Part 85 (2/2)
”n.o.body else hears you, my dear Beatrice; talk commonsense. Heroics sound well in mixed society; but there is nothing less suited to the tone of a family conversation.”
Madame di Negra bent down her head abashed, and that sudden change in the expression of her countenance which had seemed to betray susceptibility to generous emotion, faded as suddenly away.
”But still,” she said coldly, ”you enjoy one half of those ample revenues: why talk, then, of suicide and ruin?”
”I enjoy them at the pleasure of the crown; and what if it be the pleasure of the crown to recall our cousin, and reinstate him in his possessions?”
”There is a probability, then, of that pardon? When you first employed me in your researches you only thought there was a possibility.”
”There is a great probability of it, and therefore I am here. I learned some little time since that the question of such recall had been suggested by the emperor, and discussed in Council. The danger to the State, which might arise from our cousin's wealth, his alleged abilities,--abilities! bah! and his popular name, deferred any decision on the point; and, indeed, the difficulty of dealing with myself must have embarra.s.sed the minister. But it is a mere question of time. He cannot long remain excluded from the general amnesty already extended to the other refugees. The person who gave me this information is high in power, and friendly to myself; and he added a piece of advice on which I acted. 'It was intimated,' said he, 'by one of the partisans of your kinsman, that the exile could give a hostage for his loyalty in the person of his daughter and heiress; that she had arrived at marriageable age; that if she were to wed, with the emperor's consent, some one whose attachment to the Austrian crown was unquestionable, there would be a guarantee both for the faith of the father, and for the transmission of so important a heritage to safe and loyal hands. Why not' (continued my friend) 'apply to the emperor for his consent to that alliance for yourself,--you, on whom he can depend; you who, if the daughter should die, would be the legal heir to those lands?' On that hint I spoke.”
”You saw the emperor?”
”And after combating the unjust prepossessions against me, I stated that so far from my cousin having any fair cause of resentment against me, when all was duly explained to him, I did not doubt that he would willingly give me the hand of his child.”
”You did!” cried the marchesa, amazed.
”And,” continued the count, imperturbably, as he smoothed, with careless hand, the snowy plaits of his s.h.i.+rt front,--”and that I should thus have the happiness of becoming myself the guarantee of my kinsman's loyalty, the agent for the restoration of his honours, while, in the eyes of the envious and malignant, I should clear up my own name from all suspicion that I had wronged him.”
”And the emperor consented?”
”Pardieu, my dear sister, what else could his Majesty do? My proposition smoothed every obstacle, and reconciled policy with mercy. It remains, therefore, only to find out what has. .h.i.therto baffled all our researches, the retreat of our dear kinsfolk, and to make myself a welcome lover to the demoiselle. There is some disparity of years, I own; but--unless your s.e.x and my gla.s.s flatter me overmuch--I am still a match for many a gallant of five-and-twenty.”
The count said this with so charming a smile, and looked so pre-eminently handsome, that he carried off the c.o.xcombry of the words as gracefully as if they had been spoken by some dazzling hero of the grand old comedy of Parisian life.
Then interlacing his fingers and lightly leaning his hands, thus clasped, upon his sister's shoulder, he looked into her face, and said slowly, ”And now, my sister, for some gentle but deserved reproach.
Have you not sadly failed me in the task I imposed on your regard for my interests? Is it not some years since you first came to England on the mission of discovering these worthy relations of ours? Did I not entreat you to seduce into your toils the man whom I new to be my enemy, and who was indubitably acquainted with our cousin's retreat,--a secret he has. .h.i.therto locked within his bosom? Did you not tell me, that though he was then in England, you could find no occasion even to meet him, but that you had obtained the friends.h.i.+p of the statesman to whom I directed your attention, as his most intimate a.s.sociate? And yet you, whose charms are usually so irresistible, learn nothing from the statesman, as you see nothing of Milord. Nay, baffled and misled, you actually suppose that the quarry has taken refuge in France. You go thither, you pretend to search the capital, the provinces, Switzerland, que sais je? All in vain,--though--foi de gentilhomme--your police cost me dearly. You return to England; the same chase, and the same result. Palsambleu, ma soeur, I do too much credit to your talents not to question your zeal.
In a word, have you been in earnest,--or have you not had some womanly pleasure in amusing yourself and abusing my trust?”
”Giulio,” answered Beatrice, sadly, ”you know the influence you have exercised over my character and my fate. Your reproaches are not just. I made such inquiries as were in my power, and I have now cause to believe that I know one who is possessed of this secret, and can guide us to it.”
”Ah, you do!” exclaimed the count. Beatrice did not heed the exclamation, and hurried on.
”But grant that my heart shrunk from the task you imposed on me, would it not have been natural? When I first came to England, you informed me that your object in discovering the exiles was one which I could honestly aid. You naturally wished first to know if the daughter lived; if not, you were the heir. If she did, you a.s.sured me you desired to effect, through my mediation, some liberal compromise with Alphonso, by which you would have sought to obtain his restoration, provided he would leave you for life in possession of the grant you hold from the crown.
While these were your objects, I did my best, ineffectual as it was, to obtain the information required.”
”And what made me lose so important, though so ineffectual an ally?”
asked the count, still smiling; but a gleam that belied the smile shot from his eye.
”What! when you bade me receive and co-operate with the miserable spies--the false Italians--whom you sent over, and seek to entangle this poor exile, when found, in some rash correspondence to be revealed to the court; when you sought to seduce the daughter of the Count of Peschiera, the descendant of those who had ruled in Italy, into the informer, the corrupter, and the traitress,--no, Giulio, then I recoiled; and then, fearful of your own sway over me, I retreated into France. I have answered you frankly.”
The count removed his hands from the shoulder on which they had reclined so cordially.
”And this,” said he, ”is your wisdom, and this your grat.i.tude! You, whose fortunes are bound up in mine; you, who subsist on my bounty; you, who--”
”Hold,” cried the marchesa, rising, and with a burst of emotion, as if stung to the utmost, and breaking into revolt from the tyranny of years,--”hold! Grat.i.tude! bounty! Brother, brother! what, indeed, do I owe to you? The shame and the misery of a life. While yet a child, you condemned me to marry against my will, against my heart, against my prayers,--and laughed at my tears when I knelt to you for mercy. I was pure then, Giulio,--pure and innocent as the flowers in my virgin crown.
And now--now--”
Beatrice stopped abruptly, and clasped her hands before her face.
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