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Rocca's health was failing, and they repaired to Italy for a time. In 1816 they returned to Paris, Napoleon having gone from his final defeat to St. Helena. But Madame de Staël was broken with her trials. She seemed to grow more and more frail, till the end came. She said frequently, "My father awaits me on the other shore." To Chateaubriand she said, "I have loved God, my father, and my country."
Her little son, and Rocca's, five years old, was cared for by Auguste and Albertine, her daughter. After Madame de Staël's death, her Considerations on the French Revolution and Ten Years of Exile were published. Of the former, Sainte-Beuve says: "Its publication was an event. It was the splendid public obsequies of the authoress.
To be handsome, smooth, talented, jealous all this is Villa Rocca's "metier." He is a true Italian. Paris is a human hive. Thousands labor to restore its beauty. The stream of life ebbs and flows once more on the boulevards. The galleries reopen. Armand labors in the Louvre. He finished the velvet-eyed Madonna, copied after Murillo's magic hand. He chafes under Raoul's laurels.
Yet the avenger has panther feet. Out of the shadow, in a moment, she will be. "Oh, God!" the cry smothers in her throat. Like lightning, stab after stab in her back paralyzes her. Bubbling blood from her quivering lips, Marie falls on her face. A dark shadow glides away, past buttress and vaulted door. Is it Villa Rocca's ready Italian stiletto?
Write fully in a few days. She is all alone on earth. This is a crushing blow. No one to trust. None to advise, for she has leaned on Ernesto. Her mind reels under this blow. Pere Francois is her only stay. The sorrow of these days needs expression. Villa Rocca's gay letters continue to arrive. They are a ghastly mockery of these hours. Hardin can cast her off now, and claim the heiress.
The boy would be a man. Every day the sculptor tells of the home of the wealthy Spaniard. The girl is at her convent again. Raoul meets Madame Natalie "en ami de maison." He tells of Count Villa Rocca's wooing. Marriage may crown the devotion of the courtly lover. The bust in marble is a success. Raoul is in the flush of glory. His patroness directs him to idealize for her "Helen of Troy."
"After all, social life is but a play." Her heart beats high with pride. Villa Rocca's return with the funds will be only a prelude to their union. But how to insure the half million? "How?" The count's greed and entire union in interest with her will surely hold him faithful, She will marry Ernesto as soon as he returns.
We need only refer to Labaume's book on the expedition to Russia, to Miot's work on the Egyptian campaigns, or to Rocca's history of the war in Spain, for ample proofs of the correctness of this observation. Whether this peculiarity is to be ascribed chiefly to their national character, or to the nature of the services in which they have been engaged, it is not very easy to decide.
Seizing her pen, she sends a note to the club where baccarat and billiards claim Villa Rocca's idle hours. He meets her in the Bois de Boulogne, now splendid in transplanted foliage. His coupe dismissed, they wander in the alleys so dear to lovers. There is triumph in her face as they separate.
Her own child dead; but where, or how? She must invent. Walls have been scaled, my Lady of the Castle Dangerous. The enemy is mining under your defences, in silence. With Villa Rocca's nerve and Italian finesse, even Hardin can be managed. If HE should die, then the dark secret of her child's transformation is safe forever! Days fly by. Time waits for no aching hearts.
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