CHAPTER XXV
An account remains of the marriage ceremony, which took place the nextmorning in Cardinal Origo's house. It was of the simplest kind and waswitnessed by few. Murray, Misset and his wife, and Maria Vittoria deCaprara made the public part of the company; Wogan stood for the King;and the Marquis of Monti Boulorois for James Sobieski, the bride'sfather. Bride and bridegroom played their parts bravely and well, onemust believe, for the chronicler speaks of their grace and modesty ofbearing. Clementina rose at five in the morning, dressed in a robe ofwhite, tied a white ribbon about her hair, and for her only ornamentfixed a white collar of pearls about her neck. In this garb she went atonce to the church of San Domenico, where she made her confession, andfrom the church to the Cardinal's Palace. There the Cardinal, with oneMaas, an English priest from Rome, at his elbow, was already waiting forher. Mr. Wogan thereupon read the procuration, for which he had riddento Rome in haste so many months before, and pronounced the consent ofthe King his master to its terms. Origo asked the Princess whether shelikewise consented, and the manner in which she spoke her one word,"Yes," seems to have stirred the historian to paeans. It seems that allthe virtues launched that one little word, and were clearly expressed init. The graces, too, for once in a way went hand in hand with thevirtues. Never was a "Yes" so sweetly spoken since the earth rose out ofthe sea. In a word, there was no ruffle of the great passion which thesetwo, man and woman, had trodden beneath their feet. She did not hint ofIphigenia; he borrowed no plumes from Don Quixote. Nor need one fancythat their contentment was all counterfeit. They were neither of themgrumblers, and "fate" and "destiny" were words seldom upon their lips.
One incident, indeed, is related which the chronicler thought to becurious, though he did not comprehend it. The Princess Clementinabrought from her confessional box a wisp of straw which clung to herdress at the knee. Until Wogan had placed the King's ring upon herfinger, she did not apparently remark it; but no sooner had that officebeen performed than she stooped, and with a friendly smile at hermakeshift bridegroom, she plucked it from her skirt and let it fallbeneath her foot.
And that was all. No words passed between them after the ceremony, forher Royal Highness went straight back to the little house in the garden,and that same forenoon set out for Rome.
She was not the only witness of the ceremony to take that road that day.For some three hours later, to be precise, at half-past two, MariaVittoria stepped into her coach before the Pilgrim Inn. Wogan held thecarriage door open for her. He was still in the bravery of his weddingclothes, and Maria Vittoria looked him over whimsically from the top ofhis peruke to his shoe-buckles.
"I came to see a fool-woman," said she, "and I saw a fool-man. Well,well!" and she suddenly lowered her voice to a passionate whisper. "Why,oh, why did you not take your fortunes in your hands at Peri?"
Wogan leaned forward to her. "Do you know so much?"
She answered him quickly. "I will never forgive you. Yes, I know." Sheforced her lips into a smile. "I suppose you are content. You have yourblack horse."
"You know of the horse, too," said Wogan, colouring to the edge of hisperuke. "You know I have no further use for it."
"Say that again, and I will beg it of you."
"Nay, it is yours, then. I will send him after you to Rome."
"Will you?" said Maria Vittoria. "Why, then, I accept. There's myhand;" and she thrust it through the window to him. "If ever you come toRome, the Caprara Palace stands where it did at your last visit. I donot say you will be welcome. No, I do not forgive you, but you may come.Having your horse, I could hardly bar the door against you. So you maycome."
Wogan raised her hand to his lips.
"Aye," said she, with a touch of bitterness, "kiss my hand. You have hadyour way. Here are two people crossmated, and two others not mated atall. You have made four people entirely unhappy, and a kiss on the glovesets all right."
"Nay, not four," protested Wogan.
"Your manners," she continued remorselessly, ticking off the names uponher fingers, "will hinder you from telling me to my face the King ishappy. And the Princess?"
"She was born to be a queen," replied Wogan, stubbornly. "Happiness,mademoiselle! It does not come by the striving after it. That's theroyal road to miss it. You may build up your house of happiness with allyour care through years, and you will find you have only built it up todraw down the blinds and hang out the hatchment above the door, for thetenant to inhabit it is dead."
Maria Vittoria listened very seriously till he came to the end. Then shemade a pouting grimace. "That is very fine, moral, and poetical. YourPrincess was born to be a queen. But what if her throne is set up onlyin your city of dreams? Well, it is some consolation to know that youare one of the four."
"Nay, I will make a shift not to plague myself upon the way the worldtreats you."
"Ah, but because it treats you well," cried she. "There will be work foryou, hurryings to and fro, the opportunities of excelling, nights in thesaddle, and perhaps again the quick red life of battlefields. It is wellwith you, but what of me, Mr. Wogan? What of me?" and she leaned back inher carriage and drove away. Wogan had no answer to that despairingquestion. He stood with his head bared till the carriage passed round acorner and disappeared, but the voice rang for a long while in his ears.And for a long while the dark eyes abrim with tears, and the torturedface, kept him company at nights. He walked slowly back to his lodging,and mounting a horse rode out of Bologna, and towards the Apennines.
On one of the lower slopes he came upon a villa just beyond a curve ofthe road, and reined in his horse. The villa nestled on the hillsidebelow him in a terraced garden of oleander and magnolias, very pretty tothe eye. Cypress hedges enclosed it; the spring had made it a bower ofrose blossoms, and depths of shade out of whose green darkness glowedhere and there a red statue like a tutelary god. Wogan dismounted andled his horse down the path to the door. He inquired for LadyFeatherstone, and was shown into a room from the windows of which helooked down on Bologna, that city of colonnades. Lady Featherstone,however, had heard the tramp of his horse; she came running up from thegarden, and without waiting to hear any particulars of her visitor,burst eagerly into the room.
"Well?" she said, and stopped and swayed upon the threshold. Woganturned from the window towards her.
"Your Ladyship was wise, I think, to leave Bologna. The little house inthe trees there had no such wide prospect as this."
He spoke rather to give her time than out of any sarcasm. She set ahand against the jamb of the door, and even so barely sustained hertrifling weight. Her knees shook, her childlike face grew white aspaper, a great terror glittered in her eyes.
"I am not the visitor whom you expect," continued Wogan, "nor do I bringthe news which you would wish to hear;" and at that she raised atrembling hand. "I beg you--a moment's silence. Then I will hear you,Mr. Warner." She made a sort of stumbling run and reached a couch. Woganshut the door and waited. He was glad that she had used the name ofWarner. It recalled to him that evening at Ohlau when she had stoodbehind the curtain with a stiletto in her hand, and the three last daysof his perilous ride to Schlestadt. He needed his most vividrecollections to steel his heart against her; for he was beginning tothink it was his weary lot to go up and down the world causing pain towomen. After a while she said, "Now your news;" and she held her handlightly to her heart to await the blow.
"The King married this morning the Princess Clementina," said Wogan.Lady Featherstone did not move her hand; she still waited. It was justto hinder this marriage that she had come to Italy, but her failure wasat this moment of no account. She heard of it with indifference; it hadno meaning to her. She waited. Wogan's mere presence at the villa toldher there was more to come. He continued:--
"Last night Mr. Whittington came with the King to Bologna--youunderstand, no doubt, why;" and she nodded without moving her eyes fromhis face. She made no pretence as to the part she had played in theaffair. All the world might know it. That was a matter
at this moment ofcomplete indifference. She waited.
"The King and Mr. Whittington came at nine of the night to the littlehouse which you once occupied. I was there, but I was not there alone.Can your Ladyship conjecture whom I brought there? Your Ladyship, as Ilearned last night from Mr. Whittington's own lips, had paid a visitsecretly, using a key which you had retained to the house on an excusethat you had left behind jewels of some value. You saw her Highness thePrincess. You told her a story of the King and Mlle. de Caprara. I rodeto Rome, and when the King came last night Mlle. de Caprara was with thePrincess. I had evidence against Mr. Whittington, a confession of one ofthe soldiers of the Governor of Trent, the leader of a party of five whoattacked me at Peri. No doubt you know of that little matter too;" andagain Lady Featherstone nodded.
"Thus your double plot--to set the King against the Princess, and thePrincess against the King--doubly failed."
"Go on," said Lady Featherstone, moistening her dry lips. Wogan told herhow from the little sitting-room on the ground-floor he had seen theKing and Whittington cross the lawn; he described his interview withthe King, and how he had come quietly down the stairs.
"I went into the garden," he went on, "and touched Whittington on theelbow. I told him just what I have explained to you. I said, 'You are acoward, a liar, a slanderer of women,' and I beat him on the mouth."
Lady Featherstone uttered a cry and drew herself into an extraordinarycrouching attitude, with her eyes blazing steadily at him. He thoughtshe meant to spring at him; he looked at that hand upon her heart to seewhether it held a weapon hidden in the fold of her bosom.
"Go on," she said; "and he?"
"He answered me in the strangest quiet way imaginable. 'You insultedLady Featherstone at Ohlau, Mr. Wogan,' said he, 'one evening when shehid behind your curtain. It was a very delicate piece of drollery, nodoubt. But I shall be glad to show you another, view of it.' It isstrange how that had rankled in his thoughts. I liked him for it,--uponmy soul, I did,--though it was the only thing I liked in him."
"Go on," said Lady Featherstone. Mr. Wogan's likes or dislikes were ofno more interest to her than the failure of her effort to hinder themarriage.
"We went to the bottom of the garden where there is a little square oflawn hedged in with myrtle-trees. The night was very dark, so westripped to our shirts. From the waist upwards we were visible to eachother as a vague glimmer of white, and thus we fought, foot to foot,among the myrtle-trees. We could not see so much as our swords unlessthey clashed more than usually hard, and a spark struck from them. Wefought by guesswork and feel, and in the end luck served me. I drove mysword through his chest until the hilt rang upon his breast-bone."
Then just a movement from Lady Featherstone as though she drew up herfeet beneath her.
"He lived for perhaps five minutes. He was in great distress lest harmshould come to you; and since there was no one but his enemy to whom hecould speak, why, he spoke to his enemy. I promised him, madam, thatwith his death the story should be closed, if you left Italy within theweek."
"And he?" she interrupted,--"he died there. Well?"
"You know the laurel hedge by the sun-dial? There is an out-house wherethe gardener keeps his tools. I found a spade there, and beneath thatlaurel hedge I buried him."
Lady Featherstone rose to her feet. She spoke no word; she uttered nocry; her face was white and terrible. She stood rigid like oneparalysed; then she swayed round and fell in a swoon upon the floor. Andas she fell, something bright slipped from her hand and dropped atWogan's feet. He picked it up. It was a stiletto. He stood looking downat the childish figure with a queer compassionate smile upon his face."She could love," said he; "yes, she could love."
He walked out of the house, led his horse back onto the road and mountedit. The night was gathering; there were purple shadows upon theApennines. Wogan rode away alone.
EPILOGUE
Sir Charles Wogan had opportunities enough to appreciate in later yearsthe accuracy of Maria Vittoria's prophecy. "Here are two peoplecross-mated," said she, and events bore her out. The jealousies ofcourtiers no doubt had their share in the estrangement of that unhappycouple, but that was no consolation to Wogan, who saw, within so short atime of that journey into Italy, James separated from the chosen woman,and the chosen woman herself seeking the seclusion of a convent. As hisreward he was made Governor of La Mancha in Spain, and no place couldhave been found with associations more suitable to this Irishman whoturned his back upon his fortunes at Peri. At La Mancha he lived formany years, writing a deal of Latin verse, and corresponding with manydistinguished men in England upon matters of the intellect. Matters ofthe heart he left alone, and meddled with no more. Nor did any womanever ride on his black horse into his city of dreams. He lived and dieda bachelor. The memory of that week when he had rescued his Princess andcarried her through the snows was to the last too vivid in his thoughts.The thunderous roll of the carriage down the slopes, the sparksstriking from the wheels, the sound of Clementina's voice singing softlyin the darkness of the carriage, the walk under the stars to Ala, thecoming of the dawn about that lonely hut, high-placed amongst the pines.These recollections bore him company through many a solitary evening.Somehow the world had gone awry. Clementina, withdrawn into her convent,was, after all, "wasted," as he had sworn she should not be. James wasfallen upon a deeper melancholy, and diminished hopes. He himself was anexile alone in his white _patio_ in Spain. In only one point was MariaVittoria's prophecy at fault. She had spoken of two who were to find nomates, and one of the two was herself. She married five years later.
THE END
Thank you for reading books on BookFrom.Net Share this book with friends