Vittoria — Complete by George Meredith (e novels for free .TXT) 📕

“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.