broken in appearance, but wore his usual collected manner. Who had told him of the marriage? A person downstairs, he said; not Count Ammiani; not signor Balderini; no one whom he saw present, no one whom he knew.

“A very mysterious person,” said the duchess.

“Then it’s true after all,” cried Laura. “I did but guess it.” She assured Violetta that she had only guessed it.

“Does Major Weisspriess know it to be true?” The question came from Anna.

Weisspriess coolly verified it, on the faith of a common servant’s communication.

The ladies could see that some fresh piece of mystery lay between him and Wilfrid.

“With whom have you had an interview, and what have you heard?” asked Lena, vexed by Wilfrid’s pallid cheeks.

Both men stammered and protested, out of conceit, and were as foolish as men are when pushed to play at mutual concealment.

The duchess’s chasseur, Jacob Baumwalder Feckelwitz, stepped up to his mistress and whispered discreetly. She gazed straight at Laura. After hesitation she shook her head, and the chasseur retired. Amalia then came to the rescue of the unhappy military wits that were standing a cross-fire of sturdy interrogation.

“Do you not perceive what it is?” she said to Anna. “Major Weisspriess meets Private Pierson at the door of my house, and forgets that he is well-born and my guest. I may be revolutionary, but I declare that in plain clothes Private Pierson is the equal of Major Weisspriess. If bravery made men equals, who would be Herr Pierson’s superior? Ire has done me the honour, at a sacrifice of his pride, I am sure, to come here and meet his sister, and rejoice me with his society. Major Weisspriess, if I understand the case correctly, you are greatly to blame.”

“I beg to assert,” Weisspriess was saying as the duchess turned her shoulder on him.

“There is really no foundation,” Wilfrid began, with similar simplicity.

“What will sharpen the wits of these soldiers!” the duchess murmured dolefully to Laura.

“But Major Weisspriess was called out of his room by a message—was that from Private Pierson?” said Anna.

“Assuredly; I should presume so,” the duchess answered for them.

“Ay; undoubtedly,” Weisspriess supported her.

“Then,” Laura smiled encouragement to Wilfrid, “you know nothing of Count Ammiani’s marriage after all?”

Wilfrid launched his reply on a sharp repression of his breath, “Nothing whatever.”

“And the common servant’s communication was not made to you?” Anna interrogated Weisspriess.

“I simply followed in the track of Pierson,” said that officer, masking his retreat from the position with a duck of his head and a smile, tooth on lip.

“How could you ever suppose, child, that a common servant would be sent to deliver such tidings? and to Major Weisspriess!” the duchess interposed.

This broke up the Court of inquiry.

Weisspriess shortly after took his leave, on the plea that he wished to prove his friendliness by accompanying Private Pierson, who had to be on duty early next day in Milan. Amalia had seen him breaking from Anna in extreme irritation, and he had only to pledge his word that he was really bound for Milan to satisfy her. “I believe you to be at heart humane,” she said meaningly.

“Duchess, you may be sure that I would not kill an enemy save on the point of my sword,” he answered her.

“You are a gallant man,” said Amalia, and pride was in her face as she looked on him.

She willingly consented to Wilfrid’s sudden departure, as it was evident that some shot had hit him hard.

On turning to Laura, the duchess beheld an aspect of such shrewd disgust that she was provoked to exclaim: “What on earth is the matter now?”

Laura would favour her with no explanation until they were alone in the duchess’s boudoir, when she said that to call Weisspriess a gallant man was an instance of unblushing adulation of brutal strength: “Gallant for slaying a boy? Gallant because he has force of wrist?”

“Yes; gallant;—an honour to his countrymen: and an example to some of yours,” Amalia rejoined.

“See,” cried Laura, “to what a degeneracy your excess of national sentiment reduces you!”

While she was flowing on, the duchess leaned a hand across her shoulder, and smiling kindly, said she would not allow her to utter words that she would have to eat. “You saw my chasseur step up to me this evening, my Laura? Well, not to torment you, he wished to sound an alarm cry after Angelo Guidascarpi. I believe my conjecture is correct, that Angelo Guidascarpi was seen by Major Weisspriess below, and allowed to pass free. Have you no remark to make?”

“None,” said Laura.

“You cannot admit that he behaved like a gallant man?” Laura sighed deeply. “Perhaps it was well for you to encourage him!”

The mystery of Angelo’s interview with Weisspriess was cleared the next night, when in the midst of a ball-room’s din, Aennchen, Amalia’s favourite maid, brought a letter to Laura from Countess Ammiani. These were the contents:

“DEAREST SIGNORA,

“You now learn a new and blessed thing. God make the marriage fruitful! I have daughter as well as son. Our Carlo still hesitated, for hearing of the disgraceful rumours in Milan, he fancied a duty lay there for him to do. Another menace came to my daughter from the madman Barto Rizzo. God can use madmen to bring about the heavenly designs. We decided that Carlo’s name should cover her. My son was like a man who has awakened up. M. Powys was our good genius. He told her that he had promised you to bring it about. He, and Angelo, and myself, were the witnesses. So much before heaven! I crossed the lake with them to Stress. I was her tirewoman, with Giacinta, to whom I will give a husband for the tears of joy she dropped upon the bed. Blessed be it! I placed my daughter in my Carlo’s arms. Both kissed their mother at parting.

“This is something fixed. I had great fears during the war. You do not yet know what it is to have a sonless son in peril. Terror and remorse haunted me for having sent the last Ammiani out to those fields, unattached to posterity.

“An envelope from Milan arrived on the morning of his nuptials. It was intercepted by me. The German made a second appointment at Como. Angelo undertook to assist me in saving my son’s honour. So my Carlo had nothing to disturb his day. Pray with me, Laura Piaveni, that the day and the night of it may prove fresh springs of a river that shall pass our name through the happier mornings of Italy! I commend you to God, my dear, and am your friend,

“MARCCELLINA, COUNTESS AMMIANI.

“P.S. Countess Alessandra will be my daughter’s name.”

The letter was read and re-read before the sweeter burden it contained would allow Laura to understand that Countess Ammiani had violated a seal and kept a second hostile appointment hidden from her son.

“Amalia, you detest me,” she said, when they had left the guests for a short space, and the duchess had perused the letter, “but acknowledge Angelo Guidascarpi’s devotion. He came here in the midst of you Germans, at the risk of his life, to offer battle for his cousin.”

The duchess, however, had much more to say for the magnanimity of Major Weisspriess, who, if he saw him, had spared him; she compelled Laura to confess that Weisspriess must have behaved with some nobleness, which Laura did, humming and I ‘brumming,’ and hinting at the experience he had gained of Angelo’s skill. Her naughtiness provoked first, and then affected Amalia; in this mood the duchess had the habit of putting on a grand air of pitying sadness. Laura knew it well, and never could make head against it. She wavered, as a stray floating thing detached from an eddy whirls and passes on the flood. Close on Amalia’s bosom she sobbed out: “Yes; you Austrians have good qualities some: many! but you choose to think us mean because we can’t readily admit them when we are under your heels. Just see me; what a crumb feeds me! I am crying with delight at a marriage!”

The duchess clasped her fondly.

“It’s not often one gets you so humble, my Laura.”

“I am crying with delight at a marriage! Amalia, look at me: you would suppose it a mighty triumph. A marriage! two little lovers lying cheek to cheek! and me blessing heaven for its goodness! and there may be dead men unburied still on the accursed Custozza hill-top!”

Amalia let her weep. The soft affection which the duchess bore to her was informed with a slight touch of envy of a complexion that could be torn with tears one minute, and the next be fit to show in public. No other thing made her regard her friend as a southern—that is, a foreign-woman.

“Be patient,” Laura said.

“Cry; you need not be restrained,” said Amalia.

“You sighed.”

“没有！”

“A sort of sigh. My fit’s over. Carlo’s marriage is too surprising and delicious. I shall be laughing presently. I hinted at his marriage—I thought it among the list of possible things, no more—to see if that crystal pool, called Violetta d’Isorella, could be discoloured by stirring. Did you watch her face? I don’t know what she wanted with Carlo, for she’s cold as poison—a female trifler; one of those women whom I, and I have a chaste body, despise as worse than wantons; but she certainly did not want him to be married. It seems like a victory—though we’re beaten. You have beaten us, my dear!”

“My darling! it is your husband kisses you,” said Amalia, kissing Laura’s forehead from a full heart.

Weisspriess and Wilfrid made their way toward Milan together, silently smoking, after one attempt at conversation, which touched on Vittoria’s marriage; but when they reached Monza the officer slapped his degraded brother in arms upon the shoulder, and asked him whether he had any inclination to crave permission to serve in Hungary. For his own part, Weisspriess said that he should quit Italy at once; he had here to skewer the poor devils, one or two weekly, or to play the mightily generous; in short, to do things unsoldierly; and he was desirous of getting away from the country. General Schoneck was at Monza, and might arrange the matter for them both. Promotion was to be looked for in Hungary; the application would please the General; one battle would restore the lieutenant’s star to Wilfrid’s collar. Wilfrid, who had been offended by his companion’s previous brooding silence, nodded briefly, and they stopped at Monza, where they saw General Schoneck in the morning, and Wilfrid being by extraordinary favour in civilian’s dress during his leave of absence, they were jointly invited to the General’s table at noon, though not to meet any other officer. General Schoneck agreed with Weisspriess that Hungary would be a better field for Wilfrid; said he would do his utmost to serve them in the manner they wished, and dismissed them after the second cigar. They strolled about the city, glad for reasons of their own to be out of Milan as long as the leave permitted. At night, when they were passing a palace in one of the dark streets, a feather, accompanied by a sharp sibilation from above, dropped on Wilfrid’s face. Weisspriess held the feather up, and judged by its length that it was an eagle’s, and therefore belonging to the Hungarian Hussar regiment stationed in Milan. “The bird’s aloft,” he remarked. His voice aroused a noise of feet that was instantly still. He sent a glance at the doorways, where he thought he discerned men. Fetching a whistle in with his breath, he unsheathed his sword, and seeing that Wilfrid had no weapon, he pushed him to a gate of the palace-court that had just cautiously turned a hinge. Wilfrid found his hand taken by a woman’s hand inside. The gate closed behind him. He was led up to an apartment where, by the light of a darkly-veiled lamp, he beheld a young Hungarian officer and a lady clinging to his neck, praying him not to go forth. Her Italian speech revealed how matters stood in this house. The officer accosted Wilfrid: “But you are not one of us!” He repeated it to the lady: “You see, the man is not one of us!”

She assured him that she had seen the uniform when she dropped the feather, and wept protesting it.

“Louis, Louis! why did you come to-night! why did I make you come! You will be slain. I had my warning, but I was mad.”

The officer hushed her with a quick squeeze of her inter-twisted fingers.

“Are you the man to take a sword and be at my back, sir?” he said; and resumed in a manner less contemptuous toward the civil costume: “I request it for the sole purpose of quieting this lady’s fears.”

Wilfrid explained who and what he was. On hearing that he was General Pierson’s nephew the officer laughed cheerfully, and lifted the veil from the lamp, by which Wilfrid knew him to be Colonel Prince Radocky, a most gallant and the handsomest cavalier in the Imperial service. Radocky laughed again when he was told of Weisspriess keeping guard below.

“Aha! we are three, and can fight like a pyramid.”

He flourished his hand above the lady’s head, and called for a sword. The lady affected to search for one while he stalked up and down in the jaunty fashion of a Magyar horseman; but the sword was not to be discovered without his assistance, and he was led away in search of it. The moment he was alone Wilfrid burst into tears. He could bear anything better than the sight of fondling lovers. When they rejoined him, Radocky had evidently yielded some point; he stammered and worked his underlip on his moustache. The lady undertook to speak for him. Happily for her, she said, Wilfrid would not compromise her; and taking her lover’s hand, she added with Italian mixture of wit and grace: “Happily for me, too, he does. The house is surrounded by enemies; it is a reign of terror for women. I am dead, if they slay him; but if they recognize him, I am lost.”

Wilfrid readily leaped to her conclusion. He offered his opera-hat and civil mantle to Radocky, who departed in them, leaving his military cloak in exchange. During breathless seconds the lady hung kneeling at the window. When the gate opened there was a noise as of feet preparing to rush; Weisspriess uttered an astonished cry, but addressed Radocky as “my Pierson!” lustily and frequently; and was heard putting a number of meaningless questions, laughing and rallying Pierson till the two passed out of hearing unmolested. The lady then kissed a Cross passionately, and shivered Wilfrid’s manhood by asking him whether he knew what love was. She went on:

“Never, never love a married woman! It’s a past practice. Never! Thrust a spike in the palm of your hands drink scalding oil, rather than do that.”

“The Prince Radocky is now safe,” Wilfrid said.

“Yes, he is safe; and he is there, and I am here: and I cannot follow him; and when will he come to me?”

The tones were lamentable. She struck her forehead, after she had mutely thrust her hand to right and left to show the space separating her from her lover.

Her voice changed when she accepted Wilfrid’s adieux, to whose fate in the deadly street she appeared quite indifferent, though she gave him one or two prudent directions, and expressed a hope that she might be of service to him.

He was set upon as soon as he emerged from the gateway; the cavalry cloak was torn from his back, and but for the chance circumstance of his swearing in English, he would have come to harm. A chill went through his blood on hearing one of his assailants speak the name of Barto Rizzo. The English oath stopped an arm that flashed a dagger half its length. Wilfrid obeyed a command to declare his name, his country, and his rank. “It’s not the prince! it’s not the Hungarian!” went many whispers; and he was drawn away by a man who requested him to deliver his reasons for entering the palace, and who appeared satisfied by Wilfrid’s ready mixture of invention and fact. But the cloak! Wilfrid stated boldly that the cloak was taken by him from the Duchess of Graatli’s at Como; that he had seen a tall Hussar officer slip it off his shoulders; that he had wanted a cloak, and had appropriated it. He had entered the gate of the palace because of a woman’s hand that plucked at the skirts of this very cloak.

“I saw you enter,” said the man; “do that no more. We will not have the blood of Italy contaminated—do you hear? While that half-Austrian Medole is tip-toeing ‘twixt Milan and Turin, we watch over his honour, to set an example to our women and your officers. You have outwitted us to-night. Off with you!”

Wilfrid was twirled and pushed through the crowd till he got free of them. He understood very well that they were magnanimous rascals who could let an accomplice go, though they would have driven steel into the principal.

Nothing came of this adventure for some time. Wilfrid’s reflections (apart from the horrible hard truth of Vittoria’s marriage, against which he dashed his heart perpetually, almost asking for anguish) had leisure to examine the singularity of his feeling a commencement of pride in the clasping of his musket;—he who on the first day of his degradation had planned schemes to stick the bayonet-point between his breast-bones: he thought as well of the queer woman’s way in Countess Medole’s adjuration to him that he should never love a married woman;—in her speaking, as it seemed, on his behalf, when it was but an outcry of her own acute wound. Did he love a married woman? He wanted to see one married woman for the last time; to throw a frightful look on her; to be sublime in scorn of her; perhaps to love her all the better for the cruel pain, in the expectation of being consoled. While doing duty as a military machine, these were the pictures in his mind; and so well did his routine drudgery enable him to bear them, that when he heard from General Schoneck that the term of his degradation was to continue in Italy, and from his sister that General Pierson refused to speak of him or hear of him until he had regained his gold shoulder-strap, he revolted her with an ejaculation of gladness, and swore brutally that he desired to have no advancement; nothing but sleep and drill; and, he added conscientiously, Havannah cigars. “He has grown to be like a common soldier,” Adela said to herself with an amazed contemplation of the family tie. Still, she worked on his behalf, having, as every woman has, too strong an instinct as to what is natural to us to believe completely in any eccentric assertion. She carried the tale of his grief and trials and his romantic devotion to the Imperial flag, daily to Countess Lena; persisting, though she could not win a responsive look from Lena’s face.

One day on the review-ground, Wilfrid beheld Prince Radocky bending from his saddle in conversation with Weisspriess. The prince galloped up to General Pierson, and stretched his hand to where Wilfrid was posted as marker to a wheeling column, kept the hand stretched out, and spoke furiously, and followed the General till he was ordered to head his regiment. Wilfrid began to hug his musket less desperately. Little presents—feminine he knew by the perfumes floating round them,—gloves and cigars, fine handkerchiefs, and silks for wear, came to his barracks. He pretended to accuse his sister of sending them. She in honest delight accused Lena. Lena then accused herself of not having done so.

It was winter: Vittoria had been seen in Milan. Both Lena and Wilfrid spontaneously guessed her to be the guilty one. He made a funeral pyre of the gifts and gave his sister the ashes, supposing that she had guessed with the same spirited intuition. It suited Adela to relate this lover’s performance to Lena. “He did well!” Lena said, and kissed Adela for the first time. Adela was the bearer of friendly messages to the poor private in the ranks. From her and from little Jenna, Wilfrid heard that he was unforgotten by Countess Lena, and new hopes mingled with gratitude caused him to regard his situation seriously. He confessed to his sister that the filthy fellows, his comrades, were all but too much for him, and asked her to kiss him, that he might feel he was not one of them. But he would not send a message in reply to Lena. “That is also well!” Lena said. Her brother Karl was a favourite with General Pierson. She proposed that Adela and herself should go to Count Karl, and urge him to use his influence with the General. This, however, Adela was disinclined to do; she could not apparently say why. When Lena went to him, she was astonished to hear that he knew every stage of her advance up to the point of pardoning her erratic lover; and even knew as much as that Wilfrid’s dejected countenance on the night when Vittoria’s marriage was published in the saloon of the duchess on Lake Como, had given her fresh offence. He told her that many powerful advocates were doing their best for the down-fallen officer, who, if he were shot, or killed, would still be gazetted an officer. “A nice comfort!” said Lena, and there was a rallying exchange of banter between them, out of which she drew the curious discovery that Karl had one of his strong admirations for the English lady. “Surely!” she said to herself; “I thought they were all so cold.” And cold enough the English lady seemed when Lena led to the theme. “Do I admire your brother, Countess Lena? Oh! yes;—in his uniform exceedingly.”

Milan was now full. Wilfrid had heard from Adela that Count Ammiani and his bride were in the city and were strictly watched. Why did not conspirators like these two take advantage of the amnesty? Why were they not in Rome? Their Chief was in Rome; their friends were in Rome. Why were they here? A report, coming from Countess d’Isorella, said that they had quarrelled with their friends, and were living for love alone. As she visited the Lenkensteins—high Austrians—some believed her; and as Count Ammiani and his bride had visited the Duchess of Graatli, it was thought possible. Adela had refused to see Vittoria; she did not even know the house where Count Ammiani dwelt; so Wilfrid was reduced to find it for himself. Every hour when off duty the miserable sentimentalist wandered in that direction, nursing the pangs of a delicious tragedy of emotions; he was like a drunkard going to his draught. As soon as he had reached the head of the Corso, he wheeled and marched away from it with a lofty head, internally grinning at his abject folly, and marvelling at the stiff figure of an Austrian common soldier which flashed by the windows as he passed. He who can unite prudence and madness, sagacity and stupidity, is the true buffoon; nor, vindictive as were his sensations, was Wilfrid unaware of the contrast of Vittoria’s soul to his own, that was now made up of antics. He could not endure the tones of cathedral music; but he had at times to kneel and listen to it, and be overcome.

On a night in the month of February, a servant out of livery addressed him at the barrack-gates, requesting him to go at once to a certain hotel, where his sister was staying. He went, and found there, not his sister, but Countess Medole. She smiled at his confusion. Both she and the prince, she said, had spared no effort to get him reinstated in his rank; but his uncle continually opposed the endeavours of all his friends to serve him. This interview was dictated by the prince’s wish, so that he might know them to be a not ungrateful couple. Wilfrid’s embarrassment in standing before a lady in private soldier’s uniform, enabled him with very peculiar dignity to declare that his present degradation, from the General’s point of view, was a just punishment, and he did not crave to have it abated. She remarked that it must end soon. He made a dim allusion to the littleness of humanity. She laughed. “It’s the language of an unfortunate lover,” she said, and straightway, in some undistinguished sentence, brought the name of Countess Alessandra Ammiani tingling to his ears. She feared that she could not be of service to him there; “at least, not just yet,” the lady astonished him by remarking. “I might help you to see her. If you take my advice you will wait patiently. You know us well enough to understand what patience will do. She is supposed to have married for love. Whether she did or not, you must allow a young married woman two years’ grace.”

The effect of speech like this, and more in a similar strain of frank corruptness, was to cleanse Wilfrid’s mind, and nerve his heart, and he denied that he had any desire to meet the Countess Ammiani, unless he could perform a service that would be agreeable to her.

The lady shrugged. “Well, that is one way. She has enemies, of course.”

Wilfrid begged for their names.

“Who are they not?” she replied. “Chiefly women, it is true.”

He begged most earnestly for their names; he would have pleaded eloquently, but dreaded that the intonation of one in his low garb might be taken for a whine; yet he ventured to say that if the countess did imagine herself indebted to him in a small degree, the mention of two or three of the names of Countess Alessandra Ammiani’s enemies would satisfy him.

“Countess Lena von Lenkenstein, Countess Violetta d’Isorella, signorina Irma di Karski.”

She spoke the names out like a sum that she was paying down in gold pieces, and immediately rang the bell for her servant and carriage, as if she had now acquitted her debt. Wilfrid bowed himself forth. A resolution of the best kind, quite unconnected with his interests or his love, urged him on straight to the house of the Lenkensteins, where he sent up his name to Countess Lena. After a delay of many minutes, Count Lenkenstein accompanied by General Pierson came down, both evidently affecting not to see him. The General barely acknowledged his salute.

“Hey! Kinsky!” the count turned in the doorway to address him by the title of his regiment; “here; show me the house inhabited by the Countess d’Isorella during the revolt.”

Wilfrid followed them to the end of the street, pointing his finger to the house, and saluted.

“An Englishman did me the favour—from pure eccentricity, of course—to save my life on that exact spot, General,” said the count. “Your countrymen usually take the other side; therefore I mention it.”

As Wilfrid was directing his steps to barracks (the little stir to his pride superinduced by these remarks having demoralized him), Count Lenkenstein shouted: “Are you off duty?” Wilfrid had nearly replied that he was, but just mastered himself in time. “No, indeed!” said the count, “when you have sent up your name to a lady.” This time General Pierson put two fingers formally to his cap, and smiled grimly at the private’s rigid figure of attention. If Wilfrid’s form of pride had consented to let him take delight in the fact, he would have seen at once that prosperity was ready to shine on him. He nursed the vexations much too tenderly to give prosperity a welcome; and even when along with Lena, and convinced of her attachment, and glad of it, he persisted in driving at the subject which had brought him to her house; so that the veil of opening commonplaces, pleasant to a couple in their position, was plucked aside. His business was to ask her why she was the enemy of Countess Alessandra Ammiani, and to entreat her that she should not seek to harm that lady. He put it in a set speech. Lena felt that it ought to have come last, not in advance of their reconciliation. “I will answer you,” she said. “I am not the Countess Alessandra Ammiani’s enemy.”

He asked her: “Could you be her friend?”

“Does a woman who has a husband want a friend?”

“I could reply, countess, in the case of a man who has a bride.”

By dint of a sweet suggestion here and there, love-making crossed the topic. It appeared that General Pierson had finally been attacked, on the question of his resistance to every endeavour to restore Wilfrid to his rank, by Count Lenkenstein, and had barely spoken the words—that if Wilfrid came to Countess Lena of his own free-will, unprompted, to beg her forgiveness, he would help to reinstate him, when Wilfrid’s name was brought up by the chasseur. All had laughed, “Even I,” Lena confessed. And then the couple had a pleasant petitish wrangle;—he was requested to avow that he had came solely, or principally, to beg forgiveness of her, who had such heaps to forgive. No; on his honour, he had come for the purpose previously stated, and on the spur of his hearing that she was Countess Alessandra Ammiani’s deadly enemy. “Could you believe that I was?” said Lena; “why should I be?” and he coloured like a lad, which sign of an ingenuousness supposed to belong to her set, made Lena bold to take the upper hand. She frankly accused herself of jealousy, though she did not say of whom. She almost admitted that when the time for reflection came, she should rejoice at his having sought her to plead for his friend rather than for her forgiveness. In the end, but with a drooping pause of her bright swift look at Wilfrid, she promised to assist him in defeating any machinations against Vittoria’s happiness, and to keep him informed of Countess d’Isorella’s movements. Wilfrid noticed the withdrawing fire of the look. “By heaven! she doubts me still,” he ejaculated inwardly.

These half-comic little people have their place in the history of higher natures and darker destinies. Wilfrid met Pericles, from whom he heard that Vittoria, with her husband’s consent, had pledged herself to sing publicly. “It is for ze Lombard widows,” Pericles apologized on her behalf; “but, do you see, I only want a beginning. She thaerst for ze stage; and it is, after marriage, a good sign. Oh! you shall hear, my friend; marriage have done her no hurt—ze contrary! You shall hear Hymen—Cupids—not a cold machine; it is an organ alaif! She has privily sung to her Pericles, and ser, and if I wake not very late on Judgement. Day, I shall zen hear—but why should I talk poetry to you, to make you laugh? I have a divin’ passion for zat woman. Do I not give her to a husband, and say, Be happy! onnly sing! Be kissed! be hugged! only give Pericles your voice. By Saint Alexandre! it is to say to ze heavens, Move on your way, so long as you drop rain on us r—you smile—you look kind.”

Pericles accompanied him into a caffe, the picture of an enamoured happy man. He waived aside contemptuously all mention of Vittoria’s having enemies. She had them when, as a virgin, she had no sense. As a woman, she had none, for she now had sense. Had she not brought her husband to be sensible, so that they moved together in Milanese society, instead of stupidly fighting at Rome? so that what he could not take to himself—the marvellous voice—he let bless the multitude! “She is the Beethoven of singers,” Pericles concluded. Wilfrid thought so on the night when she sang to succour the Lombard widows. It was at a concert, richly thronged; ostentatiously thronged with Austrian uniforms. He fancied that he could not bear to look on her. He left the house thinking that to hear her and see her and feel that she was one upon the earth, made life less of a burden.

This evening was rendered remarkable by a man’s calling out, “You are a traitress!” while Vittoria stood before the seats. She became pale, and her eyelids closed. No thinness was subsequently heard in her voice. The man was caught as he strove to burst through the crowd at the entrance-door, and proved to be a petty bookseller of Milan, by name Sarpo, known as an orderly citizen. When taken he was inflamed with liquor. Next day the man was handed from the civil to the military authorities, he having confessed to the existence of a plot in the city. Pericles came fuming to Wilfrid’s quarters. Wilfrid gathered from him that Sarpo’s general confession had been retracted: it was too foolish to snare the credulity of Austrian officials. Sarpo stated that he had fabricated the story of a plot, in order to escape the persecutions of a terrible man, and find safety in prison lodgings vender Government. The short confinement for a civic offence was not his idea of safety; he desired to be sheltered by Austrian soldiers and a fortress, and said that his torments were insupportable while Barto Rizzo was at large. This infamous Republican had latterly been living in his house, eating his bread, and threatening death to him unless he obeyed every command. Sarpo had undertaken his last mission for the purpose of supplying his lack of resolution to release himself from his horrible servitude by any other means; not from personal animosity toward the Countess Alessandra Ammiani, known as la Vittoria. When seized, fear had urged him to escape. Such was his second story. The points seemed irreconcilable to those who were not in the habit of taking human nature into their calculations of a possible course of conduct; even Wilfrid, though he was aware that Barto Rizzo hated Vittoria inveterately, imagined Sarpo’s first lie to have necessarily fathered a second. But the second story was true: and the something like lover’s wrath with which the outrage to Vittoria fired Pericles, prompted him to act on it as truth. He told Wilfrid that he should summon Barto Rizzo to his presence. As the Government was unable to exhibit so much power, Wilfrid looked sarcastic; whereupon Pericles threw up his chin crying: “Oh! you shall know my resources. Now, my friend, one bit of paper, and a messenger, and zen home to my house, to Tokay and cigarettes, and wait to see.” He remarked after pencilling a few lines, “Countess d’Isorella is her enemy? hein!”

“Why, you wouldn’t listen to me when I told you,” said Wilfrid.

“No,” Pericles replied while writing and humming over his pencil; “my ear is a pelican-pouch, my friend; it—and Irma is her enemy also?—it takes and keeps, but does not swallow till it wants. I shall hear you, and I shall hear my Sandra Vittoria, and I shall not know you have spoken, when by-and-by I tinkle, tinkle, a bell of my brain, and your word walks in,—‘quite well?’—‘very well! ‘—sit down’—‘if it is ze same to you, I prefer to stand’—‘good; zen I examine you.’ My motto:—‘Time opens ze gates: my system: ‘it is your doctor of regiment’s system when your twelve, fifteen, forty recruits strip to him:—‘Ah! you, my man, have varicose vein: no soldier in our regiment, you!’ So on. Perhaps I am not intelligible; but, hear zis. I speak not often of my money; but I say—it is in your ear—a man of millions, he is a king!” The Greek jumped up and folded a couple of notes. “I will not have her disturbed. Let her sing now and awhile to Pericles and his public: and to ze Londoners, wiz your permission, Count Ammiani, one saison. I ask no more, and I am satisfied, and I endow your oldest child, signor Conte—it is said! For its mama was a good girl, a brave girl; she troubled Pericles, because he is an intellect; but he forgives when he sees sincerity—rare zing! Sincerity and genius: it may be zey are as man and wife in a bosom. He forgives; it is not onnly voice he craves, but a soul, and Sandra, your countess, she has a soul—I am not a Turk. I say, it is a woman in whom a girl I did see a soul! A woman when she is married, she is part of ze man; but a soul, it is for ever alone, apart, confounded wiz nobody! For it I followed Sandra, your countess. It was a sublime devotion of a dog. Her voice tsrilled, her soul possessed me, Your countess is my Sandra still. I shall be pleased if child-bearing trouble her not more zan a very little; but, enfin! she is married, and you and I, my friend Wilfrid, we must accept ze decree, and say, no harm to her out of ze way of nature, by Saint Nicolas! or any what saint you choose for your invocation. Come along. And speed my letters by one of your militaires at once off. Are Pericles’ millions gold of bad mint? If so, he is an incapable. He presumes it is not so. Come along; we will drink to her in essence of Tokay. You shall witness two scenes. Away!”

Wilfrid was barely to be roused from his fit of brooding into which Pericles had thrown him. He sent the letters, and begged to be left to sleep. The image of Vittoria seen through this man’s mind was new, and brought a new round of torments. “The devil take you,” he cried when Pericles plucked at his arm, “I’ve sent the letters; isn’t that enough?” He was bitterly jealous of the Greek’s philosophic review of the conditions of Vittoria’s marriage; for when he had come away from the concert, not a thought of her being a wife had clouded his resignation to the fact. He went with Pericles, nevertheless, and was compelled to acknowledge the kindling powers of the essence of Tokay. “Where do you get this stuff?” he asked several times. Pericles chattered of England, and Hagar’s ‘Addio,’ and ‘Camilla.’ What cabinet operas would he not give! What entertainments! Could an emperor offer such festivities to his subjects? Was a Field Review equal to Vittoria’s voice? He stung Wilfrid’s ears by insisting on the mellowed depth, the soft human warmth, which marriage had lent to the voice. At a late hour his valet announced Countess d’Isorella. “Did I not say so?” cried Pericles, and corrected himself: “No, I did not say so; it was a surprise to you, my friend. You shall see; you shall hear. Now you shall see what a friend Pericles can be when a person satisfy him.” He pushed Wilfrid into his dressing-room, and immediately received the countess with an outburst of brutal invectives—pulling her up and down the ranked regiment of her misdeeds, as it were. She tried dignity, tried anger, she affected amazement, she petitioned for the heads of his accusations, and, as nothing stopped him, she turned to go. Pericles laughed when she had left the room. Irma di Karski was announced the next minute, and Countess d’Isorella re-appeared beside her. Irma had a similar greeting. “I am lost,” she exclaimed. “Yes, you are lost,” said Pericles; “a word from me, and the back of the public is humped at you—ha! contessa, you touched Mdlle. Irma’s hand? She is to be on her guard, and never to think she is lost till down she goes? You are a more experienced woman! I tell you I will have no nonsense. I am Countess Alessandra Ammiani’s friend. You two, you women, are her enemies. I will ruin you both. You would prevent her singing in public places—you, Countess d’Isorella, because you do not forgive her marriage to Count Ammiani; you, Irma, to spite her for her voice. You would hiss her out of hearing, you two miserable creatures. Not another soldo for you! Not one! and to-morrow, countess, I will see my lawyer. Irma, begone, and shriek to your wardrobe! Countess d’Isorella, I have the extreme honour.”

Wilfrid marvelled to hear this titled and lovely woman speaking almost in tones of humility in reply to such outrageous insolence. She craved a private interview. Irma was temporarily expelled, and then Violetta stooped to ask what the Greek’s reason for his behaviour could be. She admitted that it was in his power to ruin her, as far as money went. “Perhaps a little farther,” said Pericles; “say two steps. If one is on a precipice, two steps count for something.” But, what had she done? Pericles refused to declare it. This set her guessing with a charming naivete. Pericles called Irma back to assist her in the task, and quitted them that they might consult together and hit upon the right thing. His object was to send his valet for Luigi Saracco. He had seen that no truth could be extracted from these women, save forcibly. Unaware that he had gone out, Wilfrid listened long enough to hear Irma say, between sobs: “Oh! I shall throw myself upon his mercy. Oh, Countess d’Isorella, why did you lead me to think of vengeance! I am lost! He knows everything. Oh, what is it to me whether she lives with her husband! Let them go on plotting. I am not the Government. I am sure I don’t much dislike her. Yes, I hate her, but why should I hurt myself? She will wear those jewels on her forehead; she will wear that necklace with the big amethysts, and pretend she’s humble because she doesn’t carry earrings, when her ears have never been pierced! I am lost! Yes, you may say, lookup! I am only a poor singer, and he can ruin me. Oh! Countess d’Isorella, oh! what a fearful punishment. If Countess Anna should betray Count Ammiani to-night, nothing, nothing, will save me. I will confess. Let us both be beforehand with her—or you, it does not matter for a noble lady.”

“Hush!” said Violetta. “What dreadful fool is this I sit with? You may have done what you think of doing already.”

She walked to the staircase door, and to that of the suite. An honourable sentiment, conjoined to the knowledge that he had heard sufficient, induced Wilfrid to pass on into the sleeping apartment a moment or so before Violetta took this precaution. The potent liquor of Pericles had deprived him of consecutive ideas; he sat nursing a thunder in his head, imagining it to be profound thought, till Pericles flung the door open. Violetta and Irma had departed. “Behold! I have it; ze address of your rogue Barto Rizzo,” said Pericles, in the manner of one whose triumph is absolutely due to his own shrewdness. “Are two women a match for me? Now, my friend, you shall see. Barto Rizzo is too clever for zis government, which cannot catch him. I catch him, and I teach him he may touch politics—it is not for him to touch Art. What! to hound men to interrupt her while she sings in public places? What next! But I knew my Countess d’Isorella could help me, and so I sent for her to confront Irma, and dare to say she knew not Barto’s dwelling—and why? I will tell you a secret. A long-flattered woman, my friend, she has had, you will think, enough of it; no! she is like avarice. If it is worship of swine, she cannot refuse it. Barto Rizzo worships her; so it is a deduction—she knows his abode—I act upon that, and I arrive at my end. I now send him to ze devil.”

Barto Rizzo, after having evaded the polizia of the city during a three months’ steady chase, was effectually captured on the doorstep of Vittoria’s house in the Corso Francesco, by gendarmes whom Pericles had set on his track. A day later Vittoria was stabbed at about the same hour, on the same spot. A woman dealt the blow. Vittoria was returning from an afternoon drive with Laura Piaveni and the children. She saw a woman seated on the steps as beggarwomen sit, face in lap. Anxious to shield her from the lacquey, she sent the two little ones up to her with small bits of money. But, as the woman would not lift her head, she and Laura prepared to pass her, Laura coming last. The blow, like all such unexpected incidents, had the effect of lightning on those present; the woman might have escaped, but after she had struck she sat down impassive as a cat by the hearth, with a round-eyed stare.

The news that Vittoria had been assassinated traversed the city. Carlo was in Turin, Merthyr in Rome. Pericles was one of the first who reached the house; he was coming out when Wilfrid and the Duchess of Graatli drove up; and he accused the Countess d’Isorella flatly of having instigated the murder. He was frantic. They supposed that she must have succumbed to the wound. The duchess sent for Laura. There was a press of carriages and soft-humming people in the street; many women and men sobbing. Wilfrid had to wait an hour for the duchess, who brought comfort when she came. Her first words were reassuring. “Ah!” she said, “did I not do well to make you drive here with me instead of with Lena? Those eyes of yours would be unpardonable to her. Yes, indeed; though a corpse were lying in this house; but Countess Alessandra is safe. I have seen her. I have held her hand.”

Wilfrid kissed the duchess’s hand passionately.

What she had said of Lena was true: Lena could only be generous upon the after-thought; and when the duchess drove Wilfrid back to her, he had to submit to hear scorn: and indignation against all Italians, who were denounced as cut-throats, and worse and worse and worse, males and females alike. This way grounded on her sympathy for Vittoria. But Wilfrid now felt toward the Italians through his remembrance of that devoted soul’s love of them, and with one direct look he bade his betrothed good-bye, and they parted.

It was in the early days of March that Merthyr, then among the Republicans of Rome, heard from Laura Piaveni. Two letters reached him, one telling of the attempted assassination, and a second explaining circumstances connected with it. The first summoned him to Milan; the other left it to his option to make the journey. He started, carrying kind messages from the Chief to Vittoria, and from Luciano Ramara the offer of a renewal of old friendship to Count Ammiani. His political object was to persuade the Lombard youth to turn their whole strength upon Rome. The desire of his heart was again to see her, who had been so nearly lost to all eyes for ever.

Laura’s first letter stated brief facts. “She was stabbed this afternoon, at half-past two, on the steps of her house, by a woman called the wife of Barto Rizzo. She caught her hands up under her throat when she saw the dagger. Her right arm was penetrated just above the wrist, and half-an-inch in the left breast, close to the centre bone. She behaved firmly. The assassin only struck once. No visible danger; but you should come, if you have no serious work.”

“Happily,” ran the subsequent letter, of two days’ later date, “the assassin was a woman, and one effort exhausts a woman; she struck only once, and became idiotic. Sandra has no fever. She had her wits ready—where were mine?—when she received the wound. While I had her in my arms, she gave orders that the woman should be driven out of the city in her carriage. The Greek, her mad musical adorer, accuses Countess d’Isorella. Carlo has seen this person—returns convinced of her innocence. That is not an accepted proof; but we have one. It seems that Rizzo (Sandra was secret about it and about one or two other things) sent to her commanding her to appoint an hour detestable style! I can see it now; I fear these conspiracies no longer:—she did appoint an hour; and was awaiting him when the gendarmes sprang on the man at her door.

“He had evaded them several weeks, so we are to fancy that his wife charged Countess Alessandra with the betrayal. This appears a reasonable and simple way of accounting for the deed. So I only partly give credit to it. But it may be true.

“The wound has not produced a shock to her system—very, very fortunately. On the whole, a better thing could not have happened. Should I be more explicit? Yes, to you; for you are not of those who see too much in what is barely said. The wound, then, my dear good friend, has healed another wound, of which I knew nothing. Bergamasc and Brescian friends of her husband’s, have imagined that she interrupted or diverted his studies. He also discovered that she had an opinion of her own, and sometimes he consulted it; but alas! they are lovers, and he knew not when love listened, or she when love spoke; and there was grave business to be done meanwhile. Can you kindly allow that the case was open to a little confusion? I know that you will. He had to hear many violent reproaches from his fellow-students. These have ceased. I send this letter on the chance of the first being lost on the road; and it will supplement the first pleasantly to you in any event. She lies here in the room where I write, propped on high pillows, the right arm bound up, and says: ‘Tell Merthyr I prayed to be in Rome with my husband, and him, and the Chief. Tell him I love my friend. Tell him I think he deserves to be in Rome. Tell him—’ Enter Countess Ammiani to reprove her for endangering the hopes of the house by fatiguing herself. Sandra sends a blush at me, and I smile, and the countess kisses her. I send you a literal transcript of one short scene, so that you may feel at home with us.

“There is a place called Venice, and there is a place called Rome, and both places are pretty places and famous places; and there is a thing called the fashion; and these pretty places and famous places set the fashion: and there is a place called Milan, and a place called Bergamo, and a place called Brescia, and they all want to follow the fashion, for they are giddy-pated baggages. What is the fashion, mama? The fashion, my dear, is &c. &c. &c.:—Extract of lecture to my little daughter, Amalia, who says she forgets you; but Giacomo sends his manly love. Oh, good God! should I have blood in my lips when I kissed him, if I knew that he was old enough to go out with a sword in his hand a week hence? I seem every day to be growing more and more all mother. This month in front of us is full of thunder. Addio!”

When Merthyr stood in sight of Milan an army was issuing from the gates.

Merthyr saw Laura first. He thought that Vittoria must be lying on her couch: but Laura simply figured her arm in a sling, and signified, more than said, that Vittoria was well and taking the air. She then begged hungrily for news of Rome, and again of Rome, and sat with her hands clasped in her lap to listen. She mentioned Venice in a short breath of praise, as if her spirit could not repose there. Rome, its hospitals, its municipal arrangements, the names of the triumvirs, the prospects of the city, the edicts, the aspects of the streets, the popularity of the Government, the number of volunteers ranked under the magical Republic—of these things Merthyr talked, at her continual instigation, till, stopping abruptly, he asked her if she wished to divert him from any painful subject. “No, no!” she cried, “it’s only that I want to feel an anchor. We are all adrift. Sandra is in perfect health. Our bodies, dear Merthyr, are enjoying the perfection of comfort. Nothing is done here except to keep us from boiling over.”

“Why does not Count Ammiani come to Rome?” said Merthyr.

“Why are we not all in Rome? Yes, why! why! We should make a carnival of our own if we were.”

“She would have escaped that horrible knife,” Merthyr sighed.

“Yes, she would have escaped that horrible knife. But see the difference between Milan and Rome, my friend! It was a blessed knife here. It has given her husband back to her; it has destroyed the intrigues against her. It seems to have been sent—I was kneeling in the cathedral this morning, and had the very image crossing my eyes—from the saints of heaven to cut the black knot. Perhaps it may be the means of sending us to Rome.”

Laura paused, and, looking at him, said, “It is so utterly impossible for us women to comprehend love without folly in a man; the trait by which we recognize it! Merthyr, you dear Englishman, you shall know everything. Do we not think a tisane a weak washy drink, when we are strong? But we learn, when we lie with our chins up, and our ten toes like stopped organ-pipes—as Sandra says—we learn then that it means fresh health and activity, and is better than rivers of your fiery wines. You love her, do you not?”

The question came with great simplicity.

“If I can give a proof of it, I am ready to answer,” said Merthyr, in some surprise.

“Your whole life is the proof of it. The women of your country are intolerable to me, Merthyr: but I do see the worth of the men. Sandra has taught me. She can think of you, talk of you, kiss the vision of you, and still be a faithful woman in our bondage of flesh; and to us you know what a bondage it is: How can that be? I should have asked, if I had not seen it. Dearest, she loves her husband, and she loves you. She has two husbands, and she turns to the husband of her spirit when that, or any, dagger strikes her bosom. Carlo has an unripe mind. They have been married but a little more than four months; and he reveres her and loves her.”…. Laura’s voice dragged. “Multiply the months by thousands, we shall not make those two lives one. It is the curse of man’s education in Italy? He can see that she has wits and courage. He will not consent to make use of them. You know her: she is not one to talk of these things. She, who has both heart and judgement—she is merely a little boat tied to a big ship. Such is their marriage. She cannot influence him. She is not allowed to advise him. And she is the one who should lead the way. And—if she did, we should now be within sight of the City.”

Laura took his hand. She found it moist, though his face was calm and his chest heaved regularly. An impish form of the pity women feel for us at times moved her to say, “Your skin is as bronzed as it was last year. Sandra spoke of it. She compared it to a young vine-leaf. I wonder whether girls have really an admonition of what is good for them while they are going their ways like destined machines?”

“Almost all men are of flesh and blood,” said Merthyr softly.

“I spoke of girls.”

“I speak of men.”

“Blunt—witted that I am! Of course you did. But do not imagine that she is not happy with her husband. They are united firmly.”

“The better for her, and him, and me,” said Merthyr.

Laura twisted an end of her scarf with fretful fingers. “Carlo Albert has crossed the Ticino?”

“Is about to do so,” Merthyr rejoined.

“Will Rome hold on if he is defeated?”

“Rome has nothing to fear on that side.”

“But you do not speak hopefully of Rome.”

“I suppose I am thinking of other matters.”

“You confess it!”

The random conversation wearied him. His foot tapped the floor.

“为什么这么说？” 他问。

“Verily, for no other reason than that I have a wicked curiosity, and that you come from Rome,” said Laura, now perfectly frank, and believing that she had explained her enigmatical talk, if she had not furnished an excuse for it. Merthyr came from the City which was now encircled by an irradiating halo in her imagination, and a fit of spontaneous inexplicable feminine tenderness being upon her at the moment of their meeting, she found herself on a sudden prompted to touch and probe and brood voluptuously over an unfortunate lover’s feelings, supposing that they existed. For the glory of Rome was on him, and she was at the same time angry with Carlo Ammiani. It was the form of passion her dedicated widowhood could still be subject to in its youth; the sole one. By this chance Merthyr learnt what nothing else would have told him.

Her tale of the attempted assassination was related with palpable indifference. 她陈述了事实。 “The woman seemed to gasp while she had her hand up; she struck with no force; and she has since been inanimate, I hear. The doctor says that a spasm of the heart seized her when she was about to strike. It has been shaken—I am not sure that he does not say displaced, or unseated—by some one of her black tempers. She shot Rinaldo Guidascarpi dead. Perhaps it was that. I am informed that she worshipped the poor boy, and has been like a trapped she-wolf since she did it. In some way she associated our darling with Rinaldo’s death, like the brute she is. The ostensible ground for her futile bit of devilishness was that she fancied Sandra to have betrayed Barto Rizzo, her husband, into the hands of the polizia. He wrote to the Countess Alessandra—such a letter!—a curiosity!—he must see her and cross-examine her to satisfy himself that she was a true patriot, &c. You know the style: we neither of us like it. Sandra was waiting to receive him when they pounced on him by the door. Next day the woman struck at her. Decidedly a handsome woman. She is the exact contrast to the Countess Violetta in face, in everything. Heart-disease will certainly never affect that pretty spy! But, mark,” pursued Laura, warming, “when Carlo arrived, tears, penitence, heaps of self-accusations: he had been unkind to her even on Lake Orta, where they passed their golden month; he had neglected her at Turin; he had spoken angry words in Milan; in fact, he had misused his treasure, and begged pardon;—‘If you please, my poor bleeding angel, I am sorry. But do not, I entreat, distract me with petitions of any sort, though I will perform anything earthly to satisfy you. Be a good little boat in the wake of the big ship. I will look over at you, and chirrup now and then to you, my dearest, when I am not engaged in piloting extraordinary.’—Very well; I do not mean to sneer at the unhappy boy, Merthyr; I love him; he was my husband’s brother in arms; the sweetest lad ever seen. He is in the season of faults. He must command; he must be a chief; he fancies he can intrigue poor thing! 会过去的。 And so will the hour to be forward to Rome. But I call your attention to this: when he heard of the dagger—I have it from Colonel Corte, who was with him at the time in Turin—he cried out Violetta d’Isorella’s name. 为什么？ After he had buried his head an hour on Sandra’s pillow, he went straight to Countess d’Isorella, and was absent till night. The woman is hideous to me. No; don’t conceive that I think her Sandra’s rival. She is too jealous. She has him in some web. If she has not ruined him, she will. She was under my eyes the night she heard of his marriage: I saw how she will look at seventy! Here is Carlo at the head of a plot she has prepared for him; and he has Angelo Guidascarpi, and Ugo Corte, Marco Sana, Giulio Bandinelli, and about fifty others. They have all been kept away from Rome by that detestable ——-, you object to hear bad names cast on women, Merthyr. Hear Agostino! The poor old man comes daily to this house to persuade Carlo to lead his band to Rome. It is so clearly Rome—Rome, where all his comrades are; where the chief stand must be made by the side of Italy’s Chief. Worst sign of all, it has been hinted semi-officially to Carlo that he may upon application be permitted to re-issue his journal.

Laura started up as the door opened, and Vittoria appeared leaning upon Carlo’s arm. Countess Ammiani, Countess d’Isorella, and Pericles were behind them. Laura’s children followed.

When Merthyr rose, Vittoria was smiling in Carlo’s face at something that had been spoken. She was pale, and her arm was in a sling, but there was no appearance of her being unnerved. Merthyr waited for her recognition of him. She turned her eyes from Carlo slowly. The soft dull smile in them died out as it were with a throb, and then her head drooped on one shoulder, and she sank to the floor.

Merthyr left the house at Laura’s whispered suggestion. He was agitated beyond control, for Vittoria had fallen with her eyes fixed on him; and at times the picture of his beloved, her husband, and Countess Ammiani, and the children bending over her still body, swam before him like a dark altar-piece floating in incense, so lost was he to the reality of that scene. He did not hear Beppo, his old servant, at his heels. After a while he walked calmly, and Beppo came up beside him. Merthyr shook his hand.

“Ah, signor Mertyrio! ah, padrone!” said Beppo.

Merthyr directed his observation to a regiment of Austrians marching down the Corso Venezia to the Ticinese gate.

“Yes, they are ready enough for us,” Beppo remarked. “Perhaps Carlo Alberto will beat them this time. If he does, viva to him! If they beat him, down goes another Venetian pyramid. The Countess Alessandra—” Beppo’s speech failed.

“What of your mistress?” said Merthyr.

“When she dies, my dear master, there’s no one for me but the Madonna to serve.”

“Why should she die, silly fellow?”

“Because she never cries.”

Merthyr was on the point of saying, “Why should she cry?” His heart was too full, and he shrank from inquisitive shadows of the thing known to him.

“Sit down at this caffe with me,” he said. “It’s fine weather for March. The troops will camp comfortably. Those Hungarians never require tents. Did you see much sacking of villages last year?”

“Padrone, the Imperial command is always to spare the villages.”

“That’s humane.”

“Padrone, yes; if policy is humanity.”

“It’s humanity not carried quite as far as we should wish it.”

Beppo shrugged and said: “It won’t leave much upon the conscience if we kill them.”

“Do you expect a rising?” said Merthyr.

“If the Ticino overflows, it will flood Milan,” was the answer.

“And your occupation now is to watch the height of the water?”

“My occupation, padrone? I am not on the watch-tower.” Beppo winked, adding: “I have my occupation.” He threw off the effort or pretence to be discreet. “Master of my soul! this is my occupation. I drink coffee, but I do not smoke, because I have to kiss a pretty girl, who means to object to the smell of the smoke. Via! I know her! At five she draws me into the house.”

“Are you relating your amours to me, rascal?” Merthyr interposed.

“Padrone, at five precisely she draws me into the house. She is a German girl. Pardon me if I make no war on women. Her name is Aennchen, which one is able to say if one grimaces;—why not? It makes her laugh; and German girls are amiable when one can make them laugh. ‘Tis so that they begin to melt. Behold the difference of races! I must kiss her to melt her, and then have a quarrel. I could have it after the first, or the fiftieth with an Italian girl; but my task will be excessively difficult with a German girl, if I am compelled to allow myself to favour her with one happy solicitation for a kiss, to commence with. We shall see. It is, as my abstention from tobacco declares, an anticipated catastrophe.”

“Long-worded, long-winded, obscure, affirmatizing by negatives, confessing by implication!—where’s the beginning and end of you, and what’s your meaning?” said Merthyr, who talked to him as one may talk to an Italian servant.

“The contessa, my mistress, has enemies. Padrone, I devote myself to her service.”

“By making love to a lady’s maid?”

“Padrone, a rat is not born to find his way up the grand staircase. She has enemies. One of them was the sublime Barto Rizzo—admirable—though I must hate him. He said to his wife: ‘If a thing happens to me, stab to the heart the Countess Alessandra Ammiani.’”

“Inform me how you know that?” said Merthyr.

Beppo pointed to his head, and Merthyr smiled. To imagine, invent, and believe, were spontaneous with Beppo when has practical sagacity was not on the stretch. He glanced at the caffe clock.

“Padrone, at eleven to-night shall I see you here? At eleven I shall come like a charged cannon. I have business. I have seen my mistress’s blood! I will tell you: this German girl lets me know that some one detests my mistress. Who? I am off to discover. But who is the damned creature? I must coo and kiss, while my toes are dancing on hot plates, to find her out. Who is she? If she were half Milan…”

His hands waved in outline the remainder of the speech, and he rose, but sat again. He had caught sight of the spy, Luigi Saracco, addressing the signor Antonio-Pericles in his carriage. Pericles drove on. The horses presently turned, and he saluted Merthyr.

“She has but one friend in Milan: it is myself,” was his introductory remark. “My poor child! my dear Powys, she is the best—‘I cannot sing to you to-day, dear Pericles’—she said that after she had opened her eyes; after the first mist, you know. She is the best child upon earth. I could wish she were a devil, my Powys. Such a voice should be in an iron body. But she has immense health. The doctor, who is also mine, feels her pulse. He assures me it goes as Time himself, and Time, my friend, you know, has the intention of going a great way. She is good: she is too good. She makes a baby of Pericles, to whom what is woman? Have I not the sex in my pocket? Her husband, he is a fool, ser.” Pericles broke thundering into a sentence of English, fell in love with it, and resumed in the same tongue: “I—it is I zat am her guard, her safety. Her husband—oh! she must marry a young man, little donkey zat she is! We accept it as a destiny, my Powys. And he plays false to her. Good; I do not object. But, imagine in your own mind, my Powys—instead of passion, of rage, of tempest, she is frozen wiz a repose. Do you, hein? sink it will come out,”—Pericles eyed Merthyr with a subtle smile askew,—“I have sot so;—it will come out when she is one day in a terrible scene … Mon Dieu! it was a terrible scene for me when I looked on ze clout zat washed ze blood of ze terrible assassination. So goes out a voice, possibly! Divine, you say? We are a machine. Now, you behold, she has faints. It may happen at my concert where she sings to-morrow night. You saw me in my carriage speaking to a man. He is my spy—my dog wiz a nose. I have set him upon a woman. If zat woman has a plot for to-morrow night to spoil my concert, she shall not know where she shall wake to-morrow morning after. Ha! here is military music—twenty sossand doors jam on horrid hinge; and right, left, right, left, to it, confound! like dolls all wiz one face. Look at your soldiers, Powys. Put zem on a stage, and you see all background people—a bawling chorus. It shows to you how superior it is—a stage to life! Hark to such music! I cannot stand it; I am driven away; I am violent; I rage.”

Pericles howled the name of his place of residence, with an offer of lodgings in it, and was carried off writhing his body as he passed a fine military marching band.

The figure of old Agostino Balderini stood in front of Merthyr. They exchanged greetings. At the mention of Rome, Agostino frowned impatiently. He spoke of Vittoria in two or three short exclamations, and was about to speak of Carlo, but checked his tongue. “Judge for yourself. Come, and see, and approve, if you can. Will you come? There’s a meeting; there’s to be a resolution. Question—Shall we second the King of Sardinia, Piedmont, and Savoy? If so, let us set this pumpkin, called Milan, on its legs. I shall be an attentive listener like you, my friend. I speak no more.”

Merthyr went with him to the house of a carpenter, where in one of the uppermost chambers communicating with the roof, Ugo Corte, Marco Sana, Giulio Bandinelli, and others, sat waiting for the arrival of Carlo Ammiani; when he came Carlo had to bear with the looks of mastiffs for being late. He shook Merthyr’s hand hurriedly, and as soon as the door was fastened, began to speak. His first sentence brought a grunt of derision from Ugo Corte. It declared that there was no hope of a rising in Milan. Carlo swung round upon the Bergamasc. “Observe our leader,” Agostino whispered to Merthyr; “it would be kindness to give him a duel.” More than one tumult of outcries had to be stilled before Merthyr gathered any notion of the designs of the persons present. Bergamasc sneered at Brescian, and both united in contempt of the Milanese, who, having a burden on their minds, appealed at once to their individual willingness to use the sword in vindication of Milan against its traducers. By a great effort, Carlo got some self-mastery. He admitted, colouring horribly, that Brescia and Bergamo were ready, and Milan was not; therefore those noble cities (he read excerpts from letters showing their readiness) were to take the lead, and thither on the morrow-night he would go, let the tidings from the king’s army be what they might.

Merthyr quitted the place rather impressed by his eloquence, but unfavourably by his feverish look. Countess d’Isorella had been referred to as one who served the cause ably and faithfully. In alluding to her, Carlo bit his lip; he did not proceed until surrounding murmurs of satisfaction encouraged him to continue a sort of formal eulogy of the lady, which proved to be a defence against foregone charges, for Corte retracted an accusation, and said that he had no fault to find with the countess. A proposal to join the enterprise was put to Merthyr, but his engagement with the Chief in Rome saved him from hearing much of the marvellous facilities of the plot. “I should have wished to see you to-night,” Carlo said as they were parting. Merthyr named his hotel. Carlo nodded. “My wife is still slightly feeble,” he said.

“I regret it,” Merthyr rejoined.

“She is not ill.”

“No, it cannot be want of courage,” Merthyr spoke at random.

“Yes, that’s true,” said Carlo, as vacantly. “You will see her while I am travelling.”

“I hope to find the Countess Alessandra well enough to receive me.”

“Always; always,” said Carlo, wishing apparently to say more. Merthyr waited an instant, but Carlo broke into a conventional smile of adieu.

“While he is travelling,” Merthyr repeated to Agostino, who had stood by during the brief dialogue, and led the way to the Corso.

“He did not say how far!” was the old man’s ejaculation.

“But, good heaven! if you think he’s on an unfortunate errand, why don’t you stop him, advise him?” Merthyr broke out.

“Advise him! stop him! my friend. I would advise him, if I had the patience of angels; stop him, if I had the power of Lucifer. Did you not see that he shunned speaking to me? I have been such a perpetual dish of vinegar under his nose for the last month, that the poor fellow sniffs when I draw near. He must go his way. He leads a torrent that must sweep him on. Corte, Sana, and the rest would be in Rome now, but for him. So should I. Your Agostino, however, is not of Bergamo, or of Brescia; he is not a madman; simply a poor rheumatic Piedmontese, who discerns the point where a united Italy may fix its standard. I would start for Rome to-morrow, if I could leave her—my soul’s child!” Agostino raised his hand: “I do love the woman, Countess Alessandra Ammiani. I say, she is a peerless woman. Is she not?”

“There is none like her,” said Merthyr.

“A peerless woman, recognized and sacrificed! I cannot leave her. If the Government here would lay hands on Carlo and do their worst at once, I would be off. They are too wary. I believe that they are luring him to his ruin. I can give no proofs, but I judge by the best evidence. What avails my telling him? I lose my temper the moment I begin to speak. A curst witch beguiles the handsome idiot—poor darling lad that he is! She has him—can I tell you how? She has got him—got him fast!—The nature of the chains are doubtless innocent, if those which a woman throws round us be ever distinguishable. He loves his wife—he is not a monster.”

“He appears desperately feverish,” said Merthyr.

“Did you not notice it? Yes, like a man pushed by his destiny out of the path. He is ashamed to hesitate; he cannot turn back. Ahead of him he sees a gulf. That army of Carlo Alberto may do something under its Pole. Prophecy is too easy. I say no more. We may have Lombardy open; and if so, my poor boy’s vanity will be crowned: he will only have the king and his army against him then.”

Discoursing in this wise, they reached the caffe where Beppo had appointed to meet his old master, and sat amid here and there a whitecoat, and many nods and whispers over such news as the privileged journals and the official gazette afforded.

Beppo’s destination was to the Duchess of Graatli’s palace. Nearing it, he perceived Luigi endeavouring to gain a passage beside the burly form of Jacob Baumwalder Feckelwitz, who presently seized him and hurled him into the road. As Beppo was sidling up the courtway, Jacob sprang back; Luigi made a rush; Jacob caught them both, but they wriggled out of his clutch, and Luigi, being the fearfuller, ran the farthest. While he was out of hearing, Beppo told Jacob to keep watch upon Luigi, as the bearer of an amorous letter from a signor of quality to Aennchen, the which he himself desired to obtain sight of; “for the wench has caused me three sleepless nights,” he confessed frankly. Jacob affected not to understand. Luigi and Beppo now leaned against the wall on either side of him and baited him till he shook with rage.

“He is the lord of the duchess, his mistress—what a lucky fellow!” said Luigi. “When he’s dog at the gates no one can approach her. When he isn’t, you can fancy what!”—“He’s only a mechanical contrivance; he’s not a man,” said Beppo. “He’s the principal flea-catcher of the palace,” said Luigi—“here he is all day, and at night the devil knows where he hunts.”—Luigi hopped in a half-circle round the exacerbated Jacob, and finally provoked an assault that gave an opening to Beppo. They all ran in, Luigi last. Jacob chased Beppo up the stairs, lost him, and remembered what he had said of the letter borne by Luigi, for whom he determined to lie in waiting. “Better two in there than one,” he thought. The two courted his Aennchen openly; but Luigi, as the bearer of an amorous letter from the signor of quality, who could be no other than signor Antonio-Pericles, was the one to be intercepted. Like other jealous lovers, Jacob wanted to read Aennchen’s answer, to be cured of his fatal passion for the maiden, and on this he set the entire force of his mind.

Running up by different staircases, Beppo and Luigi came upon Aennchen nearly at the same time. She turned a cold face on Beppo, and requested Luigi to follow her. Astonished to see him in such favour, Beppo was ready to provoke the quarrel before the kiss when she returned; but she said that she had obeyed her mistress’s orders, and was obeying the duchess in refusing to speak of them, or of anything relating to them. She had promised him an interview in that little room leading into the duchess’s boudoir. He pressed her to conduct him. “Ah; then it’s not for me you come,” she said. Beppo had calculated that the kiss would open his way to the room, and the quarrel disembarrass him of his pretty companion when there. “You have come to listen to conversation again,” said Aennchen. “Ach! the fool a woman is to think that you Italians have any idea except self-interest when you, when you… talk nonsense to us. Go away, if you please. Good-evening.” She dropped a curtsey with a surly coquetry, charming of its kind. Beppo protested that the room was dear to him because there first he had known for one blissful half-second the sweetness of her mouth.

“Who told you that persons who don’t like your mistress are going to talk in there?” said Aennchen.

“You,” said Beppo.

Aennchen drew up in triumph: “And now will you pretend that you didn’t come up here to go in there to listen to what they say?”

Beppo clapped hands at her cleverness in trapping him. “Hush,” said all her limbs and features, belying the previous formal “good-evening.” He refused to be silent, thinking it a way of getting to the little antechamber. “Then, I tell you, downstairs you go,” said Aennchen stiffly.

“Is it decided?” Beppo asked. “Then, good-evening. You detestable German girls can’t love. One step—a smile: another step—a kiss. You tit-for-tat minx! Have you no notion of the sacredness of the sentiments which inspires me to petition that the place for our interview should be there where I tasted ecstatic joy for the space of a flash of lightning? I will go; but it is there that I will go, and I will await you there, signorina Aennchen. Yes, laugh at me! laugh at me!”

“No; really, I don’t laugh at you, signor Beppo,” said Aennchen, protesting in denial of what she was doing. “This way.”

“No, it’s that way,” said Beppo.

“It’s through here.” She opened a door. “The duchess has a reception to-night, and you can’t go round. Ach! you would not betray me?”

“Not if it were the duchess herself,” said Beppo; “he would refuse to satisfy man’s natural vanity, in such a case.”

Eager to advance to the little antechamber, he allowed Aennchen to wait behind him. He heard the door shut and a lock turn, and he was in the dark, and alone, left to take counsel of his fingers’ ends.

“She was born to it,” Beppo remarked, to extenuate his outwitted cunning, when he found each door of the room fast against him.

On the following night Vittoria was to sing at a concert in the Duchess of Graatli’s great saloon, and the duchess had humoured Pericles by consenting to his preposterous request that his spy should have an opportunity of hearing Countess d’Isorella and Irma di Karski in private conversation together, to discover whether there was any plot of any sort to vex the evening’s entertainment; as the jealous spite of those two women, Pericles said, was equal to any devilry on earth. It happened that Countess d’Isorella did not come. Luigi, in despair,—was the hearer of a quick question and answer dialogue, in the obscure German tongue, between Anna von Lenkenstein and Irma di Karski; but a happy peep between the hanging curtains gave him sight of a letter passing from Anna’s hands to Irma’s. Anna quitted her. Irma, was looking at the superscription of the letter, an the act of passing in her steps, when Luigi tore the curtains apart, and sprang on her arm like a cat. Before her shrieks could bring succour, Luigi was bounding across the court with the letter in his possession. A dreadful hug awaited him; his pockets were ransacked, and he was pitched aching into the street. Jacob Baumwalder Feckelwitz went straightway under a gas-lamp, where he read the address of the letter to Countess d’Isorella. He doubted; he had a half-desire to tear the letter open. But a rumour of the attack upon Irma had spread among the domestics and Jacob prudently went up to his mistress. The duchess was sitting with Laura. She received the letter, eyed: it all over, and held it to a candle.

Laura’s head was bent in dark meditation. The sudden increase of light aroused her, and she asked, “What is that?”

“A letter from Countess Anna to Countess d’Isorella,” said the duchess.

“Burnt!” Laura screamed.

“It’s only fair,” the duchess remarked.

“From her to that woman! It may be priceless. Stop! Let me see what remains. Amalia! are you mad? Oh! you false friend. I would have sacrificed my right hand to see it.”

“Try and love me still,” said the duchess, letting her take one unburnt corner, and crumble the black tissuey fragments to smut in her hands.

There was no writing; the unburnt corner of the letter was a blank.

Laura fooled the wretched ashes between her palms. “Good-night,” she said. “Your face will be of this colour to me, my dear, for long.”

“I cannot behave disgracefully, even to keep your love, my beloved,” said the duchess.

“You cannot betray a German, you mean,” Laura retorted. “You could let a spy into the house.”

“That was a childish matter—merely to satisfy a whim.”

“I say you could let a spy into the house. Who is to know where the scruples of you women begin? I would have given my jewels, my head, my husband’s sword, for a sight of that letter. I swear that it concerns us. Yes, us. You are a false friend. Fish-blooded creature! may it be a year before I look on you again. Hide among your miserable set!”

“Judge me when you are cooler, dearest,” said the duchess, seeking to detain the impetuous sister of her affection by the sweeping skirts; but Laura spurned her touch, and went from her.

Irma drove to Countess d’Isorella’s. Violetta was abed, and lay fair and placid as a Titian Venus, while Irma sputtered out her tale, with intermittent sobs. She rose upon her elbow, and planting it in her pillow, took half-a-dozen puffs of a cigarette, and then requested Irma to ring for her maid. “Do nothing till you see me again,” she said; “and take my advice: always get to bed before midnight, or you’ll have unmanageable wrinkles in a couple of years. If you had been in bed at a prudent hour to-night, this scandal would not have occurred.”

“How can I be in bed? How could I help it?” moaned Irma, replying to the abstract rule, and the perplexing illustration of its force.

Violetta dismissed her. “After all, my wish is to save my poor Amaranto,” she mused. “I am only doing now what I should have been doing in the daylight; and if I can’t stop him, the Government must; and they will. Whatever the letter contained, I can anticipate it. He knows my profession and my necessities. I must have money. Why not from the rich German woman whom he jilted?”

She attributed Anna’s apparent passion of revenge to a secret passion of unrequited love. What else was implied by her willingness to part with land and money for the key to his machinations?

Violetta would have understood a revenge directed against Angelo Guidascarpi, as the slayer of Anna’s brother. But of him Anna had only inquired once, and carelessly, whether he was in Milan. Anna’s mystical semi-patriotism—prompted by her hatred of Vittoria, hatred of Carlo as Angelo’s cousin and protector, hatred of the Italy which held the three, who never took the name Tedesco on their tongues without loathing—was perfectly hidden from this shrewd head.

Some extra patrols were in the streets. As she stepped into the carriage, a man rushed up, speaking hoarsely and inarticulately, and jumped in beside her. She had discerned Barto Rizzo in time to give directions to her footman, before she was addressed by a body of gendarmes in pursuit, whom she mystified by entreating them to enter her house and search it through, if they supposed that any evil-doer had taken advantage of the open door. They informed her that a man had escaped from the civil prison. “Poor creature!” said the countess, with womanly pity; “but you must see that he is not in my house. How could three of you let one escape?” She drove off laughing at their vehement assertion that he would not have escaped from them. Barto Rizzo made her conduct him to Countess Ammiani’s gates.

Violetta was frightened by his eyes when she tried to persuade him in her best coaxing manner to avoid Count Ammiani. In fact she apprehended that he would be very much in her way. She had no time for chagrin at her loss of power over him, though she was sensible of vexation. Barto folded his arms and sat with his head in his chest, silent, till they reached the’ gates, when he said in French, “Madame, I am a nameless person in your train. Gabble!” he added, when the countess advised him not to enter; nor would he allow her to precede him by more than one step. Violetta sent up her name. The man had shaken her nerves. “At least, remember that your appearance should be decent,” she said, catching sight of blood on his hands, and torn garments. “I expect, madame,” he replied, “I shall not have time to wash before I am laid out. My time is short. I want tobacco. The washing can be done by-and-by, but not the smoking.”

They were ushered up to the reception-room, where Countess Ammiani, Vittoria, and Carlo sat, awaiting the visitor whose unexpected name, cast in their midst at so troubled a season, had clothed her with some of the midnight’s terrors.

Barto Rizzo had silence about him without having to ask for it, when he followed Violetta into Countess Ammiani’s saloon of reception. Carlo was leaning over his mother’s chair, holding Vittoria’s wrist across it, and so enclosing her, while both young faces were raised to the bowed forehead of the countess. They stood up. Violetta broke through the formal superlatives of an Italian greeting. “Speak to me alone,” she murmured for Carlo’s ear and glancing at Barto: “Here is a madman; a mild one, I trust.” She contrived to show that she was not responsible for his intrusion. Countess Ammiani gathered Vittoria in her arms; Carlo stepped a pace before them. Terror was on the venerable lady’s face, wrath on her son’s. As he fronted Barto, he motioned a finger to the curtain hangings, and Violetta, quick at reading signs, found his bare sword there. “But you will not want it,” she remarked, handing the hilt to him, and softly eyeing the impression of her warm touch on the steel as it passed.

“Carlo, thou son of Paolo! Countess Marcellina, wife of a true patriot! stand aside, both of you. It is between the Countess Alessandra and myself,” so the man commenced, with his usual pomp of interjection. “Swords and big eyes,—are they things to stop me?” Barto laughed scornfully. He had spoken in the full roll of his voice, and the sword was hard back for the thrust.

Vittoria disengaged herself from the countess. “Speak to me,” she said, dismayed by the look of what seemed an exaltation of madness in Barto’s visage, but firm as far as the trembling of her limbs would let her be.

He dropped to her feet and kissed them.

“Emilia Alessandra Belloni! Vittoria! Countess Alessandra Ammiani! pity me. Hear this:—I hated you as the devil is hated. Yesterday I woke up in prison to hear that I must adore you. God of all the pits of punishment! was there ever one like this? I had to change heads.”

It was the language of a distorted mind, and lamentable to hear when a sob shattered his voice.

“Am I mad?” he asked piteously, clasping his temples.

“You are as we are, if you weep,” said Vittoria, to sooth him.

“Then I have been mad!” he cried, starting. “I knew you a wicked virgin—signora contessa, confess to me, marriage has changed you. Has it not changed you? In the name of the Father of the Saints, help me out of it:—my brain reels backwards. You were false, but marriage—It acts in this way with you women; yes, that we know—you were married, and you said, ‘Now let us be faithful.’ Did you not say that? I am forgiving, though none think it. You have only to confess. If you will not,—oh!” He smote his face, groaning.

Carlo spoke a stern word in an undertone; counselling him to be gone.

“If you will not—what was she to do?” Barto cut the question to interrogate his strayed wits. “Look at me, Countess Alessandra. I was in the prison. I heard that my Rosellina had a tight heart. She cried for her master, poor heathen, and I sprang out of the walls to her. There—there—she lay like a breathing board; a woman with a body like a coffin half alive; not an eye to show; nothing but a body and a whisper. She perished righteously, for she disobeyed. She acted without my orders: she dared to think! She will be damned, for she would have vengeance before she went. She glorified you over me—over Barto Rizzo. Oh! she shocked my soul. But she is dead, and I am her slave. Every word was of you. Take another head, Barto Rizzo your old one was mad: she said that to my soul. She died blessing you above me. I saw the last bit of life go up from her mouth blessing you. It’s heard by this time in heaven, and it’s written. Then I have had two years of madness. If she is right, I was wrong; I was a devil of hell. I know there’s an eye given to dying creatures, and she looked with it, and she said, the soul of Rinaldo Guidascarpi, her angel, was glorifying you; and she thanked the sticking of her heart, when she tried to stab you, poor fool!”

Carlo interrupted: “Now go; you have said enough.”

“No, let him speak,” said Vittoria. She supposed that Barto was going to say that he had not given the order for her assassination. “You do not wish me dead, signore?”

“Nothing that is not standing in my way, signora contessa,” said Barto; and his features blazed with a smile of happy self-justification. “I have killed a sentinel this night: Providence placed him there. I wish for no death, but I punish, and—ah! the cursed sight of the woman who calls me mad for two years. She thrusts a bar of iron in an engine at work, and says, Work on! work on! Were you not a traitress? Countess Alessandra, were you not once a traitress? Oh! confess it; save my head. Reflect, dear lady! it’s cruel to make a man of a saintly sincerity look back—I count the months—seventeen months! to look back seventeen months, and see that his tongue was a clapper,—his will, his eyes, his ears, all about him, everything, stirred like a pot on the fire. I traced you. I saw your treachery. I said—I, I am her Day of Judgement. She shall look on me and perish, struck down by her own treachery. Were my senses false to me? I had lived in virtuous fidelity to my principles. None can accuse me. Why were my senses false, if my principles were true? I said you were a traitress. I saw it from the first. I had the divine contempt for women. My distrust of a woman was the eye of this brain, and I said—Follow her, dog her, find her out! I proved her false; but her devilish cunning deceived every other man in the world. Oh! let me bellow, for it’s me she proves the mass of corruption! Tomorrow I die, and if I am mad now, what sort of a curse is that?

“Now to-morrow is an hour—a laugh! But if I’ve not been shot from a true bow—if I’ve been a sham for two years—if my name, and nature, bones, brains, were all false things hunting a shadow, Countess Alessandra, see the misery of Barto Rizzo! Look at those two years, and say that I had my head. Answer me, as you love your husband: are you heart and soul with him in the fresh fight for Lombardy?” He said this with a look penetrating and malignant, and then by a sudden flash pitifully entreating.

Carlo feared to provoke, revolted from the thought of slaying him. “Yes, yes,” he interposed, “my wife is heart and soul in it. Go.”

Barto looked from him to her with the eyes of a dog that awaits an order.

Victoria gathered her strength, and said: “I am not.”

“It is her answer!” Barto roared, and from deep dejection his whole countenance radiated. “She says it—she might give the lie to a saint! I was never mad. I saw the spot, and put my finger on it, and not a madman can do that. My two years are my own. Mad now, for, see!

“I worship the creature. She is not heart and soul in it. She is not in it at all. She is a little woman, a lovely thing, a toy, a cantatrice. Joy to the big heart of Barto Rizzo! I am for Brescia!”

He flung his arm like a banner, and ran out.

Carlo laid his sword on a table. Vittoria’s head was on his mother’s bosom.

The hour was too full of imminent grief for either of the three to regard this scene as other than a gross intrusion ended.

“Why did you deny my words?” Carlo said coldly.

“I could not lie to make him wretched,” she replied in a low murmur.

“Do you know what that ‘I am for Brescia’ means? He goes to stir the city before a soul is ready.”

“I warned you that I should speak the truth of myself to-night, dearest.”

“You should discern between speaking truth to a madman, and to a man.”

Vittoria did not lift her eyes, and Carlo beckoned to Violetta, with whom he left the room.

“He is angry,” Countess Ammiani murmured. “My child, you cannot deal with men in a fever unless you learn to dissemble; and there is exemption for doing it, both in plain sense, and in our religion. If I could arrest him, I would speak boldly. It is, alas! vain to dream of that; and it is therefore an unkindness to cause him irritation. Carlo has given way to you by allowing you to be here when his friends assemble. He knows your intention to speak. He has done more than would have been permitted by my husband to me, though I too was well-beloved.”

Vittoria continued silent that her head might be cherished where it lay. She was roused from a stupor by hearing new voices. Laura’s lips came pressing to her cheek. Colonel Corte, Agostino, Marco Sana, and Angelo Guidascarpi, saluted her. Angelo she kissed.

“That lady should be abed and asleep,” Corte was heard to say.

The remark passed without notice. Angelo talked apart with Vittoria. He had seen the dying of the woman whose hand had been checked in the act of striking by the very passion of animal hatred which raised it. He spoke of her affectionately, attesting to the fact that Barto Rizzo had not prompted her guilt. Vittoria moaned at a short outline that he gave of the last minutes between those two, in which her name was dreadfully and fatally, incomprehensibly prominent.

All were waiting impatiently for Carlo’s return.

When he appeared he informed his mother that the Countess d’Isorella would remain in the house that night, and his mother passed out to her abhorred guest, who, for the time at least, could not be doing further mischief.

It was a meeting for the final disposition of things before the outbreak. Carlo had begun to speak when Corte drew his attention to the fact that ladies were present, at which Carlo put out his hand as if introducing them, and went on speaking.

“Your wife is here,” said Corte.

“My wife and signora Piaveni,” Carlo rejoined. “I have consented to my wife’s particular wish to be present.”

“The signora Piaveni’s opinions are known: your wife’s are not.”

“Countess Alessandra shares mine,” said Laura, rather tremulously.

Countess Ammiani at the same time returned and took Vittoria’s hand and pressed it with force. Carlo looked at them both.

“I have to ask your excuses, gentlemen. My wife, my mother, and signora Piaveni, have served the cause we worship sufficiently to claim a right—I am sorry to use such phrases; you understand my meaning. Permit them to remain. I have to tell you that Barto Rizzo has been here: he has started for Brescia. I should have had to kill him to stop him—a measure that I did not undertake.”

“Being your duty!” remarked Corte.

Agostino corrected him with a sarcasm.

“I cannot allow the presence of ladies to exclude a comment on manifest indifference,” said Corte. “Pass on to the details, if you have any.”

“The details are these,” Carlo resumed, too proud to show a shade of self-command; “my cousin Angelo leaves Milan before morning. You, Colonel Corte, will be in Bergamo at noon to-morrow. Marco and Angelo will await my coming in Brescia, where we shall find Giulio and the rest. I join them at five on the following afternoon, and my arrival signals the revolt. We have decided that the news from the king’s army is good.”

A perceptible shudder in Vittoria’s frame at this concluding sentence caught Corte’s eye.

“Are you dissatisfied with that arrangement?” he addressed her boldly.

“I am, Colonel Corte,” she replied. So simple was the answering tone of her voice that Corte had not a word.

“It is my husband who is going,” Vittoria spoke on steadily; “him I am prepared to sacrifice, as I am myself. If he thinks it right to throw himself into Brescia, nothing is left for me but to thank him for having done me the honour to consult me. His will is firm. I trust to God that he is wise. I look on him now as one of many brave men whose lives belong to Italy, and if they all are misdirected and perish, we have no more; we are lost. The king is on the Ticino; the Chief is in Rome. I desire to entreat you to take counsel before you act in anticipation of the king’s fortune. I see that it is a crushed life in Lombardy. In Rome there is one who can lead and govern. He has suffered and is calm. He calls to you to strengthen his hands. My prayer to you is to take counsel. I know the hour is late; but it is not too late for wisdom. Forgive me if I am not speaking humbly. Brescia is but Brescia; Rome is Italy. I have understood little of my country until these last days, though I have both talked and sung of her glories. I know that a deep duty binds you to Bergamo and to Brescia—poor Milan we must not think of. You are not personally pledged to Rome: yet Rome may have the greatest claims on you. The heart of our country is beginning to beat there. Colonel Corte! signor Marco! my Agostino! my cousin Angelo! it is not a woman asking for the safety of her husband, but one of the blood of Italy who begs to offer you her voice, without seeking to disturb your judgement.”

She ceased.

“Without seeking to disturb their judgement!” cried Laura. “Why not, when the judgement is in error?”

To Laura’s fiery temperament Vittoria’s speech had been feebleness. She was insensible to that which the men felt conveyed to them by the absence of emotion in the language of a woman so sorrowfully placed. “Wait,” she said, “wait for the news from Carlo Alberto, if you determine to play at swords and guns in narrow streets.” She spoke long and vehemently, using irony, coarse and fine, with the eloquence which was her gift. In conclusion she apostrophized Colonel Corte as one who had loved him might have done. He was indeed that figure of indomitable strength to which her spirit, exhausted by intensity of passion, clung more than to any other on earth, though she did not love him, scarcely liked him.

Corte asked her curiously—for she had surprised and vexed his softer side—why she distinguished him with such remarkable phrases only to declare her contempt for him.

“It’s the flag whipping the flag-pole,” murmured Agostino; and he now spoke briefly in support of the expedition to Rome; or at least in favour of delay until the King of Sardinia had gained a battle. While he was speaking, Merthyr entered the room, and behind him a messenger who brought word that Bergamo had risen.

The men drew hurriedly together, and Countess Ammiani, Vittoria and Laura stood ready to leave them.

“You will give me, five minutes?” Vittoria whispered to her husband, and he nodded.

“Merthyr,” she said, passing him, “can I have your word that you will not go from me?”

Merthyr gave her his word after he had looked on her face.

“Send to me every two hours, that I may know you are near,” she added; “do not fear waking me. Or, no, dear friend; why should I have any concealment from you? Be not a moment absent, if you would not have me fall to the ground a second time: follow me.”

Even as he hesitated, for he had urgent stuff to communicate to Carlo, he could see a dreadful whiteness rising on her face, darkening the circles of her eyes.

“It’s life or death, my dearest, and I am bound to live,” she said. Her voice sprang up from tears.

Merthyr turned and tried in vain to get a hearing among the excited, voluble men. They shook his hand, patted his shoulder, and counselled him to leave them. He obtained Carlo’s promise that he would not quit the house without granting him an interview; after which he passed out to Vittoria, where Countess Ammiani and Laura sat weeping by the door.

When they were alone Merthyr said: “I cannot give many minutes, not much time. I have to speak to your husband.”

She answered: “Give me many minutes—much time. All other speaking is vain here.”

“It concerns his safety.”

“It will not save him.”

“But I have evidence that he is betrayed. His plans are known; a trap is set for him. If he moves, he walks into a pit.”

“You would talk reason, Merthyr,” Vittoria sighed. “Talk it to me. I can listen; I thirst for it. I beat at the bars of a cage all day. When I saw you this afternoon, I looked on another life. It was too sudden, and I swooned. That was my only show of weakness. Since then you are the only strength I feel.”

“Have they all become Barto Rizzos?” Merthyr exclaimed.

“Beloved, I will open my mind to you,” said Vittoria. “I am cowardly, and I thought I had such courage! Tonight a poor mad creature has been here, who has oppressed me, I cannot say how long, with real fear—that I only understand now that I know the little ground I had for it. I am even pleased that one like Barto Rizzo should see me in a better light. I find the thought smiling in my heart when every other thing is utterly dark there. You have heard that Carlo goes to Brescia. When I was married, I lost sight of Italy, and everything but happiness. I suffer as I deserve for it now. I could have turned my husband from this black path; I preferred to dream and sing. I would not see—it was my pride that would not let me see his error. My cowardice would not let me wound him with a single suggestion. You say that he is betrayed. Then he is betrayed by the woman who has never been unintelligible to me. We were in Turin surrounded by intrigues, and there I thanked her so much for leaving me the days with my husband by Lake Orta that I did not seek to open his eyes to her. We came to Milan, and here I have been thanking her for the happy days in Turin. Carlo is no longer to blame if he will not listen to me. I have helped to teach him that I am no better than any of these Italian women whom he despises. I spoke to him as his wife should do, at last. He feigned to think me jealous, and I too remember the words of the reproach, as if they had a meaning. Ah, my friend! I would say of nothing that it is impossible, except this task of recovering lost ground with one who is young. Experience of trouble has made me older than he. When he accused me of jealousy, I could mention Countess d’Isorella’s name no more. I confess to that. Yet I knew my husband feigned. I knew that he could not conceive the idea of jealousy existing in me, as little as I could imagine unfaithfulness in him. But my lips would not take her name! Wretched cowardice cannot go farther. I spoke of Rome. As often as I spoke, that name was enough to shake me off: he had but to utter it, and I became dumb. He did it to obtain peace; for no other cause. So, by degrees, I have learnt the fatal truth. He has trusted her, for she is very skilful; distrusting her, for she is treacherous. He has, therefore, believed excessively in his ability to make use of her, and to counteract her baseness. I saw his error from the first; and I went on dreaming and singing; and now this night has come!”

Vittoria shadowed her eyes.

“I will go to him at once,” said Merthyr.

“Yes; I am relieved. Go, dear friend,” she sobbed; “you have given me tears, as I hoped. You will not turn him; had it been possible, could I have kept you from him so long? I know that you will not turn him from his purpose, for I know what a weight it is that presses him forward in that path. Do not imagine our love to be broken. He will convince you that it is not. He has the nature of an angel. He permitted me to speak before these men to-night—feeble thing that I am! It was a last effort. I might as well have tried to push a rock.”

She rose at a noise of voices in the hall below.

“They are going, Merthyr. See him now. There may be help in heaven; if one could think it! If help were given to this country—if help were only visible! The want of it makes us all without faith.”

“Hush! you may hear good news from Carlo Alberto in a few hours,” said Merthyr.

“Ask Laura; she has witnessed how he can be shattered,” Vittoria replied bitterly.

Merthyr pressed her fingers. He was met by Carlo on the stairs.

“Quick!” Carlo said; “I have scarce a minute to spare. I have my adieux to make, and the tears have set in already. First, a request: you will promise to remain beside my wife; she will want more than her own strength.”

Such a request, coming from an Italian husband, was so great a proof of the noble character of his love and his knowledge of the woman he loved, that Merthyr took him in his arms and kissed him.

“Get it over quickly, dear good fellow,” Carlo murmured; “you have something to tell me. Whatever it is, it’s air; but I’ll listen.”

They passed into a vacant room. “You know you are betrayed,” Merthyr began.

“Not exactly that,” said Carlo, humming carelessly.

“Positively and absolutely. The Countess d’Isorella has sold your secrets.”

“I commend her to the profit she has made by it.”

“Do you play with your life?”

Carlo was about to answer in the tone he had assumed for the interview. He checked the laugh on his lips.

“She must have some regard for my life, such as it’s worth, since, to tell you the truth, she is in the house now, and came here to give me fair warning.”

“Then, you trust her.”

“I? Not a single woman in the world!—that is, for a conspiracy.”

It was an utterly fatuous piece of speech. Merthyr allowed it to slip, and studied him to see where he was vulnerable.

“She is in the house, you say. Will you cause her to come before me?”

“Curiously,” said Carlo, “I kept her for some purpose of the sort. Will I? and have a scandal now? Oh! no. Let her sleep.”

Whether he spoke from noble-mindedness or indifference, Merthyr could not guess.

“I have a message from your friend Luciano. He sends you his love, in case he should be shot the first, and says that when Lombardy is free he hopes you will not forget old comrades who are in Rome.”

“Forget him! I would to God I could sit and talk of him for hours. Luciano! Luciano! He has no wife.”

Carlo spoke on hoarsely. “Tell me what authority you have for charging Countess d’Isorella with… with whatever it may be.”

“A conversation between Countess Anna of Lenkenstein and a Major Nagen, in the Duchess of Graatli’s house, was overheard by our Beppo. They spoke German. The rascal had a German sweetheart with him. She imprisoned him for some trespass, and had come stealing in to rescue him, when those two entered the room. Countess Anna detailed to Nagen the course of your recent plotting. She named the hour this morning when you are to start for Brescia. She stated what force you have, what arms you expect; she named you all.”

“Nagen—Nagen,” Carlo repeated; “the man’s unknown to me.”

“It’s sufficient that he is an Austrian officer.”

“Quite. She hates me, and she has reason, for she’s aware that I mean to fight her lover, and choose my time. The blood of my friends is on that man’s head.”

“I will finish what I have to say,” pursued Merthyr. “When Beppo had related as much as he could make out from his sweetheart’s translation, I went straight to the duchess. She is an Austrian, and a good and reasonable woman. She informed me that a letter addressed by Countess Anna to Countess d’Isorella fell into her hands this night. She burnt it unopened. I leave it to you to consider whether you have been betrayed and who has betrayed you. The secret was bought. Beppo himself caught the words, ‘from a mercenary Italian.’ The duchess tells me that Countess Anna is in the habit of alluding to Countess d’Isorella in those terms.”

Carlo stretched his arms like a man who cannot hide the yawning fit.

“I promised my wife five minutes, though we have had the worst of the parting over. Perhaps you will wait for me; I may have a word to say.”

He was absent for little more than the space named. When he returned, he was careful to hide his face. He locked the door, and leading Merthyr to an inner room, laid his watch on the table, and said: “Now, friend, you will see that I have nothing to shrink from, for I am going to do execution upon myself, and before him whom I would, above all other men, have think well of me. My wife supposes that I am pledged to this Brescian business because I am insanely patriotic. If I might join Luciano tomorrow I would shout like a boy. I would be content to serve as the lowest in the ranks, if I might be with you all under the Chief. Rome crowns him, and Brescia is my bloody ditch, and it is deserved! When I was a little younger—I am a boy still, no doubt—I had the honour to be distinguished by a handsome woman; and when I grew a little older, I discovered by chance that she had wit. The lady is the Countess Violetta d’Isorella. It is a grief to me to know that she is sordid: it hurts my vanity the more. Perhaps: you begin to perceive that vanity governs me. The signora Laura has not expressed her opinion on this subject with any reserve, but to Violetta belongs the merit of having seen it without waiting for the signs. First—it is a small matter, but you are English—let me assure you that my wife has had no rival. I have taunted her with jealousy when I knew that it was neither in her nature to feel it, nor in mine to give reason for it. No man who has a spark of his Maker in him could be unfaithful to such a woman. When Lombardy was crushed, we were in the dust. I fancy we none of us knew how miserably we had fallen—we, as men. The purest—I dare say, the bravest—marched to Rome. God bless my Luciano there! But I, sir, I, my friend, I, Merthyr, I said proudly that I would not abandon a beaten country: and I was admired for my devotion. The dear old poet, Agostino, praised me. It stopped his epigrams—during a certain time, at least. Colonel Corte admired me. Marco Sana, Giulio Bandinelli admired me. Vast numbers admired me. I need not add that I admired myself. I plunged into intrigues with princes, and priests, and republicans. A clever woman was at my elbow. In the midst of all this, my marriage: I had seven weeks of peace; and then I saw what I was. You feel that you are tired, when you want to go another way and you feel that you have been mad when you want to undo your work. But I could not break the chains I had wrought, for I was a chief of followers. The men had come from exile, or they had refused to join the Roman enterprise:—they, in fact, had bound themselves to me; and that means, I was irrevocably bound to them. I had an insult to wipe out: I refrained from doing it, sincerely, I may tell you, on the ground that this admired life of mine was precious. I will heap no more clumsy irony on it: I can pity it. Do you see now how I stand? I know that I cannot rely on the king’s luck or on the skill of his generals, or on the power of his army, or on the spirit in Lombardy: neither on men nor on angels. But I cannot draw back. I have set going a machine that’s merciless. From the day it began working, every moment has added to its force. Do not judge me by your English eyes: other lands, other habits; other habits, other thoughts.

He uttered this with a profound conviction of his quality as leader, that escaped the lurid play of self-inspection which characterized what he had previously spoken, and served singularly in bearing witness to the truth of his charge against himself.

“Useless!” he said, waving his hand at anticipated remonstrances. “Look with the eyes of my country; not with your own, my friend. I am disgraced if I do not go out. My friends are disgraced if I do not head them in. Brescia—sacrificed!—murdered!—how can I say what? Can I live under disgrace or remorse? The king stakes on his army; I on the king. Whether he fights and wins, or fights and loses, I go out. I have promised my men—promised them success, I believe!—God forgive me! Did you ever see a fated man before? None had plotted against me. I have woven my own web, and that’s the fatal thing. I have a wife, the sweetest woman of her time. Goodnight to her! our parting is over.”

He glanced at his watch. “Perhaps she will be at the door below. Her heart beats like mine just now. You wish to say that you think me betrayed, and therefore I may draw back? Did you not hear that Bergamo has risen? The Brescians are up too by this time. Gallant Brescians! they never belie the proverb in their honour; and to die among them would be sweet if I had all my manhood about me. You would have me making a scene with Violetta.”

“Set the woman face to face with me!” cried Merthyr, sighting a gleam of hope.

Carlo smiled. “Can she bear my burden though she be ten times guilty? Let her sleep. I have her here harmless for the night. The Brescians are up:—that’s an hour that has struck, and there’s no calling it to move a step in the rear. Brescia under the big Eastern hill which throws a cloak on it at sunrise! Brescia is always the eagle that looks over Lombardy! And Bergamo! you know the terraces of Bergamo. Aren’t they like a morning sky? Dying there is not death; it’s flying into the dawn. You Romans envy us. Come, confess it; you envy us. You have no Alps, no crimson hills, nothing but old walls to look on while you fight. Farewell, Merthyr Powys. I hear my servant’s foot outside. My horse is awaiting me saddled, a mile from the city. Perhaps I shall see my wife again at the door below, or in heaven. Addio! Kiss Luciano for me. Tell him that I knew myself as well as he did, before the end came. Enrico, Emilio, and the others—tell them I love them. I doubt if there will ever be but a ghost of me to fight beside them in Rome. And there’s no honour, Merthyr, in a ghost’s fighting, because he’s shotproof; so I won’t say what the valiant disembodied ‘I’ may do by-and-by.”

He held his hands out, with the light soft smile of one who asks forgiveness for flippant speech, and concluded firmly: “I have talked enough, and you are the man of sense I thought you; for to give me advice is childish when no power on earth could make me follow it. Addio! Kiss me.”

They embraced. Merthyr said no more than that he would place messengers on the road to Brescia to carry news of the king’s army. His voice was thick, and when Carlo laughed at him, his sensations strangely reversed their situations.

There were two cloaked figures at different points in the descent of the stairs. These rose severally at Carlo’s approach, took him to their bosoms, and kissed him in silence. They were his mother and Laura. A third crouched by the door of the courtyard, which was his wife.

Merthyr kept aloof until the heavy door rolled a long dull sound. Vittoria’s head was shawled over. She stood where her husband had left her, groping for him with one hand, that closed tremblingly hard on Merthyr when he touched it. Not a word was uttered in the house.

Until daylight Merthyr sat by himself, trying to realize the progressive steps of the destiny which seemed like a visible hand upon Count Ammiani, that he might know it to be nothing else than Carlo’s work. He sat in darkness in the room where Carlo had spoken, thinking of him as living and dead. The brilliant life in Carlo protested against a possible fatal tendency in his acts so irrevocable as to plunge him to destruction when his head was clear, his blood cool, and a choice lay open to him. That brilliant young life, that fine face, the tones of Carlo’s voice, swept about Merthyr, accusing him of stupid fatalism. Grief stopped his answer to the charge; but in his wise mind he knew Carlo to have surveyed things justly; and that the Fates are within us. Those which are the forces of the outer world are as shadows to the power we have created within us. He felt this because it was his gathered wisdom. Human compassion, and love for the unhappy youth, crushed it in his heart, and he marvelled how he could have been paralyzed when he had a chance of interceding. Can a man stay a torrent? But a noble and fair young life in peril will not allow our philosophy to liken it to things of nature. The downward course of a fall that takes many waters till it rushes irresistibly is not the course of any life. Yet it is true that our destiny is of our own weaving. Carlo’s involvements cast him into extreme peril, almost certain death, unless he abjured his honour, dearer than a life made precious by love. Merthyr saw that it was not vanity, but honour; for Carlo stood pledged to lead a forlorn enterprise, the ripeness of his own scheming. In the imminent hour Carlo had recognized his position as Merthyr with the wisdom of years looked on it. That was what had paralyzed the older man, though he could not subsequently trace the cause. Thinking of the beauty of the youth, husband of the woman who was to his soul utterly an angel, Merthyr sat in the anguish of self-accusation, believing that some remonstrance, some inspired word, might have turned him, and half dreading to sound his own heart, as if an evil knowledge of his nature haunted it.

He rose up at last with a cry. The door opened, and Giacinta, Vittoria’s maid, appeared, bearing a lamp. She had been sitting outside, waiting to hear him stir before she intruded. He touched her cheek kindly, and thought that one could do little better than die, if need were, in the service of such a people. She said that her mistress was kneeling. She wished to make coffee for him, and Merthyr let her do it, knowing the comfort there is to a woman in the ministering occupation of her hands. It was soon daylight. Beppo had not come back to the house.

“No one has left the house?” Merthyr asked.

“Not since—” she answered convulsively.

“The Countess d’Isorella is here?”

“是的，先生。”

“Asleep?” he put the question mournfully, in remembrance of Carlo’s “Let her sleep!”

“Yes, signore; like the first night after confession.”

“She resides, I think, in the Corso Venezia. When she awakens, let her know that I request to have the honour of conducting her.”

“Yes, signore. Her carriage is still at the gates. The countess’s horses are accustomed to stand.”

Merthyr knew this for a hint against his leaving, as well as against the lady’s character.

“Let your mistress be assured that I shall on no account be long absent at any time.”

“Signore, I shall do so,” said Giacinta.

She brought him word soon after, that Countess d’Isorella was stirring. Merthyr met Violetta on the stairs.

“Can it be true?” she accosted him first.

“Count Ammiani has left for Brescia,” he replied.

“In spite of my warning?”

Merthyr gave space for her to pass into the room. She appeared undecided, saying that she had a dismal apprehension of her not having dismissed her coachman overnight.

“In spite of my warning,” she murmured again, “he has really gone? Surely I cannot have slept more than three hours.”

“It was Count Ammiani’s wish that you should enjoy your full sleep undisturbed in his house,” said Merthyr, “As regards your warning to him, he has left Milan perfectly convinced of the gravity of a warning that comes from you.”

Violetta shrugged lightly. “Then all we have to do is to pray for the success of Carlo Alberto.”

“Oh! pardon me, countess,” Merthyr rejoined, “prayers may be useful, but you at least have something to do besides.”

His eyes caught hers firmly as they were letting a wild look of interrogation fall on him, and he continued with perfect courtesy, “You will accompany me to see Countess Anna of Lenkenstein. You have great influence, madame. It is not Count Ammiani’s request; for, as I informed you, it was his wish that you should enjoy your repose. The request is mine, because his life is dear to me. Nagen, I think, is the name of the Austrian officer who has started for Brescia.”

She had in self-defence to express surprise while he spoke, which compelled her to meet his mastering sight and submit to a struggle of vision sufficient to show him that he had hit a sort of guilty consciousness. Otherwise she was not discomposed, and with marvellous sagacity she accepted the forbearance he assumed, not affecting innocence to challenge it, as silly criminals always do when they are exposed, but answering quite in the tone of innocence, and so throwing the burden by an appearance of mutual consent on some unnamed third person.

“Certainly; let us go to Countess Anna of Lenkenstein, if you think fit. I have to rely on your judgement. I quite abjure my own. If I have to plead for anything, I am going before a woman, remember.”

“I do not forget it,” said Merthyr.

“The expedition to Brescia may be unfortunate,” she resumed hurriedly; “I wish it had not been undertaken. At any rate, it rescues Count Ammiani from an expedition to Rome, and his slavish devotion to that priest-hating man whom he calls, or called, his Chief. At Brescia he is not outraging the head of our religion. That is a gain.”

“A gain for him in the next world?” said Merthyr. “I believe that Countess Anna of Lenkenstein is also a fervent Catholic; is she not?”

“我相信如此。”

“On behalf of her peace of mind, I trust so, too. In that case, she also must be a sound sleeper.”

“We shall have to awaken her. What excuse—what am I to say to her?”

“I beg you to wait for the occasion, Countess d’Isorella. The words will come.”

Violetta bit her lip. She had consented to this extraordinary step in an amazement. As she contemplated it now, it seemed worse than a partial confession and an appeal to his generosity. She broke out in pity for her horses, in dread of her coachman, declaring that it was impossible for her to give him the order to drive her anywhere but home.

“With your permission, countess, I will undertake to give him the order,” said Merthyr.

“But have you no compassion, signor Powys? and you are an Englishman! I thought that Englishmen were excessively compassionate with horses.”

“They have been known to kill them in the service of their friends, nevertheless.”

“Well!”—Violetta had recourse to the expression of her shoulders—“and I am really to see Countess Anna?”

“In my presence.”

“Oh! that cannot be. Pardon me; it is impossible. She will decline the scene. I say it with the utmost sincerity: I know that she will refuse.”

“Then, countess,” Merthyr’s face grew hard, “if I am not to be in your company to prompt you, allow me to instruct you beforehand.”

Violetta looked at him eagerly, as one looks for tidings, with an involuntary beseeching quiver of the strained eyelids.

“No irony!” she said, fearing horribly that he was about to throw off the mask of irony.

This desperate effort of her wits at the crisis succeeded.

Merthyr, not knowing what design he had, hopeless of any definite end in tormenting the woman, and never having it in his mind merely to punish, was diverted by the exclamation to speak ironically. “You can tell Countess Anna that it is only her temporal sovereign who is attacked, and that therefore—” he could not continue.

“Some affection?” he murmured, in intense grief.

His manly forbearance touched her whose moral wit was too blunt to apprehend the contempt in it.

“Much affection—much!” Violetta exclaimed. “I have a deep affection for Count Ammiani; an old friendship. Believe me! believe me! I came here last night to save him. Anything on earth that I can do, I will do—on my honour; and do not smile at that—I have never pledged it without fulfilling the oath. I will not sleep while I can aid in preserving him. He shall know that I am not the base person he has conceived me to be. You, signor Powys, are not a man to paint all women black that are a little less than celestial—are you? I am told it is a trick with your countrymen; and they have a poet who knew us! I entreat you to confide in me. I am at present quite unaware that Count Ammiani runs particular—I mean personal danger. He is in danger, of course; everyone can see it. But, on my honour—and never in my life have I spoken so earnestly, my friends would hardly recognize me—I declare to you on my faith as a Christian lady, I am ignorant of any plot against him. I can take a Cross and kiss it, like a peasant, and swear to you by the Madonna that I know nothing of it.”

She corrected her ardour, half-exulting in finding herself carried so far and so swimmingly on a tide of truth, half wondering whether the flowering beauty of her face in excitement had struck his sensibility. He was cold and speculative.

“Ah!” she said, “if I were to ask my compatriots to put faith in a woman’s pure friendship for a man, I should know the answer; but you, signor Powys, who have shown us that a man is capable of the purest friendship for a woman, should believe me.”

He led her down to the gates, where her coachman sat muffled in a three-quarter sleep. The word was given to drive to her own house; rejoiced by which she called his attention deploringly to the condition of her horses, requesting him to say whether he could imagine them the best English, and confessing with regret, that she killed three sets a year—loved them well, notwithstanding. Merthyr saw enough of her to feel that she was one of the weak creatures who are strong through our greater weakness; and, either by intuition or quick wit, too lively and too subtle to be caught by simple suspicion. She even divined that reflection might tell him she had evaded him by an artifice—a piece of gross cajolery; and said, laughing: “Concerning friendship, I could offer it to a boy, like Carlo Ammiani; not to you, signor Powys. I know that I must check a youth, and I am on my guard. I should be eternally tormented to discover whether your armour was proof.”

“I dare say that a lady who had those torments would soon be able to make them mine,” said Merthyr.

“You could not pay a fairer compliment to some one else,” she remarked. In truth, the candid personal avowal seemed to her to hold up Vittoria’s sacred honour in a crystal, and the more she thought of it, the more she respected him, for his shrewd intelligence, if not for his sincerity; but on the whole she fancied him a loyal friend, not solely a clever maker of phrases; and she was pleased with herself for thinking such a matter possible, in spite of her education.

“I do most solemnly hope that you may not have to sustain Countess Alessandra under any affliction whatsoever,” she said at parting.

Violetta had escaped an exposure—a rank and naked accusation of her character and deeds. She feared nothing but that, being quite indifferent to opinion; a woman who would not have thought it preternaturally sad to have to walk as a penitent in the streets, with the provision of a very thick veil to cover her. She had escaped, but the moment she felt herself free, she was surprised by a sharp twinge of remorse. She summoned her maid to undress her, and smelt her favourite perfume, and lay in her bed, to complete her period of rest, closing her eyes there with a child’s faith in pillows. Flying lights and blood-blotches rushed within a span of her forehead. She met this symptom promptly with a medical receipt; yet she had no sleep; nor would coffee give her sleep. She shrank from opium as deleterious to the constitution, and her mind settled on music as the remedy.

Some time after her craving for it had commenced, an Austrian foot regiment, marching to the drum, passed under her windows. The fife is a merry instrument; fife and drum colour the images of battle gaily; but the dull ringing Austrian step-drum, beating unaccompanied, strikes the mind with the real nature of battles, as the salt smell of powder strikes it, and more in horror, more as a child’s imagination realizes bloodshed, where the scene is a rolling heaven, black and red on all sides, with pitiable men moving up to the mouth of butchery, the insufferable flashes, the dark illumination of red, red of black, like a vision of the shadows Life and Death in a shadow-fight over the dear men still living. Sensitive minds may be excited by a small stimulant to see such pictures. This regimental drum is like a song of the flat-headed savage in man. It has no rise or fall, but leads to the bloody business with an unvarying note, and a savage’s dance in the middle of the rhythm. Violetta listened to it until her heart quickened with alarm lest she should be going to have a fever. She thought of Carlo Ammiani, and of the name of Nagen; she had seen him at the Lenkensteins. Her instant supposition was that Anna had perhaps paid heavily for the secret of Carlo’s movements an purpose to place Major Nagen on the Brescian high-road to capture him. Capture meant a long imprisonment, if not execution. Partly for the sake of getting peace of mind—for she was shocked by her temporary inability to command repose—but with some hope of convincing Carlo that she strove to be of use to him, she sent for the spy Luigi, and at a cost of two hundred and twenty Austrian florins, obtained his promise upon oath to follow Count Ammiani into Brescia, if necessary, and deliver to him a letter she had written, wherein Nagen’s name was mentioned, and Carlo was advised to avoid personal risks; the letter hinted that he might have incurred a private enmity, and he had better keep among his friends. She knew the writing of this letter to be the foolishest thing she had ever done. Two hundred and twenty florins—the man originally stipulated to have three hundred—was a large sum to pay for postage. However, sacrifices must now and then be made for friendship, and for sleep. When she had paid half the money, her mind was relieved, and she had the slumber which preserves beauty. Luigi was to be paid the other half on his return. “He may never return,” she thought, while graciously dismissing him. The deduction by mental arithmetic of the two hundred and twenty, or the one hundred and ten florins, from the large amount Countess Anna was bound to pay her in turn, annoyed her, though she knew it was a trifle. For this lady, Milan, Turin, and Paris sighed deeply.

When he had left Violetta at her house in the Corso, Merthyr walked briskly for exercise, knowing that he would have need of his health and strength. He wanted a sight of Alps to wash out the image of the woman from his mind, and passed the old Marshal’s habitation fronting the Gardens, wishing that he stood in the field against the fine old warrior, for whom he had a liking. Near the walls he discovered Beppo sitting pensively with his head between his two fists. Beppo had not seen Count Ammiani, but he had seen Barto Rizzo, and pointing to the walls, said that Barto had dropped down there. He had met him hurrying in the Corso Francesco. Barto took him to the house of Sarpo, the bookseller, who possessed a small printing-press. Beppo described vividly, with his usual vivacity of illustration, the stupefaction of the man at the apparition of his tormentor, whom he thought fast in prison; and how Barto had compelled him to print a proclamation to the Piedmontese, Lombards, and Venetians, setting forth that a battle had been fought South of the Ticino, and that Carlo Alberto was advancing on Milan, signed with the name of the Piedmontese Pole in command of the king’s army. A second, framed as an order of the day, spoke of victory and the planting of the green, white and red banner on the Adige, and forward to the Isonzo.

“I can hear nothing of Carlo Alberto’s victory,” Beppo said; “no one has heard of it. Barto told us how the battle was fought, and the name of the young lieutenant who discovered the enemy’s flank march, and got the artillery down on him, and pounded him so that—signore, it’s amazing! I’m ready to cry, and laugh, and howl!—fifteen thousand men capitulated in a heap!”

“Don’t you know you’ve been listening to a madman?” said Merthyr, irritated, and thoroughly angered to see Beppo’s opposition to that view.

“Signore, Barto described the whole battle. It began at five o’clock in the morning.”

“When it was dark!”

“Yes; when it was dark. He said so. And we sent up rockets, and caught the enemy coming on, and the cavalry of Alessandria fell upon two batteries of field guns and carried them off, and Colonel Romboni was shot in his back, and cries he, ‘Best give up the ghost if you’re hit in the rear. Evviva l’Italia!’”

“A Piedmontese colonel, you fool! he would have shouted ‘Viva Carlo Alberto!’” said Merthyr, now critically disgusted with the tale, and refusing to hear more. Two hours later, he despatched Beppo to Carlo in Brescia, warning him that for some insane purpose these two proclamations had been printed by Barto Rizzo, and that they were false.

It was early on the morning of a second day, before sunrise, when Vittoria sent for Merthyr to conduct her to the cathedral. “There has been a battle,” she said. Her lips hardly joined to frame the syllables in speech. Merthyr refrained from asking where she had heard of the battle. As soon as the Duomo doors were open, he led her in and left her standing shrinking under the great vault with her neck fearfully drawn on her shoulders, as one sees birds under thunder. He thought that she was losing courage. Choosing to go out on the steps rather than look on her, he was struck by the sight of two horsemen, who proved to be Austrian officers, rattling at racing speed past the Duomo up the Corso. The sight of them made it seem possible that a battle had been fought. As soon as he was free, Merthyr went to the Duchess of Graatli, from whom he had the news of Novara. The officers he had seen were Prince Radocky and Lieutenant Wilfrid Pierson, the old Marshal’s emissaries of victory. They had made a bet on the bloody field about reaching Milan first, and the duchess affected to be full of the humour of this bet in order to conceal her exultation. The Lenkensteins called on her; the Countess of Lenkenstein, Anna, and Lena; and they were less considerate, and drew their joy openly from the source of his misery—a dreadful house for Merthyr to remain in; but he hoped to see Wilfrid, having heard the duchess rally Lena concerning the deeds of the white umbrella, which, Lena said, was pierced with balls, and had been preserved for her. “The dear foolish fellow insisted on marching right into the midst of the enemy with his absurd white umbrella; and wherever there was danger the men were seen following it. Prince Radocky told me the whole army was laughing. How he escaped death was a miracle!” She spoke unaffectedly of her admiration for the owner, and as Wilfrid came in she gave him brilliant eyes. He shook Merthyr’s hand without looking at him. The ladies would talk of nothing but the battle, so he went up to Merthyr, and under pretext of an eager desire for English news, drew him away.

“Her husband was not there? not at Novara, I mean?” he said.

“He’s at Brescia,” said Merthyr.

“Well, thank goodness he didn’t stand in those ranks!”

Wilfrid murmured, puffing thoughtfully over the picture they presented to his memory.

Merthyr then tried to hint to him that he had a sort of dull suspicion of Carlo’s being in personal danger, but of what kind he could not say. He mentioned Weisspriess by name; and Nagen; and Countess Anna. Wilfrid said, “I’ll find out if there’s anything, only don’t be fancying it. The man’s in a bad hole at Brescia. Weisspriess, I believe, is at Verona. He’s an honourable fellow. The utmost he would do would be to demand a duel; and I’m sure he’s heartily sick of that work. Besides, he and Countess Anna have quarrelled. Meet me;—by the way, you and I mustn’t be seen meeting, I suppose. The duchess is neutral ground. Come here to-night. And don’t talk of me, but say that a friend asks how she is, and hopes—the best things you can say for me. I must go up to their confounded chatter again. Tell her there’s no fear, none whatever. You all hate us, naturally; but you know that Austrian officers are gentlemen. Don’t speak my name to her just yet. Unless, of course, she should happen to allude to me, which is unlikely. I had a dismal idea that her husband was at Novara.”

The tender-hearted duchess sent a message to Vittoria, bidding her not to forget that she had promised her at Meran to ‘love her always.’

“And tell her,” she said to Merthyr, “that I do not think I shall have my rooms open for the concert to-morrow night. I prefer to let Antonio-Pericles go mad. She will not surely consider that she is bound by her promise to him? He drags poor Irma from place to place to make sure the miserable child is not plotting to destroy his concert, as that man Sarpo did. Irma is half dead, and hasn’t the courage to offend him. She declares she depends upon him for her English reputation. She has already caught a violent cold, and her sneezing is frightful. I have never seen so abject a creature. I have no compassion at the sight of her.”

That night Merthyr heard from Wilfrid that a plot against Carlo Ammiani did exist. He repeated things he had heard pass between Countess d’Isorella and Irma in the chamber of Pericles before the late battle. Modestly confessing that he was ‘for some reasons’ in high favour with Countess Lena, he added that after a long struggle he had brought her to confess that her sister had sworn to have Countess Alessandra Ammiani begging at her feet.

By mutual consent they went to consult the duchess. She repelled the notion of Austrian women conspiring. “An Austrian noble lady—do you think it possible that she would act secretly to serve a private hatred? Surely I may ask you, for my sake, to think better of us?”

Merthyr showed her an opening to his ground by suggesting that Anna’s antipathy to Victoria might spring more from a patriotic than a private source.

“Oh! I will certainly make inquiries, if only to save Anna’s reputation with her enemies,” the duchess answered rather proudly.

It would have been a Novara to Pericles if Vittoria had refused to sing. He held the pecuniarily-embarrassed duchess sufficiently in his power to command a concert at her house; his argument to those who pressed him to spare Vittoria in a season of grief running seriously, with visible contempt of their intellects, thus: “A great voice is an ocean. You cannot drain it with forty dozen opera-hats. It is something found—an addition to the wealth of this life. Shall we not enjoy what we find? You do not wear out a picture by looking at it; likewise you do not wear out a voice by listening to it. A bird has wings;—here is a voice. Why were they given? I should say, to go into the air. Ah; but not if grandmother is ill. What is a grandmother to the wings and the voice? If to sing would kill,—yes, then let the puny thing be silent! But Sandra Belloni has a soul that has not a husband—except her Art. Her body is husbanded; but her soul is above her body. You would treat it as below. Art is her soul’s husband! Besides, I have her promise. She is a girl who will go up to a loaded gun’s muzzle if she gives her word. And besides, her husband may be shot to-morrow. So, all she sings now is clear gain.”

Vittoria sent word to him that she would sing.

In the meantime a change had come upon Countess Anna. Weisspriess, her hero, appeared at her brother’s house, fresh from the field of Novara, whither he had hurried from Verona on a bare pretext, that was a breach of military discipline requiring friendly interposition in high quarters. Unable to obtain an audience with Count Lenkenstein, he remained in the hall, hoping for things which he affected to care nothing for; and so it chanced that he saw Lena, who was mindful that her sister had suffered much from passive jealousy when Wilfrid returned from the glorious field, and led him to Anna, that she also might rejoice in a hero. Weisspriess did not refrain from declaring on the way that he would rather charge against a battery. Some time after, Anna lay in Lena’s arms, sobbing out one of the wildest confessions ever made by woman:—she adored Weisspriess; she hated Nagen; but was miserably bound to the man she hated. “Oh! now I know what love is.” She repeated this with transparent enjoyment of the opposing sensations by whose shock the knowledge was revealed to her.

“How can you be bound to Major Nagan?” asked Lena.

“Oh! why? except that I have been possessed by devils.”

Anna moaned. “Living among these Italians has distempered my blood.” She exclaimed that she was lost.

“In what way can you be lost?” said Lena.

“I have squandered more than half that I possess. I am almost a beggar. I am no longer the wealthy Countess Anna. I am much poorer than anyone of us.”

“But Major Weisspriess is a man of honour, and if he loves you—”

“Yes; he loves me! he loves me! or would he come to me after I have sent him against a dozen swords? But he is poor; he must, must marry a wealthy woman. I used to hate him because I thought he had his eye on money. I love him for it now. He deserves wealth; he is a matchless hero. He is more than the first swordsman of our army; he is a knightly man. Oh my soul Johann!” She very soon fell to raving. Lena was implored by her to give her hand to Weisspriess in reward for his heroism—“For you are rich,” Anna said; “you will not have to go to him feeling that you have made him face death a dozen times for your sake, and that you thank him and reward him by being a whimpering beggar in his arms. Do, dearest! Will you? Will you, to please me, marry Johann? He is not unworthy of you.” And more of this hysterical hypocrisy, which brought on fits of weeping. “I have lived among these savages till I have ceased to be human—forgotten everything but my religion,” she said. “I wanted Weisspriess to show them that they dared not stand up against a man of us, and to tame the snarling curs. He did. He is brave. He did as much as a man could do, but I was unappeasable. They seem to have bitten me till I had a devouring hunger to humiliate them. Lena, will you believe that I have no hate for Carlo Ammiani or the woman he has married? None! and yet, what have I done!” Anna smote her forehead. “They are nothing but little dots on a field for me. I don’t care whether they live or die. It’s like a thing done in sleep.”

“I want to know what you have done,” said Lena caressingly.

“You at least will try to reward our truest hero, and make up to him for your sister’s unkindness, will you not?” Anna replied with a cajolery wonderfully like a sincere expression of her wishes. “He will be a good husband.. He has proved it by having been so faithful a—a lover. So you may be sure of him. And when he is yours, do not let him fight again, Lena, for I have a sickening presentiment that his next duel is his last.”

“Tell me,” Lena entreated her, “pray tell me what horrible thing you have done to prevent your marrying him.”

“With their pride and their laughter,” Anna made answer; “the fools! were they to sting us perpetually and not suffer for it? That woman, the Countess Alessandra, as she’s now called—have you forgotten that she helped our Paul’s assassin to escape? was she not eternally plotting against Austria? And I say that I love Austria. I love my country; I plot for my country. She and her husband plot, and I plot to thwart them. I have ruined myself in doing it. Oh, my heart! why has it commenced beating again? Why did Weisspriess come here? He offended me. He refused to do my orders, and left me empty-handed, and if he suffers too,” Anna relieved a hard look with a smile of melancholy, “I hope he will not; I cannot say more.”

“And I’m to console him if he does?” said Lena.

“At least, I shall be out of the way,” said Anna. “I have still money enough to make me welcome in a convent.”

“I am to marry him?” Lena persisted, and half induced Anna to act a feeble part, composed of sobs and kisses and full confession of her plight. Anna broke from her in time to leave what she had stated of herself vague and self-justificatory, so that she kept her pride, and could forgive, as she was ready to do even so far as to ask forgiveness in turn, when with her awakened enamoured heart she heard Vittoria sing at the concert of Pericles. Countess Alessandra’s divine gift, which she would not withhold, though in a misery of apprehension; her grave eyes, which none could accuse of coldness, though they showed no emotion; her simple noble manner that seemed to lift her up among the forces threatening her; these expressions of a superior soul moved Anna under the influence of the incomparable voice to pass over envious contrasts, and feel the voice and the nature were one in that bosom. Could it be the same as the accursed woman who had stood before her at Meran? She could hardly frame the question, but she had the thought sufficiently firmly to save her dignity; she was affected by very strong emotion when Vittoria’s singing ended, and nothing but the revival of the recollection of her old contempt preserved her from an impetuous desire to take the singer by the hand and have all clear between them; for they were now of equal rank to tolerating eyes. “But she has no religious warmth!” Anna reflected with a glow of satisfaction. The concert was broken up by Laura Piaveni. She said out loud that the presence of Major Weisspriess was intolerable to the Countess Alessandra. It happened that Weisspriess entered the room while Laura sat studying the effect produced by her countrywoman’s voice on the thick eyelids of Austrian Anna; and Laura, seeing their enemy ready to weep in acknowledgment of their power, scorned the power which could never win freedom, and broke up the sitting, citing the offence of the presence of Weisspriess for a pretext. The incident threw Anna back upon her old vindictiveness. It caused an unpleasant commotion in the duchess’s saloon. Count Serabiglione was present, and ran round to Weisspriess, apologizing for his daughter’s behaviour. “Do you think I can’t deal with your women as well as your men, you ass?” said Weisspriess, enraged by the scandal of the scene. He was overheard by Count Karl Lenkenstein, who took him to task sharply for his rough speech; but Anna supported her lover, and they joined hands publicly. Anna went home prostrated with despair. “What conscience is in me that I should wish one of my Kaiser’s officers killed?” she cried enigmatically to Lena. “But I must have freedom. 哦！ to be free. I am chained to my enemy, and God blesses that woman. He makes her weep, but he blesses her, for her body is free, and mine,—the thought of mine sets flames creeping up my limbs as if I were tied to the stake.

There came tidings of the bombardment of Brescia one of the historic deeds of infamy. Many officers of the Imperial army perceived the shame which it cast upon their colours, even in those intemperate hours, and Karl Lenkenstein assumed the liberty of private friendship to go complaining to the old Marshal, who was too true a soldier to condemn a soldier in action, however strong his disapproval of proceedings. The liberty assumed by Karl was excessive; he spoke out in the midst of General officers as if his views were shared by them and the Marshal; and his error was soon corrected; one after another reproached him, until the Marshal, pitying his condition, sent him into his writing-closet, where he lectured the youth on military discipline. It chanced that there followed between them a question upon what the General in command at Brescia would do with his prisoners; and hearing that they were subject to the rigours of a court-martial, and if adjudged guilty, would forthwith summarily be shot, Karl ventured to ask grace for Vittoria’s husband. He succeeded finally in obtaining his kind old Chief’s promise that Count Ammiani should be tried in Milan, and as the bearer of a paper to that effect, he called on his sisters to get them or Wilfrid to convey word to Vittoria of her husband’s probable safety. He found Anna in a swoon, and Lena and the duchess bending over her. The duchess’s chasseur Jacob Baumwalder Feckelwitz had been returning from Moran, when on the Brescian high-road he met the spy Luigi, and acting promptly under the idea that Luigi was always a pestilential conductor of detestable correspondence, he attacked him, overthrew him, and ransacked him, and bore the fruit of his sagacious exertions to his mistress in Milan; it was Violetta d’Isorella’s letter to Carlo Ammiani. “I have read it,” the duchess said; “contrary to any habits when letters are not addressed to me. I bring it open to your sister Anna. She catches sight of one or two names and falls down in the state in which you see her.”

“Leave her to me,” said Karl.

He succeeded in extracting from Anna hints of the fact that she had paid a large sum of her own money to Countess d’Isorella for secrets connected with the Bergamasc and Brescian rising. “We were under a mutual oath to be silent, but if one has broken it the other cannot; so I confess it to you, dearest good brother. I did this for my country at my personal sacrifice.”

Karl believed that he had a sister magnificent in soul. She was glad to have deluded him, but she could not endure his praises, which painted to her imagination all that she might have been if she had not dashed her patriotism with the low cravings of vengeance, making herself like some abhorrent mediaeval grotesque, composed of eagle and reptile. She was most eager in entreating him to save Count Ammiani’s life. Carlo, she said, was their enemy, but he had been their friend, and she declared with singular earnestness that she should never again sleep or hold up her head, if he were slain or captured.

“My Anna is justified by me in everything she has done,” Karl said to the duchess.

“In that case,” the duchess replied, “I have only to differ with her to feel your sword’s point at my breast.”

“I should certainly challenge the man who doubted her,” said Karl.

The duchess laughed with a scornful melancholy.

On the steps of the door where his horse stood saddled, he met Wilfrid, and from this promised brother-in-law received matter for the challenge. Wilfrid excitedly accused Anna of the guilt of a conspiracy to cause the destruction of Count Ammiani. In the heat of his admiration for his sister, Karl struck him on the cheek with his glove, and called him a name by which he had passed during the days of his disgrace, signifying one who plays with two parties. Lena’s maid heard them arrange to meet within an hour, and she having been a witness of the altercation, ran to her mistress in advance of Wilfrid, and so worked on Lena’s terrors on behalf of her betrothed and her brother, that Lena, dropped at Anna’s feet telling her all that she had gathered and guessed in verification of Wilfrid’s charge, and imploring her to confess the truth. Anna, though she saw her concealment pierced, could not voluntarily forego her brother’s expressed admiration of her, and clung to the tatters of secresy. After a brief horrid hesitation, she chose to face Wilfrid. This interview began with lively recriminations, and was resulting in nothing—for Anna refused to be shaken by his statement that the Countess d’Isorella had betrayed her, and perceived that she was listening to suspicions only—when, to give his accusation force, Wilfrid said that Brescia had surrendered and that Count Ammiani had escaped.

“And I thank God for it!” Anna exclaimed, and with straight frowning eyes demanded the refutation of her sincerity.

“Count Ammiani and his men have five hours’ grace ahead of Major Nagen and half a regiment,” said Wilfrid.

At this she gasped; she had risen her breath to deny or defy, and hung on the top of it without a voice.

“Tell us—say, but do say—confess that you know Nagen to be a name of mischief,” Lena prayed her.

“I will say anything to prevent my brother from running into danger,” Anna rejoined.

“She is most foully accused by one whom we permitted to aspire to be of our own family,” said Karl.

“Yet you, Karl, have always been the first to declare her revengeful,” Lena turned to him.

“Help, Karl, help me,” said Anna.

“Yes!” cried her sister; “there you stand, and ask for help, meanest of women! Do you think these men are not in earnest? Karl is to help you, and you will not speak a word to save him from a grave before night, or me from a lover all of blood.”

“Am I to be the sacrifice?” said Anna.

“Whatever you call it, Wilfrid has spoken truth of you, and to none but members of our family; and he had a right to say it, and you are bound now to acknowledge it.”

“I acknowledge that I love and serve my country, Lena.”

“Not with a pure heart: you can’t forgive. Insult or a wrong makes a madwoman of you. Confess, Anna! You know well that you can’t kneel to a priest’s ear, for you’ve stopped your conscience. You have pledged yourself to misery to satisfy a spite, and you have not the courage to ask for—” Lena broke her speech like one whose wits have been kindled. “Yes, Karl,” she resumed; “Anna begged you to help her. You will. Take her aside and save her from being miserable forever. You do mean to fight my Wilfrid?”

“I am certainly determined to bring him to repentance leaving him the option of the way,” said Karl.

Lena took her sullen sister by the arm.

“Anna, will you let these two men go—to slaughter? Look at them; they are both our brothers. One is dearer than a brother to me, and, oh God! I have known what it is to half-lose him. You to lose a lover and have to go bound by a wretched oath to be the wife of a detestable short-sighted husband! Oh, what an abominable folly!”

This epithet, ‘short-sighted,’ curiously forced in by Lena, was like a shock of the very image of Nagen’s needle features thrust against Anna’s eyes; the spasm of revulsion in her frame was too quick for her habitual self-control.

At that juncture Weisspriess opened the door, and Anna’s eyes met his.

“You don’t spare me,” she murmured to Lena.

Her voice trembled, and Wilfrid bent his head near her, pressing her hand, and said, “Not only I, but Countess Alessandra Ammiani exonerates you from blame. As she loves her country, you love yours. My words to Karl were an exaggeration of what I know and think. Only tell me this;—if Nagen captures Count Ammiani, how is he likely to deal with him?”

“How can I inform you?” Anna replied coldly; but she reflected in a fire of terror. She had given Nagen the prompting of a hundred angry exclamations in the days of her fever of hatred; she had nevertheless forgotten their parting words; that is, she had forgotten her mood when he started for Brescia, and the nature of the last instructions she had given him. Revolting from the thought of execution being done upon Count Ammiani, as one quickly springing out of fever dreams, all her white face went into hard little lines, like the withered snow which wears away in frost. “Yes,” she said; and again, “Yes,” to something Weisspriess whispered in her ear, she knew not clearly what. Weisspriess told Wilfrid that he would wait below. As he quitted the room, the duchess entered, and went up to Anna. “My good soul,” she said, “you have, I trust, listened to Major Weisspriess. Oh, Anna! you wanted revenge. Now take it, as becomes a high-born woman; and let your enemy come to your feet, and don’t spurn her when she is there. Must I inform you that I have been to Countess d’Isorella myself with a man who can compel her to speak? But Anna von Lenkenstein is not base like that Italian. Let them think of you as they will, I believe you to have a great heart. I am sure you will not allow personal sentiment to sully your devotion to our country. Show them that our Austrian faces can be bright; and meet her whom you call your enemy; you cannot fly. You must see her, or you betray yourself. The poor creature’s husband is in danger of capture or death.”

While the duchess’s stern under-breath ran on hurriedly, convincing Anna that she had, with no further warning, to fall back upon her uttermost strength—the name of Countess Alessandra Ammiani was called at the door. Instinctively the others left a path between Vittoria and Anna. It was one of the moments when the adoption of a decisive course says more in vindication of conduct than long speeches. Anna felt that she was on her trial. For the first time since she had looked on this woman she noticed the soft splendour of Vittoria’s eyes, and the harmony of her whole figure; nor was the black dress of protesting Italian mourning any longer offensive in her sight, but on a sudden pitiful, for Anna thought: “It may at this very hour be for her husband, and she not knowing it.” And with that she had a vision under her eyelids of Nagen like a shadowy devil in pursuit of men flying, and striking herself and Vittoria worse than dead in one blow levelled at Carlo Ammiani. A sense of supernatural horror chilled her blood when she considered again, facing her enemy, that their mutual happiness was by her own act involved in the fate of one life. She stepped farther than the half-way to greet her visitor, whose hands she took. Before a word was uttered between them, she turned to her brother, and with a clear voice said:

“Karl, the Countess Alessandra’s husband, our old, friend Carlo Ammiani, may need succour in his flight. Try to cross it; or better, get among those who are pursuing him; and don’t delay one minute. You understand me.”

Count Karl bowed his head, bitterly humbled.

Anna’s eyes seemed to interrogate Vittoria, “Can I do, more?” but her own heart answered her.

Inveterate when following up her passion for vengeance, she was fanatical in responding to the suggestions of remorse.

“Stay; I will despatch Major Weisspriess in my own name,” she said. “He is a trusty messenger, and he knows those mountains. Whoever is the officer broken for aiding Count Ammiani’s escape, he shall be rewarded by me to the best of my ability. Countess Alessandra, I have anticipated your petition; I hope you may not have to reproach me. Remember that my country was in pieces when you and I declared war. You will not suffer without my suffering tenfold. Perhaps some day you will do me the favour to sing to me, when there is no chance of interruption. At present it is cruel to detain you.”

Vittoria said simply: “I thank you, Countess Anna.”

She was led out by Count Karl to where Merthyr awaited her. All wondered at the briefness of a scene that had unexpectedly brought the crisis to many emotions and passions, as the broken waters of the sea beat together and make here or there the wave which is topmost. Anna’s grand initiative hung in their memories like the throbbing of a pulse, so hotly their sensations swarmed about it, and so intensely it embraced and led what all were desiring. The duchess kissed Anna, saying:

“That is a noble heart to which you have become reconciled. Though you should never be friends, as I am with one of them, you will esteem her. Do not suppose her to be cold. She is the mother of an unborn little one, and for that little one’s sake she follows out every duty; she checks every passion in her bosom. She will spare no sacrifice to save her husband, but she has brought her mind to look at the worst, for fear that a shock should destroy her motherly guard.”

“Really, duchess,” Anna replied, “these are things for married women to hear;” and she provoked some contempt of her conventional delicacy, at the same time that in her imagination the image of Vittoria struggling to preserve this burden of motherhood against a tragic mischance, completely humiliated and overwhelmed her, as if nature had also come to add to her mortifications.

“I am ready to confess everything I have done, and to be known for what I am,” she said.

“Confess no more than is necessary, but do everything you can; that’s wisest,” returned the duchess.

“Ah; you mean that you have nothing to learn.” Anna shuddered.

“I mean that you are likely to run into the other extreme of disfavouring yourself just now, my child. And,” continued the duchess, “you have behaved so splendidly that I won’t think ill of you.”

Before the day darkened, Wilfrid obtained, through Prince Radocky’s influence, an order addressed to Major Nagen for the surrender of prisoners into his hands. He and Count Karl started for the Val Camonica on the chance of intercepting the pursuit. These were not much wiser than their guesses and their apprehensions made them; but Weisspriess started on the like errand after an interview with Anna, and he had drawn sufficient intelligence out of sobs, and broken sentences, and torture of her spirit, to understand that if Count Ammiani fell alive or dead into Nagen’s hands, Nagen by Anna’s scrupulous oath, had a claim on her person and her fortune: and he knew Nagen to be a gambler. As he was now by promotion of service Nagen’s superior officer, and a near relative of the Brescian commandant, who would be induced to justify his steps, his object was to reach and arbitrarily place himself over Nagen, as if upon a special mission, and to get the lead of the expedition. For that purpose he struck somewhat higher above the Swiss borders than Karl and Wilfrid, and gained a district in the mountains above the vale, perfectly familiar to him. Obeying directions forwarded to her by Wilfrid, Vittoria left Milan for the Val Camonica no later than the evening; Laura was with her in the carriage; Merthyr took horse after them as soon as he had succeeded in persuading Countess Ammiani to pardon her daughter’s last act of wilfulness, and believe that, during the agitation of unnumbered doubts, she ran less peril in the wilds where her husband fled, than in her home.

“I will trust to her idolatrously, as you do,” Countess Ammiani said; “and perhaps she has already proved to me that I may.”

Merthyr saw Agostino while riding out of Milan, and was seen by him; but the old man walked onward, looking moodily on the stones, and merely waved his hand behind.