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Your income is greatly reduced. Enrica is therefore portionless." "No, no, not altogether." The marchesa moved nervously in her chair, carefully avoiding meeting Trenta's steely blue eyes. "I have saved money, Cesarino I have indeed," she repeated. The marchesa was becoming quite affable. "I cannot touch the heirlooms. But Enrica will have a small portion." "Well, well," replied Trenta.
"Putting aside the sacred office with which I am invested," resumed the count, without noticing Trenta's observation, "no wife could sympathize with me. It would be a case of Byron over again. What agony it would be to me to see the exquisite Enrica unable to understand me! A poet, a mystic, I am only fit to live alone.
Trenta, still rooted to the same spot, listened to each word that fell from the count's lips with a look of anguish. "Sit down, cavaliere sit down," continued Marescotti, seeing his distress. He put his arm round Trenta's burly, well-filled figure, and drew him down gently into the depths of the arm-chair. "Listen, cavaliere listen to what I have to say before you altogether condemn me.
As he and the marchesa disagreed on almost every possible subject, disputes often arose between them; but, thanks to Trenta's pliant temper and perfect good-breeding, they were always amicably settled. "Count Marescotti and Baldassare are outside," continued Trenta, looking at her inquiringly, as the marchesa had not spoken.
Still she pitied her old friend, although no word expressed it; nothing but the pressure of her hand resting upon his shoulder. Trenta's sobs were the only sound that broke the silence. "This is losing time," she said. "Send at once for Fra Pacifico. Until he comes, we know nothing." When Fra Pacifico's rugged, mountainous figure entered Enrica's room, he seemed to fill it.
A match was now produced out of Trenta's pocket. The candles were lighted, and the casements closed. The party then sat down to whist. The marchesa was always specially irritable when at cards. The previous conversation had not improved her temper. Moreover, the count was her partner, and a worse one could hardly be conceived.
Trenta's naturally piping voice grows shriller as he proceeds, from a certain sense of agitation. "As the common friend of both parties, I am come to propose a marriage to you, Count Marescotti." "And who may the lady be?" asks the count, drawing back with a sudden air of reserve. "Who is it that would consent to leave home and friends, perhaps country, to share the lot of a fugitive patriot?"
He returned, therefore, to the charge perseveringly. "You speak of a mission, Count Marescotti; what is the nature of this mission? Nothing political, I hope?" He stopped abruptly. The count's eyelids dropped over his eyes as he met Trenta's inquiring glance. Then he bowed his head in acquiescence. "Another revolution may do much for Italy," he answered, in a low tone.
"The villain!" he exclaimed, "'Gone forever! 'You have betrayed me! 'Cannot marry you! 'Marescotti!" Here Trenta stopped, remembering suddenly what had passed between himself and Count Marescotti at their interview, which he justly considered as confidential. Trenta's first feeling was one of amazement how Nobili had come to know it.
Listen to me. Lay to heart what an old man tells you. Such a miracle as I am about to relate must touch even the count's hard heart." He glanced round at Marescotti, but it was evident he was chagrined by what he saw. Marescotti neither heard him, nor even affected to do so. Trenta's voice in the great church was weak and piping indistinct even to those beside him.
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