CHAPTER XXIV
ADVENTURES OF VITTORIA AND ANGELO
Nothing was distinguishable for the flying couple save the high-roadwinding under rock and forest, and here and there a coursing water inthe depths of the ravines, that showed like a vein in black marble.They walked swiftly, keeping brisk ears for sound of hoof or foot behindthem. Angelo promised her that she should rest after the morning lighthad come; but she assured him that she could bear fatigue, and her firmcheerfulness lent his heart vigour. At times they were hooded with thedarkness, which came on them as if, as benighted children fancy, theirfaces were about to meet the shaggy breast of the forest. Rising up tolighter air, they had sight of distant twinklings: it might be city, orautumn weed, or fires of the woodmen, or beacon fires: they glimmeredlike eyelets to the mystery of the vast unseen land. Innumerable brookswent talking to the night: torrents in seasons of rain, childish voicesnow, with endless involutions of a song of three notes and a sort ofunnoted clanging chorus, as if a little one sang and would sing onthrough the thumping of a tambourine and bells. Vittoria had thesefancies: Angelo had none. He walked like a hunted man whose life is atstake.
'If we reach a village soon we may get some conveyance,' he said.
'I would rather walk than drive,' said Vittoria; 'it keeps me fromthinking!
'There is the dawn, signorina!
Vittoria frightened him by taking a seat upon a bench of rock; whileit was still dark about them, she drew off Camilla's silken shoes andstockings, and stood on bare feet.
'You fancied I was tired,' she said. 'No, I am thrifty; and I want tosave as much of my finery as I can. I can go very well on naked feet.These shoes are no protection; they would be worn out in half-a-day, andspoilt for decent wearing in another hour.'
The sight of fair feet upon hard earth troubled Angelo; he excusedhimself for calling her out to endure hardship; but she said, 'I trustyou entirely.' She looked up at the first thin wave of colour whilewalking.
'You do not know me,' said he.
'You are the Countess Ammiani's nephew.'
'I have, as I had the honour to tell you yesterday, the blood of yourlover in my veins.'
'Do not speak of him now, I pray,' said Vittoria; 'I want my strength!
'Signorina, the man we have left behind us is his enemy;--mine. I wouldrather see you dead than alive in his hands. Do you fear death?'
'Sometimes; when I am half awake,' she confessed. 'I dislike thinking ofit.'
He asked her curiously: 'Have you never seen it?'
'Death?' said she, and changed a shudder to a smile; 'I died lastnight.'
Angelo smiled with her. 'I saw you die!
'It seems a hundred years ago.'
'Or half-a-dozen minutes. The heart counts everything'
'Was I very much liked by the people, Signor Angelo?'
'They love you.'
'I have done them no good.'
'Every possible good. And now, mine is the duty to protect you.'
'And yesterday we were strangers! Signor Angelo, you spoke of sbirri.There is no rising in Bologna. Why are they after you? You look toogentle to give them cause.'
'Do I look gentle? But what I carry is no burden. Who that saw you lastnight would know you for Camilla? You will hear of my deeds, and judge.We shall soon have men upon the road; you must be hidden. See, there:there are our colours in the sky. Austria cannot wipe them out. Since Iwas a boy I have always slept in a bed facing East, to keep that truthbefore my eyes. Black and yellow drop to the earth: green, white, andred mount to heaven. If more of my countrymen saw these meanings!--butthey are learning to. My tutor called them Germanisms. If so, I havestolen a jewel from my enemy.'
Vittoria mentioned the Chief.
'Yes,' said Angelo; 'he has taught us to read God's handwriting. Irevere him. It's odd; I always fancy I hear his voice from a dungeon,and seeing him looking at one light. He has a fault: he does notcomprehend the feelings of a nobleman. Do you think he has made aconvert of our Carlo in that? Never! High blood is ineradicable.'
'I am not of high blood,' said Vittoria.
'Countess Ammiani overlooks it. And besides, low blood may be elevatedwithout the intervention of a miracle. You have a noble heart,signorina. It may be the will of God that you should perpetuate ourrace. All of us save Carlo Ammiani seem to be falling.'
Vittoria bent her head, distressed by a broad beam of sunlight. Thecountry undulating to the plain lay under them, the great Alps above,and much covert on all sides. They entered a forest pathway, followingchance for safety. The dark leafage and low green roofing tastedsweeter to their senses than clear air and sky. Dark woods are hometo fugitives, and here there was soft footing, a surroundinggentleness,--grass, and moss with dead leaves peacefully flat on it. Thebirds were not timorous, and when a lizard or a snake slipped away fromher feet, it was amusing to Vittoria and did not hurt her tenderness tosee that they were feared. Threading on beneath the trees, they wound bya valley's incline, where tumbled stones blocked the course of a greenwater, and filled the lonely place with one onward voice. When the sunstood over the valley they sat beneath a chestnut tree in a semicircleof orange rock to eat the food which Angelo had procured at the inn. Hepoured out wine for her in the hollow of a stone, deep as an egg-shell,whereat she sipped, smiling at simple contrivances; but no smile crossedthe face of Angelo. He ate and drank to sustain his strength, as aweapon is sharpened; and having done, he gathered up what was left, andlay at her feet with his eyes fixed upon an old grey stone. She, too,sat brooding. The endless babble and noise of the water had hardenedthe sense of its being a life in that solitude. The floating of a hawkoverhead scarce had the character of an animated thing. Angelo turnedround to look at her, and looking upward as he lay, his sight wassmitten by spots of blood upon one of her torn white feet, that was buthalf-nestled in the folds of her dress. Bending his head down, likea bird beaking at prey, he kissed the foot passionately. Vittoria'seyelids ran up; a chord seemed to snap within her ears: she stole theshamed foot into concealment, and throbbed, but not fearfully,for Angelo's forehead was on the earth. Clumps of grass, and sharpflint-dust stuck between his fists, which were thrust out stiff oneither side of him. She heard him groan heavily. When he raised hisface, it was white as madness. Her womanly nature did not shrink fromcaressing it with a touch of soothing hands.
She chanced to say, 'I am your sister.'
'No, by God! you are not my sister,' cried the young man. 'She diedwithout a stain of blood; a lily from head to foot, and went into thevault so. Our mother will see that. She will kiss the girl in heavenand see that.' He rose, crying louder: 'Are there echoes here?' But hisvoice beat against the rocks undoubted.
She saw that a frenzy had seized him. He looked with eyes drained ofhuman objects; standing square, with stiff half-dropped arms, and anintense melody of wretchedness in his voice.
'Rinaldo, Rinaldo!' he shouted: 'Clelia!--no answer from man or ghost.She is dead. We two said to her die! and she died. Therefore sheis silent, for the dead have not a word. Oh! Milan, Milan! accursedbetraying city! I should have found my work in you if you had keptfaith. Now here am I, talking to the strangled throat of this place, andcan get no answer. Where am I? The world is hollow: the miserable shell!They lied. Battle and slaughter they promised me, and enemies like ripemaize for the reaping-hook. I would have had them in thick to my hands.I would have washed my hands at night, and eaten and drunk and slept,and sung again to work in the morning. They promised me a sword anda sea to plunge it in, and our mother Italy to bless me. I would havetoiled: I would have done good in my life. I would have bathed mysoul in our colours. I would have had our flag about my body for awinding-sheet, and the fighting angels of God to unroll me. Now here amI, and my own pale mother trying at every turn to get in front of me.Have her away! It's a ghost, I know. She will be touching the strengthout of me. She is not the mother I love and I serve. Go: cherish yourdaughter, you dead woman!'
Angelo reeled. 'A spot of blood has s
ent me mad,' he said, and caughtfor a darkness to cross his sight, and fell and lay flat.
Vittoria looked around her; her courage was needed in that long silence.
She adopted his language: 'Our mother Italy is waiting for us. We musttravel on, and not be weary. Angelo, my friend, lend me your help overthese stones.'
He rose quietly. She laid her elbow on his hand; thus supported she lefta place that seemed to shudder. All the heavy day they walked almostsilently; she not daring to probe his anguish with a question; and hecalm and vacant as the hour following thunder. But, of her safety by hisside she had no longer a doubt. She let him gather weeds and grasses,and bind them across her feet, and perform friendly services, surethat nothing earthly could cause such a mental tempest to recur. Theconsiderate observation which at all seasons belongs to true couragetold her that it was not madness afflicting Angelo.
Near nightfall they came upon a forester's hut, where they were welcomedby an old man and a little girl, who gave them milk and black bread, andstraw to rest on. Angelo slept in the outer air. When Vittoria awoke shehad the fancy that she had taken one long dive downward in a well;and on touching the bottom found her head above the surface. While hersurprise was wearing off, she beheld the woodman's little girl at herfeet holding up one end of her cloak, and peeping underneath, overcomeby amazement at the flashing richness of the dress of the heroineCamilla. Entering into the state of her mind spontaneously, Vittoriasought to induce the child to kiss her; but quite vainly. The child'sreverence for the dress allowed her only to be within reach of the hemof it, so as to delight her curiosity. Vittoria smiled when, as she satup, the child fell back against the wall; and as she rose to her feet,the child scampered from the room. 'My poor Camilla! you can charmsomebody, yet,' she said, limping; her visage like a broken water withthe pain of her feet. 'If the bell rings for Camilla now, what sortof an entry will she make?' Vittoria treated her physical weakness andailments with this spirit of humour. 'They may say that Michiella hasbewitched you, my Camilla. I think your voice would sound as if it weredragging its feet after it just as a stork flies. O my Camilla! don'tI wish I could do the same, and be ungraceful and at ease! A moan ismarried to every note of your treble, my Camilla, like December and May.Keep me from shrieking!'
The pangs shooting from her feet were scarce bearable, but therepression of them helped her to meet Angelo with a freer mind than,after the interval of separation, she would have had. The old woodmanwas cooking a queer composition of flour and milk sprinkled with saltfor them. Angelo cut a stout cloth to encase each of her feet, and boundthem in it. He was more cheerful than she had ever seen him, and nowfirst spoke of their destination. His design was to conduct her nearto Bormio, there to engage a couple of men in her service who wouldaccompany her to Meran, by the Val di Sole, while he crossed the Stelvioalone, and turning leftward in the Tyrolese valley, tried the passageinto Switzerland.
Bormio, if, when they quitted the forest, a conveyance could beobtained, was no more than a short day's distance, according to the oldwoodman's directions. Vittoria induced the little girl to sit upon herknee, and sang to her, but greatly unspirited the charm of her dress.The sun was rising as they bade adieu to the hut.
About mid-day they quitted the shelter of forest trees and stood onbroken ground, without a path to guide them. Vittoria did her best tolaugh at her mishaps in walking, and compared herself to a Capuchinpilgrim; but she was unused to going bareheaded and shoeless, and thoughshe held on bravely, the strong beams of the sun and the stony wayswarped her strength. She had to check fancies drawn from Arabian tales,concerning the help sometimes given by genii of the air and enchantedbirds, that were so incessant and vivid that she found herself sulkingat the loneliness and helplessness of the visible sky, and feared thather brain was losing its hold of things. Angelo led her to a half-shadedhollow, where they finished the remainder of yesterday's meat and wine.She set her eyes upon a gold-green lizard by a stone and slept.
'The quantity of sleep I require is unmeasured,' she said, a minuteafterwards, according to her reckoning of time, and expected to seethe lizard still by the stone. Angelo was near her; the sky was full ofcolours, and the earth of shadows.
'Another day gone!' she exclaimed in wonderment, thinking that the daysof human creatures had grown to be as rapid and (save toward the oneend) as meaningless as the gaspings of a fish on dry land. He told herthat he had explored the country as far as he had dared to stray fromher. He had seen no habitation along the heights. The vale was toodistant for strangers to reach it before nightfall. 'We can make alittle way on,' said Vittoria, and the trouble of walking began again.He entreated her more than once to have no fear. 'What can I fear?' sheasked. His voice sank penitently: 'You can rely on me fully when thereis anything to do for you.'
'I am sure of that,' she replied, knowing his allusion to be to hisfrenzy of yesterday. In truth, no woman could have had a gentlercompanion.
On the topmost ridge of the heights, looking over an interminable gulfof darkness they saw the lights of the vale. 'A bird might find hisperch there, but I think there is no chance for us,' said Vittoria. 'Themoment we move forward to them the lights will fly back. It is their wayof behaving.'
Angelo glanced round desperately. Farther on along the ridge his eyecaught sight of a low smouldering fire. When he reached it he had agreat disappointment. A fire in the darkness gives hopes that men willbe at hand. Here there was not any human society. The fire crouched onits ashes. It was on a little circular eminence of mossed rock; blacksticks, and brushwood, and dry fern, and split logs, pitchy to thetouch, lay about; in the centre of them the fire coiled sullenly amongits ashes, with a long eye like a serpent's.
'Could you sleep here?' said Angelo.
'Anywhere!' Vittoria sighed with droll dolefulness.
'I can promise to keep you warm, signorina.'
'I will not ask for more till to-morrow, my friend.'
She laid herself down sideways, curling up her feet, with her cheek onthe palm of her hand.
Angelo knelt and coaxed the fire, whose appetite, like that which issaid to be ours, was fed by eating, for after the red jaws had takenhalf-a-dozen sticks, it sang out for more, and sent up flame leapingafter flame and thick smoke. Vittoria watched the scene through a thindivision of her eyelids; the fire, the black abyss of country, thestars, and the sentinel figure. She dozed on the edge of sleep, unableto yield herself to it wholly. She believed that she was dreaming whenby-and-by many voices filled her ears. The fire was sounding like anangry sea, and the voices were like the shore, more intelligible, butconfused in shriller clamour. She was awakened by Angelo, who knelt onone knee and took her outlying hand; then she saw that men surroundedthem, some of whom were hurling the lighted logs about, some tramplingdown the outer rim of flames. They looked devilish to a first awakeningglance. He told her that the men were friendly; they were good Italians.This had been the beacon arranged for the night of the Fifteenth, whenno run of signals was seen from Milan; and yesterday afternoon ithad been in mockery partially consumed. 'We have aroused the country,signorina, and brought these poor fellows out of their beds. Theysupposed that Milan must be up and at work. I have explained everythingto them.'
Vittoria had rather to receive their excuses than to proffer her own.They were mostly youths dressed like the better class of peasantry. Theylaughed at the incident, stating how glad they would have been to beholdthe heights all across the lakes ablaze and promising action for themorrow. One square-shouldered fellow raised her lightly from the ground.She felt herself to be a creature for whom circumstance was busilyplotting, so that it was useless to exert her mind in thought. The longprocession sank down the darkness, leaving the low red fire to die outbehind them.
Next morning she awoke in a warm bed, possessed by odd images of flamesthat stood up like crowing cocks, and cowered like hens above the brood.She was in the house of one of their new friends, and she could hearAngelo talking in the adjoining room. A conveyance was ready
to take heron to Bormio. A woman came to her to tell her this, appearing to havea dull desire to get her gone. She was a draggled woman, with a face ofslothful anguish, like one of the inner spectres of a guilty man. Shesaid that her husband was willing to drive the lady to Bormio for a sumthat was to be paid at once into his wife's hand; and little enoughit was which poor persons could ever look for from your patriots anddisturbers who seduced orderly men from their labour, and made widowsand ruined households. This was a new Italian language to Vittoria,and when the woman went on giving instances of households ruined by ahusband's vile infatuation about his country, she did not attempt todefend the reckless lord, but dressed quickly that she might leave thehouse as soon as she could. Her stock of money barely satisfied thewoman's demand. The woman seized it, and secreted it in her girdle.When they had passed into the sitting-room, her husband, who was sittingconversing with Angelo, stretched out his hand and knocked the girdle.
'That's our trick,' he said. 'I guessed so. Fund up, our little Maria ofthe dirty fingers'-ends! We accept no money from true patriots. Grub inother ground, my dear!'
The woman stretched her throat awry, and set up a howl like a dog; buther claws came out when he seized her.
'Would you disgrace me, old fowl?'
'Lorenzo, may you rot like a pumpkin!'
The connubial reciprocities were sharp until the money lay on the table,when the woman began whining so miserably that Vittoria's sensitivenerves danced on her face, and at her authoritative interposition,Lorenzo very reluctantly permitted his wife to take what he chose toreckon a fair portion of the money, and also of his contempt. She seemedto be licking the money up, she bent over it so greedily.
'Poor wretch!' he observed; 'she was born on a hired bed.'
Vittoria felt that the recollection of this woman would haunt her. Itwas inconceivable to her that a handsome young man like Lorenzo shouldever have wedded the unsweet creature, who was like a crawling image ofdecay; but he, as if to account for his taste, said that they had beenof a common age once, when he married her; now she had grown old. Herepeated that she 'was born on a hired bed.' They saw nothing further ofher.
Vittoria's desire was to get to Meran speedily, that she might seeher friends, and have tidings of her lover and the city. Those baffledbeacon-flames on the heights had become an irritating indicative vision:she thirsted for the history. Lorenzo offered to conduct her over theTonale Pass into the Val di Sole, or up the Val Furva, by the pass ofthe Corno dei Tre Signori, into the Val del Monte to Pejo, thence byCles, or by Bolzano, to Meran. But she required shoeing and refitting;and for other reasons also, she determined to go on to Bormio. Shesupposed that Angelo had little money, and that in a place such asBormio sounded to her ears she might possibly obtain the change forthe great money-order which the triumph of her singing had won fromAntonio-Pericles. In spite of Angelo's appeals to her to hurry on tothe end of her journey without tempting chance by a single pause, sheresolved to go to Bormio. Lorenzo privately assured her that there werebankers in Bormio. Many bankers, he said, came there from Milan, andthat fact she thought sufficient for her purpose. The wanderers partedregretfully. A little chapel, on a hillock off the road, shaded bychestnuts, was pointed out to Lorenzo where to bring a letter forAngelo. Vittoria begged Angelo to wait till he heard from her; and then,with mutual wavings of hands, she was driven out of his sight.