Part 11

“I saw him at Milan, and was closely connected with his most intimate friend there. As I have said, he has arrived at Genoa, and perhaps has even now landed at Pisa; he will find many friends in that town. Every man there will be his friend; but during his journey southward he will have to contend with our Florentine army, commanded by the Marshals of the usurper Charles, and assisted by his troops. Charles himself has left us, and is gone to Naples to prepare for this war. But he is detested there, as a tyrant and a robber, and Corradino will be received in the Regno as a saviour; so that if he once surmount the obstacles which oppose his entrance, I do not doubt his success, and trust that he will be crowned within a month at Rome, and the week after sit on the throne of his ancestors in Naples.”

“And who will crown him?” cried Gegia, unable to contain herself. “Italy contains no heretic base enough to do such a deed, unless it be a Jew; or he send to Constantinople for a Greek, or to Egypt for a Mohammedan. Cursed may the race of the Frederics ever be! Thrice cursed one who has affinity to the miscreant Manfred! And little do you please me, young man, by holding such discourse in my house.”

Cincolo looked at Ricciardo, as if he feared that so violent a partisan for the house of Swabia would be irritated at his wife’s attack; but he was looking on the aged woman with a regard of the most serene benignity; no contempt even was mingled with the gentle smile that played round his lips. “I will restrain myself,” he said, and, turning to Cincolo, he conversed on more general subjects, describing the various cities of Italy that he had visited; discussing their modes of government, and relating anecdotes concerning their inhabitants, with an air of experience that, contrasted with his youthful appearance, greatly impressed Cincolo, who looked on him at once with admiration and respect. Evening came on. The sound of bells died away after the _Ave Maria_ had ceased to ring, but the distant sound of music was wafted to them by the night air. Ricciardo was about to address Cincolo, when a knocking at the gate interrupted him. It was Buzeccha, the Saracen, a famous chess-player, who was used to parade about under the colonnades of the Duomo, and challenge the young nobles to play; and sometimes much stress was laid on these games, and the gain and loss became the talk of Florence. Buzeccha was a tall and ungainly man, with all that good-natured consequence of manner which the fame he had acquired by his proficiency in so trifling a science, and the familiarity with which he was permitted to treat those superior to him in rank, who were pleased to measure their forces with him, might well bestow. He was beginning with “Eh, Messere!” when perceiving Ricciardo, he cried, “Who have we here?”

“A friend to good men,” replied Ricciardo, smiling.

“Then, by Mahomet, thou art my friend, my stripling.”

“Thou shouldst be a Saracen, by thy speech?” said Ricciardo.

“And through the help of the Prophet, so am I. One who in Manfred’s time—but no more of that. We won’t talk of Manfred, eh, Monna Gegia? I am Buzeccha, the chess-player, at your service, Messer lo Forestiere.”

The introduction thus made, they began to talk of the procession of the day. After a while, Buzeccha introduced his favourite subject of chess-playing; he recounted some wonderfully good strokes he had achieved, and related to Ricciardo how before the _Palagio del Popolo_, in the presence of Count Guido Novelle de’ Giudi, then _Vicare_ of the city, he had played an hour at three chess-boards with three of the best chess-players in Florence, playing two by memory and one by sight; and out of three games which made the board, he had won two. This account was wound up by a proposal to play with his host. “Thou art a hard-headed fellow, Cincolo, and make better play than the nobles. I would swear that thou thinkest of chess only as thou cobblest thy shoes; every hole of your awl is a square of the board, every stitch a move, and a finished pair paid for checkmate to your adversary; eh, Cincolo? Bring out the field of battle, man.”

Ricciardo interposed: “I leave Florence in two hours, and before I go, Messer Cincolo promised to conduct me to the _Piazza del Duomo_.”

“Plenty of time, good youth,” cried Buzeccha, arranging his men; “I only claim one game, and my games never last more than a quarter of an hour; and then we will both escort you, and you shall dance a set into the bargain with a black-eyed houri, all Nazarine as thou art. So stand out of my light, good youth, and shut the window, if you have heeding, that the torch flare not so.”

Ricciardo seemed amused by the authoritative tone of the chess-player; he shut the window and trimmed the torch which, stuck against the wall, was the only light they had, and stood by the table, overlooking the game. Monna Gegia had replaced the pot for supper, and sat somewhat uneasily, as if she were displeased that her guest did not talk with her. Cincolo and Buzeccha were deeply intent on their game, when a knock was heard at the door. Cincolo was about to rise and open it, but Ricciardo saying, “Do not disturb yourself,” opened it himself, with the manner of one who does humble offices as if ennobling them, so that no one action can be more humble to them than another.

The visitant was welcomed by Gegia alone, with “Ah! Messer Beppe, this is kind, on May Day night.”

Ricciardo glanced slightly on him, and then resumed his stand by the players. There was little in Messer Beppe to attract a favourable regard. He was short, thin, and dry; his face long-drawn and liny; his eyes deep-set and scowling, his lips straight, his nose hooked, and his head covered by a close skull-cap, his hair cut close all round. He sat down near Gegia, and began to discourse in a whining, servile, voice, complimenting her on her good looks, launching forth into praise of the magnificence of certain Guelph Florentines, and concluded by declaring that he was hungry and tired.

“Hungry, Beppe?” said Gegia, “that should have been your first word, friend. Cincolo, wilt thou give thy guest to eat? Cincolo, art thou deaf? Art thou blind? Dost thou not hear? Wilt thou not see?—Here is Messer Giuseppe de’ Bosticchi.”

Cincolo slowly, his eyes still fixed on the board, was about to rise. But the name of the visitant seemed to have the effect of magic on Ricciardo.

“Bosticchi!” he cried—“Giuseppe Bosticchi! I did not expect to find that man beneath thy roof, Cincolo, all Guelph as thy wife is; for she also has eaten of the bread of Elisei. Farewell! thou wilt find me in the street below; follow me quickly.”

He was about to go, but Bosticchi placed himself before the door, saying in a tone whose whine expressed mingled rage and servility, “In what have I offended this young gentleman? Will he not tell me my offence?”

“Dare not to stop my way,” cried Ricciardo, passing his hand before his eyes, “nor force me again to look on thee. Begone!”

Cincolo stopped him. “Thou art too hasty, and far too passionate, my noble guest,” said he; “however this man may have offended thee, thou art too violent.”

“Violent!” cried Ricciardo, almost suffocated by passionate emotion. “Ay, draw thy knife, and show the blood of Arrigo dei Elisei, with which it is still stained.”

A dead silence followed. Bosticchi slunk out of the room; Ricciardo hid his face in his hands and wept. But soon he calmed his passion, and said: “This is indeed childish. Pardon me; that man is gone; excuse and forget my violence. Resume thy game, Cincolo, but conclude it quickly, for time gains on us. Hark! an hour of night sounds from the Campanile.”

“The game is already concluded,” said Buzeccha sorrowfully; “thy cloak overthrew the best checkmate this head ever planned—so God forgive thee!”

“Checkmate!” cried the indignant Cincolo—“Checkmate! and my queen mowing you down, rank and file!”

“Let us begone!” exclaimed Ricciardo. “Messer Buzeccha, you will play out your game with Monna Gegia. Cincolo will return ere long.” So taking his host by the arm, he drew him out of the room, and descended the narrow high stairs with the air of one to whom those stairs were not unknown.

When in the street he slackened his pace, and, first looking round to assure himself that none overheard their conversation, he addressed Cincolo: “Pardon me, my dear friend; I am hasty, and the sight of that man made every drop of my blood cry aloud in my veins. But I do not come here to indulge in private sorrows or private revenge, and my design ought alone to engross me. It is necessary for me to see speedily and secretly Messer Guielmo Lostendardo, the Neapolitan commander. I bear a message to him from the Countess Elizabeth, the mother of Corradino, and I have some hope that its import may induce him to take at least a neutral part during the impending conflict. I have chosen you, Cincolo, to aid me in this, for not only you are of that little note in your town that you may act for me without attracting observation, but you are brave and true, and I may confide to your known worth. Lostendardo resides at the _Palagio del Governo_. When I enter its doors I am in the hands of my enemies, and its dungeons may alone know the secret of my destiny. I hope better things. But if after two hours I do not appear or let you hear of my welfare, carry this packet to Corradino at Pisa. You will then learn who I am; and if you feel any indignation at my fate, let that feeling attach you still more strongly to the cause for which I live and die.”

As Ricciardo spoke, he still walked on, and Cincolo observed that, without his guidance, he directed his steps towards the _Palagio del Governo_.

“I do not understand this,” said the old man. “By what argument, unless you bring one from the other world, do you hope to induce Messer Guielmo to aid Corradino? He is so bitter an enemy of Manfred, that although that prince is dead, yet when he mentions his name he grasps the air as it were a dagger. I have heard him with horrible imprecations curse the whole house of Swabia.”

A tremor shook the frame of Ricciardo, but he replied, “Lostendardo was once the firmest support of that house, and the friend of Manfred. Strange circumstances gave birth in his mind to this unnatural hatred, and he became a traitor. But, perhaps, now that Manfred is in Paradise, the youth, the virtues, and the inexperience of Corradino may inspire him with more generous feelings, and reawaken his ancient faith. At least I must make this last trial. This cause is too holy, too sacred, to admit of common forms of reasoning or action. The nephew of Manfred must sit upon the throne of his ancestors; and to achieve that I will endure what I am about to endure.”

They entered the palace; Messer Guielmo was carousing in the great hall.

“Bear this ring to him, good Cincolo, and say that I wait. Be speedy, that my courage, my life, do not desert me at the moment of trial.”

Cincolo, casting one more inquisitive glance on his extraordinary companion, obeyed his orders, while the youth leant against one of the pillars of the court and passionately cast up his eyes to the clear firmament.

“Oh, ye stars!” he cried in a smothered voice, “ye are eternal; let my purpose, my will, be as constant as ye!”

Then, more calm, he folded his arms in his cloak, and with strong inward struggle endeavoured to repress his emotion. Several servants approached him, and bade him follow them. Again he looked at the sky and said, “Manfred,” and then he walked on with slow but firm steps. They led him through several halls and corridors to a large apartment hung with tapestry, and well lighted by numerous torches; the marble of the floor reflected their glare, and the arched roof echoed the footsteps of one who paced the apartment as Ricciardo entered. It was Lostendardo. He made a sign that the servants should retire; the heavy door closed behind them, and Ricciardo stood alone with Messer Guielmo; his countenance pale but composed, his eyes cast down as in expectation, not in fear; and but for the convulsive motion of his lips, you would have guessed that every faculty was almost suspended by intense agitation.

Lostendardo approached. He was a man in the prime of life, tall and athletic; he seemed capable with a single exertion to crush the frail being of Ricciardo. Every feature of his countenance spoke of the struggle of passions, and the terrible egotism of one who would sacrifice even himself to the establishment of his will: his black eyebrows were scattered, his grey eyes deep-set and scowling, his look at once stern and haggard. A smile seemed never to have disturbed the settled scorn which his lips expressed; his high forehead, already becoming bald, was marked by a thousand contradictory lines. His voice was studiously restrained as he said: “Wherefore do you bring that ring?”

Ricciardo looked up and met his eye, which glanced fire as he exclaimed, “Despina!”—He seized her hand with a giant’s grasp: “I have prayed for this night and day, and thou art now here! Nay, do not struggle; you are mine; for by my salvation I swear that thou shalt never again escape me.”

Despina replied calmly: “Thou mayest well believe that in thus placing myself in thy power I do not dread any injury thou canst inflict upon me, or I were not here. I do not fear thee, for I do not fear death. Loosen then thy hold, and listen to me. I come in the name of those virtues that were once thine; I come in the name of all noble sentiment, generosity, and ancient faith, and I trust that in listening to me your heroic nature will second my voice, and that Lostendardo will no longer rank with those whom the good and great never name but to condemn.”

Lostendardo appeared to attend little to what she said. He gazed on her with triumph and malignant pride; and if he still held her his motive appeared rather the delight he felt in displaying his power over her, than any fear that she would escape. You might read in her pale cheek and glazed eye, that if she feared, it was herself alone that she mistrusted; that her design lifted her above mortal dread, and that she was as impassive as the marble she resembled to any event that did not either advance or injure the object for which she came. They were both silent, until Lostendardo leading her to a seat, and then standing opposite to her, his arms folded, every feature dilated by triumph, and his voice sharpened by agitation, he said: “Well, speak! What wouldst thou with me?”

“I come to request, that if you cannot be induced to assist Prince Corradino in the present struggle, you will, at least, stand neutral, and not oppose his advance to the kingdom of his ancestors.”

Lostendardo laughed. The vaulted roof repeated the sound, but the harsh echo, though it resembled the sharp cry of an animal of prey whose paw is on the heart of its enemy, was not so discordant and dishuman as the laugh itself. “How,” he asked, “dost thou pretend to induce me to comply? This dagger”—and he touched the hilt of one that was half concealed in his vesture—“is yet stained by the blood of Manfred; ere long it will be sheathed in the heart of that foolish boy.”

Despina conquered the feeling of horror these words inspired, and replied: “Will you give a few minutes’ patient hearing?”

“I will give you a few minutes’ hearing, and if I be not so patient as in the Palagio Reale, fair Despina must excuse me. Forbearance is not a virtue to which I aspire.”

“Yes, it was in the Palagio Reale at Naples, the palace of Manfred, that you first saw me. You were then the bosom friend of Manfred, selected by him as his confidant and counsellor. Why did you become a traitor? Start not at that word: if you could hear the united voice of Italy, and even of those who call themselves your friends, they would echo that name. Why did you thus degrade and belie yourself? You call me the cause, yet I am most innocent. You saw me at the Court of your master, an attendant on Queen Sibilla, and one who, unknown to herself, had already parted with her heart, her soul, her will, her entire being, an involuntary sacrifice at the shrine of all that is noble and divine in human nature. My spirit worshipped Manfred as a saint, and my pulses ceased to beat when his eye fell upon me. I felt this, but I knew it not. You awoke me from my dream. You said that you loved me, and you reflected in too faithful a mirror my own emotions: I saw myself and shuddered. But the profound and eternal nature of my passion saved me. I loved Manfred. I loved the sun because it enlightened him; I loved the air that fed him; I deified myself, for that my heart was the temple in which he resided. I devoted myself to Sibilla, for she was his wife, and never in thought or dream degraded the purity of my affection towards him. For this you hated him. He was ignorant of my passion: my heart contained it as a treasure, which you having discovered came to rifle. You could more easily deprive me of life than my devotion for your king, and therefore you were a traitor. Manfred died, and you thought that I had then forgotten him. But love would indeed be a mockery if death were not the most barefaced cheat. How can he die who is immortalized in my thoughts—my thoughts, that comprehend the universe, and contain eternity in their graspings? What though his earthly vesture is thrown as a despised weed beside the verde, he lives in my soul as lovely, as noble, as entire, as when his voice awoke the mute air; nay, his life is more entire, more true. For before, that small shrine that encased his spirit was all that existed of him; but now, he is a part of all things; his spirit surrounds me, interpenetrates; and divided from him during his life, his death has united me to him for ever.”

The countenance of Lostendardo darkened fearfully. When she paused, he looked black as the sea before the heavily charged thunder-clouds that canopy it dissolve themselves into rain. The tempest of passion that arose in his heart seemed too mighty to admit of swift manifestation; it came slowly up from the profoundest depths of his soul, and emotion was piled upon emotion before the lightning of his anger sped to its destination. “Your arguments, eloquent Despina,” he said, “are indeed unanswerable. They work well for your purpose. Corradino is, I hear, at Pisa: you have sharpened my dagger; and before the air of another night rust it, I may, by deeds, have repaid your insulting words.”

“How far do you mistake me! And is praise and love of all heroic excellence insult to you? Lostendardo, when you first knew me, I was an inexperienced girl; I loved, but knew not what love was, and circumscribing my passion in narrow bounds, I adored the being of Manfred as I might love an effigy of stone, which, when broken, has no longer an existence. I am now much altered. I might before have treated you with disdain or anger, but now these base feelings have expired in my heart. I am animated but by one feeling—an aspiration to another life, another state of being. All the good depart from this strange earth; and I doubt not that when I am sufficiently elevated above human weaknesses, it will also be my turn to leave this scene of woe. I prepare myself for that moment alone; and in endeavouring to fit myself for a union with all the brave, generous, and wise, that once adorned humanity, and have now passed from it, I consecrate myself to the service of this most righteous cause. You wrong me, therefore, if you think there is aught of disdain in what I say, or that any degrading feelings are mingled with my devotion of spirit when I come and voluntarily place myself in your power. You can imprison me for ever in the dungeons of this palace, as a returned Ghibelline and spy, and have me executed as a criminal. But before you do this, pause for your own sake; reflect on the choice of glory or ignominy that you are now about to make. Let your old sentiments of love for the house of Swabia have some sway in your heart; reflect, that as you are the despised enemy, so you may become the chosen friend of its last descendant, and receive from every heart the praise of having restored Corradino to the honours and power to which he was born. Compare this prince to the hypocritical, the bloody and mean-spirited Charles. When Manfred died I went to Germany, and have resided at the court of the Countess Elizabeth; I have therefore been an hourly witness of the great and good qualities of Corradino. The bravery of his spirit makes him rise above the weakness of youth and inexperience; he possesses all the nobility of spirit that belongs to the family of Swabia, and, in addition, a purity and gentleness that attracts the respect and love of the old and wary courtiers of Frederic and Conrad. You are brave, and would be generous, did not the fury of your passions, like a consuming fire, destroy in their violence every generous sentiment: how then can you become the tool of Charles? His scowling eyes and sneering lips betoken the selfishness of his mind. Avarice, cruelty, meanness, and artifice are the qualities that characterize him, and render him unworthy of the majesty he usurps. Let him return to Provence, and reign with paltry despotism over the luxurious and servile French; the free-born Italians require another lord. They are not fit to bow to one whose palace is the change-house of money-lenders, whose generals are usurers, whose courtiers are milliners or monks, and who basely vows allegiance to the enemy of freedom and virtue, Clement, the murderer of Manfred. Their king, like them, should be clothed in the armour of valour and simplicity; his ornaments, his shield and spear; his treasury, the possessions of his subjects; his army, their unshaken lover. Charles will treat you as a tool; Corradino as a friend. Charles will make you the detested tyrant of a groaning province; Corradino, the governor of a prosperous and happy people. I cannot tell by your manner if what I have said has in any degree altered your determination. I cannot forget the scenes that passed between us at Naples. I might then have been disdainful; I am not so now. Your execrations of Manfred excited every angry feeling in my mind; but, as I have said, all but the feeling of love expired in my heart when Manfred died, and methinks that where love is, excellence must be its companion. You said you loved me; and though, in other times, that love was twin-brother to hate,—though then, poor prisoner in your heart, jealousy, rage, contempt, and cruelty, were its handmaids,—yet if it were love, methinks that its divinity must have purified your heart from baser feelings; and now that I, the bride of Death, am removed from your sphere, gentler feelings may awaken in your bosom, and you may incline mildly to my voice. If indeed you loved me, will you not now be my friend? Shall we not hand in hand pursue the same career? Return to your ancient faith; and now that death and religion have placed the seal upon the past, let Manfred’s spirit, looking down, behold his repentant friend the firm ally of his successor, the best and last scion of the house of Swabia.”