The Gadfly by Ethel Voynich (top fiction books of all time .txt) 📕

that they had heard from the jailer about Cardi, and that Arthur had been tricked in the confessional. I remember the student saying to me: ‘It is at least some consolation that we know he was innocent.’ My father held my hands and tried to comfort me; he did not know then about the blow. Then I went back to my room and sat there all night alone. In the morning my father went out again with the Burtons to see the harbour dragged. They had some hope of finding the body there.”

“It was never found, was it?”

“No; it must have got washed out to sea; but they thought there was a chance. I was alone in my room and the servant came up to say that a ‘reverendissimo padre’ had called and she had told him my father was at the docks and he had gone away. I knew it must be Montanelli; so I ran out at the back door and caught him up at the garden gate. When I said: ‘Canon Montanelli, I want to speak to you,’ he just stopped and waited silently for me to speak. Oh, Cesare, if you had seen his face⁠—it haunted me for months afterwards! I said: ‘I am Dr. Warren’s daughter, and I have come to tell you that it is I who have killed Arthur.’ I told him everything, and he stood and listened, like a figure cut in stone, till I had finished; then he said: ‘Set your heart at rest, my child; it is I that am a murderer, not you. I deceived him and he found it out.’ And with that he turned and went out at the gate without another word.”

“And then?”

“I don’t know what happened to him after that; I heard the same evening that he had fallen down in the street in a kind of fit and had been carried into a house near the docks; but that is all I know. My father did everything he could for me; when I told him about it he threw up his practice and took me away to England at once, so that I should never hear anything that could remind me. He was afraid I should end in the water, too; and indeed I believe I was near it at one time. But then, you know, when we found out that my father had cancer I was obliged to come to myself⁠—there was no one else to nurse him. And after he died I was left with the little ones on my hands until my elder brother was able to give them a home. Then there was Giovanni. Do you know, when he came to England we were almost afraid to meet each other with that frightful memory between us. He was so bitterly remorseful for his share in it all⁠—that unhappy letter he wrote from prison. But I believe, really, it was our common trouble that drew us together.”

Martini smiled and shook his head.

“It may have been so on your side,” he said; “but Giovanni had made up his mind from the first time he ever saw you. I remember his coming back to Milan after that first visit to Leghorn and raving about you to me till I was perfectly sick of hearing of the English Gemma. I thought I should hate you. Ah! there it comes!”

The carriage crossed the bridge and drove up to a large house on the Lung’Arno. Montanelli was leaning back on the cushions as if too tired to care any longer for the enthusiastic crowd which had collected round the door to catch a glimpse of him. The inspired look that his face had worn in the cathedral had faded quite away and the sunlight showed the lines of care and fatigue. When he had alighted and passed, with the heavy, spiritless tread of weary and heartsick old age, into the house, Gemma turned away and walked slowly to the bridge. Her face seemed for a moment to reflect the withered, hopeless look of his. Martini walked beside her in silence.

“I have so often wondered,” she began again after a little pause; “what he meant about the deception. It has sometimes occurred to me⁠—”

“Yes?”

“Well, it is very strange; there was the most extraordinary personal resemblance between them.”

“Between whom?”

“Arthur and Montanelli. It was not only I who noticed it. And there was something mysterious in the relationship between the members of that household. Mrs. Burton, Arthur’s mother, was one of the sweetest women I ever knew. Her face had the same spiritual look as Arthur’s, and I believe they were alike in character, too. But she always seemed half frightened, like a detected criminal; and her stepson’s wife used to treat her as no decent person treats a dog. And then Arthur himself was such a startling contrast to all those vulgar Burtons. Of course, when one is a child one takes everything for granted; but looking back on it afterwards I have often wondered whether Arthur was really a Burton.”

“Possibly he found out something about his mother⁠—that may easily have been the cause of his death, not the Cardi affair at all,” Martini interposed, offering the only consolation he could think of at the moment. Gemma shook her head.

“If you could have seen his face after I struck him, Cesare, you would not think that. It may be all true about Montanelli⁠—very likely it is⁠—but what I have done I have done.”

They walked on a little way without speaking.

“My dear,” Martini said at last; “if there were any way on earth to undo a thing that is once done, it would be worth while to brood over our old mistakes; but as it is, let the dead bury their dead. It is a terrible story, but at least the poor lad is out of it now, and luckier than some of those that are left⁠—the ones that are in exile and in prison. You and I have