Jean Webster

“ They pushed on farther up into the hills, between groves of twisted olive trees and sloping vineyards, through fields dyed blue and scarlet with forget-me-nots and poppies. All nature was green and glistening after the rain, and the mountain breeze blew fresh against their faces. Neither could be insensible to the influence of the day. Their talk was light and free and glancing—mere badinage; but it occasionally struck a deeper note, and holding it for an instant, half reluctantly let it go. Marcia had never known Sybert in this mood—she had not, as she realized, known him in any. ”

“ Pietro was holding a rendezvous with his friends again, and entertaining them with her uncle’s tobacco. The night was chilly and she was cold. She turned into the dark room with a little laugh at herself: she was staying away from the contessa’s musicale to avoid the night air?
She groped about the table for a book and started downstairs with the half-hearted intention of reading out the evening in the salon. A wood fire had been kindled that afternoon, to dispel the slight dampness which the stone walls seemed to exude at the slightest suggestion of an eastern wind. ”

“ It’s the great tragedy of life; and it comes to all, Miss Marcia—to you as well as to the poorest peasant girl in Castel Vivalanti. Life, after all, contains some justice.’
Marcia turned her back to the shining villa and looked down over the great Campagna stretching away darkly under the stars, with here and there the gleam of a shepherd’s fire, built to ward off the poison in the air. ”

“ Marcia’s eyes suddenly filled with tears and she bit her lip. Sybert leaned forward and poked the fire.
‘I should like to talk to you about your uncle,’ he said, with his eyes fixed on the embers. ‘He is one of the finest men I have ever known. And it is not often that a man in his position amounts to much—that is, as a human being; the temptations are all the other way. Most men, you know, with leisure and his tastes would—well, go in for collecting carved ivory and hammered silver and all that rubbish. Nobody understands what he is trying to do, least of all the people he is doing it for. ”

“ Scarcely real, and yet one of the oldest things in the world—the rolling Campagna, the arches of the aqueducts, Rome behind and the Sabines before. So it had been for centuries; thousands of human lives were wrapped up in it. That was its charm. The picture was not inanimate, but pathetically human. As she looked far off across the plain so mournfully beautiful in its desolation, a sudden rush of feeling swept over her, a rush of that insane love of Italy which has engulfed so many foreigners in the waters of Lethe. She knew now how Paul felt. Italy! Italy! ”

“ He turned his back and kicked the coping of the fountain viciously. Marcia crossed over to him and touched him on the arm.
‘Paul,’ she said, ‘I can’t let it end so. I know I have been very much to blame, but not as you think. I liked you so much.’
He turned and saw the tears in her eyes, and his anger vanished.
‘Oh, I know. I’ve no business to speak so—but—I’m naturally cut up, you know. Don’t cry about it; you can’t help it. If you don’t love me, you don’t, and that ends the matter. I’ll get over it, Marcia.’ He smiled a trifle bleakly. ”

“ Surely no one would dare to stop the carriage on the open road in broad daylight. A hundred wild imaginings were chasing through her brain, when finally, close upon eight, the rumble of wheels sounded on the avenue.
Both Mrs. Copley and Marcia uttered an exclamation of relief. Mrs. Copley had been worried on the score of the dinner, and Marcia for any number of reasons which disappeared with the knowledge that her uncle was safe. They hurried out to the loggia to meet the new-comers, and as the carriage drew up, not only did the Melvilles and Mr. Copley descend, but Laurence Sybert as well. ”

“ It was scarcely the weather for an afternoon stroll, but the ilex grove looked cool and inviting, and she finally made a courageous dash across the terrace and plunged gratefully into its shady fastnesses. The sun-beaten world outside the little realm of green was an untempered glare of heat and colour. The only sounds which smote the drowsy air were the drip, drip of the fountain and the murmurous drone of insects in the borders of the garden. Marcia paused by the fountain, and dropping down upon the coping, dipped her fingers idly in the water. ”

“ And Paul was not one to waste his opportunities. The spring was ideal; Rome was flooded with sunshine and flowers and the Italian joy of being alive. The troubles of Italy’s paupers, which Mr. Copley found so absorbing, received, during these days, little consideration from his niece. Marcia was too busy living her own life to have eyes for any but happy people. She looked at Italy through rose-coloured glasses, and Italy, basking in the spring sunshine, smiled back sympathetically. ”

“ The mass of the Vatican at their left loomed a black bulk in the night, its hundreds of windows shining in the reflected lights of the piazza like the eyes of a great octopus. At another time Marcia might have looked very curiously toward the palace. She might have wondered if in one of those dark windows Leo was not standing brooding over the throng of worshippers who had come that day. How must a pope feel to see thirty thousand people go out from under his roof—go out freely to their homes—while he alone may not step across the threshold? ”

“ I know you’re starving while others spend your money. There’s no justice for you, and there never will be. The only thing I want in the world is to see Italy happy. I am as ready to die for it as you are, but what can I do? What can any one do? The soldiers are stronger than we are, and if we raise our hands they will shoot us down like dogs, and there it will end.’ He paused with a deep breath, and went on in a quieter tone. ‘Patience is poor food to offer to starving men, but it’s the one hope now for you and for Italy. ”

“ And so the Copley dynasty began at Castel Vivalanti. The life soon fell into a daily routine, as life in even the best of places will. Three meals and tea, a book in the shadiness of the ilex grove to the tune of the splashing fountain, a siesta at noon, a drive in the afternoon, and a long night’s sleep were the sum of Vivalanti’s resources. Marcia liked it. Italy had got its hold upon her, and for the present she was content to drift. ”

“ As he caught sight of Marcia’s and Sybert’s eyes upon him, and knew that they had seen, a quick flush spread over his thin dark face, and turning away he bowed his head again.
Marcia broke the silence with a low laugh as they rode on into the shade of the cypresses.
‘He thought we were——’ and then she stopped.
‘Lovers too,’ said Sybert. ‘Poor devil! I suppose he thinks the world is full of lovers outside his monastery walls. There,’ he added, ‘is a man who is living for an idea.’
‘And is beginning to suspect that it is the wrong one.’
He shot her a quick glance of comprehension. ”

“ She stretched out her hand and touched Sybert to be sure he was there. The next moment she was beyond herself. ‘I’m afraid,’ she sobbed out, and she clung to him convulsively.
She felt him put his arm around her. ‘Marcia! My dear little girl. There’s nothing to be afraid of. When they find we are on our guard they won’t dare molest us. Nothing can hurt you.’ It was so exactly his tone to Gerald, she would have laughed had she not been crying too hard to stop. Then suddenly his arms tightened about her. ‘Marcia,’ he whispered hoarsely, ‘Marcia,’ and he bent his head until his lips touched hers. ”

“ But why, may I ask in my turn, is there anything so inherently distressing in the idea of an American family (of millionaires) spending the summer in a seventeenth-century Italian villa up in the Sabine hills—especially when the rightful heir prefers trente-et-un at Monte Carlo? Must they of necessity spoil the romance? They are human, and have their passions like the rest of us; and one of them at least is young, and men have called her beautiful—yes, in this very garden. ”

“ Marcia laughed, and then she inquired—
‘Suppose you knew a person, Mr. Sybert, who didn’t care for anything but art—who just wanted to have the world beautiful and nothing else, what would you think?’
‘Not much,’ he returned; ‘what would you?’
‘I think that you go a great deal farther in the other extreme!’
‘Not at all,’ he maintained. ‘I am granting that art is a very fine thing; only there are so many more vital issues in life that one doesn’t have time to bother with it much. However, I suppose it’s a phase one has to go through with in Italy. ”

“ Under the smiling moons of the Porta della Luna the carriage came to a halt, and the crowd of Castel Vivalanti boys, who were in the habit of scouring the highway for coppers, fell upon it vociferously. Marcia had exhausted her soldi in Genazzano, and with a laughing shake of her head she motioned them away. But the boys would not be shaken off; they swarmed about the carriage like little rats, shrilly demanding money. ”

“ On this one night it does inclose all Rome—nobility and peasants, Italians and foreigners: those who are of the faith, and those who are merely spectators; those who come to worship; those who come to be amused—St. Peter’s receives them all with the same impartiality.
Standing outside, it had seemed to them that the whole city had flowed through the doors; but within, the church was still approximately empty. As they walked down the broad nave in the dimness of twilight, Marcia turned to the young man beside her. ”

“ Just now there were storms, perhaps, but before long there would be moonlight and singing and love-making again, and the clouds would be forgotten.
She strolled on to the ruins of the old villa and sat down among the crumbling arches. She was in a very different mood herself than on that other afternoon of the early spring when Paul Dessart had found her there. ”

“ Copley were away. Marcia piled on more sticks, with a shake of her head at Italian servants. The one thing in the world that they cannot learn is to build a fire; generations of economy having ingrained within them a notion that fuel is too precious to burn.
The blaze once more started, instead of ringing for a lamp and settling down to her book, she dropped into a chair and sat lazily watching the flames. Italy had got its hold upon her, with its spell of Lethian inertia. ”

“ He had gone out with a hunting-party to one of the great Campagna estates, owned by a Roman prince whose only interest in the land was to draw from it every possible centesime of income. They had stopped to water their horses at a cluster of straw huts where the farm labourers lived, and Sybert had dismounted and gone into one of them to talk to the people. It was dark and damp, with a dirt floor and rude bunks along the sides. There, fifty human beings lived crowded together, breathing the heavy, pestilential air. ”

“ One morning an accident happened at the villa, and though it may not seem important to the world in general, still, as events turned out, it proved to be the pivot upon which destiny turned. Gerald fell over the parapet, landing eight feet below—butter-side down—with a bleeding nose and a broken front tooth. He could not claim this time that Marietta had pushed him over, as it was clearly proven that Marietta, at the moment, was sitting in the scullery doorway, smiling at François. In consequence Marietta received her wages, a ticket to Rome, and fifty lire to dry her tears. ”

“ You enjoy the Egoist, for instance. But also’—he paused—‘you can suffer many things they cannot understand. You are an individual, while they are merely human beings. Gervasio’s stepmother married a husband, and doubtless loved him very much and cried for him a week after he was dead. Then she married another, and saw no difference between him and the first. She may have to work hard, and she may be hungry sometimes, but she will escape the worst suffering in life, which you, with all your privileges, may not escape, Marcia.’
‘One would rather not escape it,’ she answered. ”

“ Melville faced him squarely.
‘For goodness’ sake, Sybert, I don’t know how much influence you have, or anything about it, but do what you can to keep things quiet. Of course the government has made mistakes—as what government has not? But until there’s something better to be substituted there’s no use kicking. Plainly, the people are too ignorant to govern themselves, and the House of Savoy is the only means of salvation.’
Sybert waved his hand impatiently. ”

“ Tarquinio followed him to the threshold, and bidding him a voluble good-bye in the face of the world, begged the signor Americano to honour his humble osteria again; so that any chance passer-by might regard the gentleman as but a casual visitor. Sybert smiled at the simple strategy. An Italian loves a plot better than his dinner, and is never happier than when engaged in an imaginary intrigue. ”

“ Marcia didn’t begin till she was twelve, and she has a very good accent, I am sure.’
Mr. Copley twisted the handle of his glass in silence.
‘I suppose, after all,’ he said finally, to no one in particular, ‘if you manage to bring up a boy to be a decent citizen you’ve done something in the world.’
‘I don’t know,’ Marcia objected, with a half-laugh. ‘If one man, whom we will suppose is a decent citizen, brings up one boy to be a decent citizen, and does nothing else, I don’t see that much is gained to the world. Your one man has merely shifted the responsibility.’
Mr. Copley shrugged a trifle. ”

“ Owing to the festa, the streets were crowded with loungers, and in the tiny piazza groups of men were gathered about the door of the tobacco-shop, arguing and quarrelling and gesticulating in their excitable Italian fashion. It had been a week or more since Marcia had visited the village, and now, as she threaded her way through the crowd, it struck her suddenly that the people’s usual friendly nods were a trifle churlish ”

“ The town—Castel Vivalanti—was built in the days when a stronghold was more to be thought of than a water-supply, and its people, from habit or love, or perhaps sheer necessity, have lived on there ever since, going down in the morning to their work in the plain and toiling up at night to their homes on the hill. So steep is its site that the doorway of one house looks down on the roof of the house below, and its narrow stone streets are in reality flights of stairs. ”

“ No one cares for those who do not care for themselves. It’s the poor people, who haven’t enough to eat, who buy the gold braid on the King’s clothes and pay for the carriages of his ministers. In my opinion, we would do better to buy bread for our children first.’
Sybert looked back in the man’s burning face, and his own caught fire. He knew that every word he said was true, and he knew how hopeless was his remedy. What could these passionate, ignorant peasants, blazing with rage, do with power if they had it? Worse than nothing. ”

“ If you want my honest opinion, I think you’ve been pretty unfair with Paul.’
‘I know it,’ Marcia said miserably; ‘you can’t blame me any worse than I blame myself. But you just can’t love people if you don’t.’
‘I’m not blaming you for not loving him; it’s for his loving you. That, by using a little foresight, might have been avoided. However, I don’t know that I’m exactly the person to preach.’ Eleanor dropped into a chair with a short laugh, and leaned forward with her chin in her hand and her eyes on Marcia’s face. ”