The Diary of a Man of Fifty

“That’s the way I used to talk.  But that’s nothing to you.”

He glanced at me again.  “On the contrary, I like to hear.”

“Well, then, let us take a walk.  If you too are staying at this inn, we are fellow-travellers.  We will walk down the Arno to the Cascine.  There are several things I should like to ask of you.”

My young Englishman assented with an air of almost filial confidence, and we strolled for an hour beside the river and through the shady alleys of that lovely wilderness.  We had a great deal of talk: it’s not only myself, it’s my whole situation over again.

“Are you very fond of Italy?” I asked.

He hesitated a moment.  “One can’t express that.”

“Just so; I couldn’t express it.  I used to try—I used to write verses.  On the subject of Italy I was very ridiculous.”

“So am I ridiculous,” said my companion.

“No, my dear boy,” I answered, “we are not ridiculous; we are two very reasonable, superior people.”

“The first time one comes—as I have done—it’s a revelation.”

“Oh, I remember well; one never forgets it.  It’s an introduction to beauty.”

“And it must be a great pleasure,” said my young friend, “to come back.”

“Yes, fortunately the beauty is always here.  What form of it,” I asked, “do you prefer?”

My companion looked a little mystified; and at last he said, “I am very fond of the pictures.”

“So was I.  And among the pictures, which do you like best?”

“Oh, a great many.”

“So did I; but I had certain favourites.”

Again the young man hesitated a little, and then he confessed that the group of painters he preferred, on the whole, to all others, was that of the early Florentines.

I was so struck with this that I stopped short.  “That was exactly my taste!”  And then I passed my hand into his arm and we went our way again.

We sat down on an old stone bench in the Cascine, and a solemn blank-eyed Hermes, with wrinkles accentuated by the dust of ages, stood above us and listened to our talk.

“The Countess Salvi died ten years ago,” I said.

My companion admitted that he had heard her daughter say so.

“After I knew her she married again,” I added.  “The Count Salvi died before I knew her—a couple of years after their marriage.”

“Yes, I have heard that.”

“And what else have you heard?”

My companion stared at me; he had evidently heard nothing.

“She was a very interesting woman—there are a great many things to be said about her.  Later, perhaps, I will tell you.  Has the daughter the same charm?”

“You forget,” said my young man, smiling, “that I have never seen the mother.”

“Very true.  I keep confounding.  But the daughter—how long have you known her?”

“Only since I have been here.  A very short time.”

“A week?”

For a moment he said nothing.  “A month.”

“That’s just the answer I should have made.  A week, a month—it was all the same to me.”

“I think it is more than a month,” said the young man.

“It’s probably six.  How did you make her acquaintance?”

“By a letter—an introduction given me by a friend in England.”

“The analogy is complete,” I said.  “But the friend who gave me my letter to Madame de Salvi died many years ago.  He, too, admired her greatly.  I don’t know why it never came into my mind that her daughter might be living in Florence.  Somehow I took for granted it was all over.  I never thought of the little girl; I never heard what had become of her.  I walked past the palace yesterday and saw that it was occupied; but I took for granted it had changed hands.”

“The Countess Scarabelli,” said my friend, “brought it to her husband as her marriage-portion.”

“I hope he appreciated it!  There is a fountain in the court, and there is a charming old garden beyond it.  The Countess’s sitting-room looks into that garden.  The staircase is of white marble, and there is a medallion by Luca della Robbia set into the wall at the place where it makes a bend.  Before you come into the drawing-room you stand a moment in a great vaulted place hung round with faded tapestry, paved with bare tiles, and furnished only with three chairs.  In the drawing-room, above the fireplace, is a superb Andrea del Sarto.  The furniture is covered with pale sea-green.”

My companion listened to all this.

“The Andrea del Sarto is there; it’s magnificent.  But the furniture is in pale red.”

“Ah, they have changed it, then—in twenty-seven years.”

“And there’s a portrait of Madame de Salvi,” continued my friend.

I was silent a moment.  “I should like to see that.”

He too was silent.  Then he asked, “Why don’t you go and see it?  If you knew the mother so well, why don’t you call upon the daughter?”

“From what you tell me I am afraid.”

“What have I told you to make you afraid?”

I looked a little at his ingenuous countenance.  “The mother was a very dangerous woman.”

The young Englishman began to blush again.  “The daughter is not,” he said.

“Are you very sure?”