“The dear, foolish child!” said Elsa, as she finished the letter, with a deep sigh; “I congratulate her with all my whole heart.”
And as she sat there and thought over how wonderfully it had all come about, and how happy the two must be in their love, her eyes became more fixed, her breathing ever harder, and then she covered her eyes with her hands, bent her head upon Meta’s letter, and cried bitterly.
X
Three days later—the autumn sun was going down, and it was already getting dusk in the large room—Giraldi sat at his writing-table near the window, reading the letters which had arrived for him. A considerable number had accumulated in the course of the day, which he had spent since early morning in important business in the town, for the sale of the property to the Count had taken place today; there were political letters from Paris and London, ecclesiastical matters from Brussels and Cologne, a detailed report from a trusty friend at Strasburg upon the state of affairs in Alsace-Lorraine, business letters of the most varied kind—English, French, Italian, German. Giraldi read one as easily as the other; he even made his marginal notes always in the same language as his correspondent wrote in. “It grows and grows,” murmured he: “we are not far now from the crisis; and how delightful it is to hear from the mouths of others as extraordinary news, things that could not have happened without us. Unfortunately they are beginning to find out here the importance of the untitled and undecorated Signor, the mere private secretary to a lady of rank, and the best part of my working powers will be lost. So long as one is a nobody one can hear everything and hear it correctly; but the moment people begin to point at one, one learns very little, and that little wrong. That is the curse of royalty.” He took up a letter, which he had before thrown on one side, taking it from its shape to be one of the begging letters which he constantly received from poor fellow-countrymen, or from native chevaliers d’industrie. “It is a priest’s hand,” he said. “Ah! from my correspondent at Tivoli. Well! the worthy man has kept me a long time waiting for an answer.” He hastily opened the letter, ran through the contents, and then leaned back in his chair with a look of annoyance.
“H’m!” he muttered, “the old fox will not fall into the trap. He has understood me, that is clear. He admits that there are many wonderful dispensations of Providence, he even hints that the boy’s birth is shrouded in mystery, which means, in Italian, that he is not the son of his parents, only that circumstances are too much against my paternity. Idiot! He must himself know that best; or is he not so stupid? Have I not offered him enough? I ought to have left the price to himself. I would pay anything. I—”
He had got up, and slowly paced up and down through the darkening room. “That is to say, I do not care to throw away my money, and the first experiment has miserably failed. Her reluctance to see the boy was decided enough, and she will not even discover a trace of likeness; says he is the type of the Roman peasants, such as are found at Albano, and Tivoli, and everywhere. Not even his beauty will she allow. There is no soul in the countenance, only the commonplace, brilliant stamp of a strong, sensual nature. And to that she holds with an obstinacy which she has never shown in anything else. It seems that the mother’s instinct cannot be deceived. Bah! what deception cannot be carried out, if a man only sets about it in the right way! I have been too hasty, that is what has startled her. I must allow that I have been, too sanguine, must play at resignation, and then perhaps like a woman, out of sheer caprice, she will come round herself—
“What is it, François?”
“The lady in black, monsieur.”
“Once for all, she is to be shown in to me by the other passage.”
“They are working in the other passage today, monsieur.”
“Never mind. You will take her back by the other passage.”
“Very well, monsieur; can she come in?”
“One moment. Madame dines at home. I dine out, at Herr von Wallbach’s—the carriage for me at . Let madame know, and that at I will come and take leave of her. Has Signor Antonio been here in the course of the day?”
“No, monsieur.”
“No one else is to be admitted. Let the lady come in.”
Giraldi did not get up as the lady entered, and now only gave her a sign to take a place near him at the writing-table.
“I was expecting you. How are we getting on?”
“No better than on the first day.”
“That is bad.”
“It is very wearisome,” said Bertalda, throwing back her veil, “very wearisome. I have come to tell you so; I am sick of the whole thing.”
She lay back in her chair, with a look of ill-humour, knocking the tips of her boots against each other.
“Bah!” said Giraldi, “how much do you want?” and he stretched out his hand to a casket which stood before him on the table.
“I want nothing,” said Bertalda. “I told you at once, the first
