Gerald Fitzgerald, the Chevalier: A Novel

‘Oh, then, it was he!’ exclaimed the Marquise. ‘Tell us, I pray you, how fortune came to play you so heartless a trick as to make you this man’s friend?’

Half reluctantly, almost resentfully, Gerald replied to this question by relating the incidents that had befallen him in the Maremma, and how he had subsequently lived for months the companion of this strange associate.

‘What marvellous lessons of evil, boy, has he not instilled into you! Tell me frankly, has he not made you suspectful of every one – distrusting all friendship, disowning all obligations, making affection seem a mockery, and woman a cheat?’

‘I have heard good and bad from his lips. If he spoke hastily of the world at times, mayhap it had not treated him with too much kindness. Indeed he said as much to me, and that it was not his fault that he thought so meanly of mankind.’

‘What poison this to pour into a young heart!’ broke in Alfieri. ‘The cattle upon the thousand hills eat not of noxious herbage; their better instincts protect them, even where seductive fruits and flowers woo their tastes. It is man alone is beguiled by false appearances, and this out of the very subtlety of his own nature. The plague-spot of the heart is distrust!’

‘These are better teachings, boy, than Signor Gabriel’s,’ said the lady.

‘You know him, then?’ asked Gerald.

‘I have little doubt that we are speaking of the same person; and if so, not I alone, but all Europe knows him.’

Gerald burned to inquire further, to know who and what this mysterious man was, how he had earned the terrible reputation that attended him, and what charges were alleged against him. He could not dare, however, to put questions in such a presence, and he sat moodily thinking over the issue.

Diverging from the high-road, they now entered a pathway which led through the vineyards and the olive groves, and, being narrow, Gerald found himself side by side with the Marquise, without any other near. Here, at length, his curiosity mastered all reserve, and plucking up courage for the effort, he said —

‘If my presumption were not too bold, madame, I would deem it a great favour to be permitted to ask you something of this Signor Gabriel. I know and feel that, do what I will, reason how I may, reject what I can, yet still his words have eaten down deep into my heart; and if I cannot put some antidote there against their influence, that they will sway me even against myself,’

‘First, let me hear how he represented himself to you. Was he as a good man grossly tricked and cheated by the world, his candour imposed on, his generosity betrayed? Did he picture a noble nature basely trifled with?’

‘No, no,’ broke in Gerald; ‘he said, indeed, at first he felt disposed to like his fellow-men, but that the impulse was unprofitable; that the true philosophy was unbelief. Still he avowed that he devoted himself to every indulgence; that happiness meant pleasure, pleasure excess; that out of the convulsive throes of the wildest debauchery, great and glorious sensations, ennobling thoughts spring – just as the volcano in full eruption throws up gold amid the lava: and he bade me, if I would know myself, to taste of this same existence.’

‘Poor boy, these were trying temptations,’

‘Not so,’ broke in Gerald proudly; ‘I wanted to be something better and greater than this,’

‘And what would you be?’ asked the Marquise, as she turned a look of interest on him.

‘Oh, if a heart’s yearning could do it,’ cried Gerald warmly, ‘I would be like him who rides yonder; I would be one whose words would give voice to many an unspoken emotion – who could make sad men hopeful, and throw over the dreariest waste of existence the soft, mild light of ideal happiness.’

She shook her head, half-sorrowfully, and said, ‘Genius is the gift of one, or two, or three, in a whole century!’ ‘Then I would be a soldier,’ cried the boy; ‘I would shed my blood for a good cause. A stout heart and a strong arm are not rare gifts, but they often win rare honours.’

‘Count Alfieri has been thinking about you,’ said she, in a tone half confidential. ‘He told me that, if you showed a disposition for it, he would place you at the University of Sienna, where you could follow your studies until such time as a career should present itself.’

‘To what do I owe this gracious interest in my fate, lady?’ asked he eagerly. ‘Is it my casual resemblance to the prince he was so fond of?’

‘So fond!’ exclaimed she; then, as quickly correcting herself, she added: ‘No, not altogether that – though, perhaps, the likeness may have served you,’

‘How kind and good of him to think of one so friendless!’ muttered Gerald, half aloud.

‘Is the proposal one you would like to close with? Tell me frankly, Gherardi, for we are speaking now in all frankness!’

‘Perhaps I may only lose another friend if I say no!’ said he timidly; and then, with bolder accents, added: ‘Let me own it, madame, I have no taste for study – at least such studies as these. My heart is set upon the world of action: I would like to win a name, no matter how brief the time left me to enjoy it.’

‘Shall I tell you my plan – ’

‘Yours!’ broke he in. ‘Surely you too have not deigned to remember me?’

‘Yes; the Count interested me strongly in you. This morning we talked of little else at breakfast, and up to the moment we overtook you at the gate. His generous ardour in your behalf filled me with a like zeal, and we discussed together many a plan for your future; and mine was, that you should enter the service of the King – ’

‘What King?’

‘What other than the King of France, boy, the heir of St. Louis?’

‘He befriended the cause of Charles Edward, did he not?’ asked Gerald eagerly.

‘Yes,’ said she, smiling at the ardour with which he asked the question. ‘Do you feel deep interest in the fortunes of that Prince?’

The youth clasped his hands together and pressed them to his heart, without a word.

‘Your family, perhaps, supported that cause?’

‘They did, lady. When I was an infant, I prayed for its success; as I grew older, I learned to sorrow for its failure.’

There was something so true and so natural in the youth’s expression as he spoke, that the Marquise was touched by it, and turned away her head to conceal her emotion.

‘The game is not played out yet, boy,’ said she at last; ‘there are great men, and wise ones too, who say that the condition of Europe, the peace of the world, requires the recognition of rights so just as those of the Stuarts. They see, too, that in the denial of these claims the Church is wounded, and the triumph of a dangerous heresy proclaimed. Who can say at what moment it may be the policy of the Continent to renew the struggle?’

‘Oh, speak on, lady: tell me more of what fills my heart with highest hope,’ exclaimed he rapturously. ‘Do not, I beseech you, look on me as the poor stroller, the thing of tinsel and spangles, but as one in whose veins generous blood is running. I am a Géraldine, and the Geraldines are all noble.’

The sudden change in the youth’s aspect, the rich, full tones of his voice, as, gaining courage with each word, he asserted his claim to consideration, seemed to have produced an effect upon the Marquise, who pondered for some time without speaking.

‘Mayhap, lady, I have offended you by this rash presumption,’ said Gerald, as he watched her downcast eyes and steadfast expression; ‘but forgive me, as one so little skilled in life, that he mistakes gentle forbearance for an interest in his fortunes.’

‘But I am interested in you, Gherardi; I do wish to befriend you. Let me hear about your kith. Who are these Geraldines you speak of?’

‘I know not, lady,’ said he, abashed; ‘but from my childhood I was ever taught to believe that, wherever my name was spoken, men would acknowledge me as noble.’

‘And from whom can we learn these things more accurately? have you friends or relations to whom we could write?’

Just as she spoke, the head of the cavalcade passed beneath a deep gateway into the court of an ancient palace, and the echoing sounds of the horses’ feet soon drowned the voices of the speakers. ‘This is “Camerotto,” an old villa of the Medici,’ whispered the Marquise. ‘We have come to see the frescoes; they are by Perugino, and of great repute.’

The party descended, and entering the villa, wandered away in groups through the rooms. It was one of those spacious edifices which were types of mediaeval life, lofty, splendid, but comfortless. Dropping behind the well-dressed train as they passed on, Gerald strayed alone and at will through the palace, and at last found himself in a small chamber, whose one window looked out on a deep and lonely valley. The hills which formed the boundaries were arid, stony, and treeless, but tinted with those gorgeous colours which, in Italian landscape, compensate in some sort for the hues of verdure, and every angle and eminence on them were marked out with that peculiar distinctness which objects assume in this pure atmosphere. The full blaze of a noonday sun lit up the scene, where not a trace of human habitation nor a track of man’s culture could be seen for miles.

‘My own road in life should lie along that glen,’ said Gerald dreamily, as he leaned out of the window and gazed on the silent landscape, and soon dropped into a deep reverie, when past, present, and future were all blended together. The unbroken stillness of the spot, the calm tranquillity of the scene, steeped his spirit in a sort of dreamy lethargy, scarcely beyond the verge of sleep itself. To his half-waking state his restless night contributed, and hour by hour went over unconsciously: now muttering verses of his old convent hymns, now snatches of wild peasant legends, his mind lost itself in close-woven fancies.

Whether the solitary tract of country before him was a reality or a mere dreamland, he knew not. It needed an effort to resume consciousness, and that effort he could not make; long fasting, too, lent its influence to increase this state, and his brain balanced between fact and imagination weariedly and hopelessly. At moments he fancied himself in some palace of his ancestors, dwelling in a high but solitary state; then would he suddenly imagine that he was a prisoner, confined for some great treason – he had taken arms against his country – he had adhered to a cause, he knew not what or whose, but it was adjudged treasonable. Then, again, it was a monastery, and he was a novice, waiting and studying to assume his vows; and his heart struggled between a vague craving for active life and a strange longing for the deathlike quiet of the cloister.

From these warring fancies he started suddenly, and, passing his hand across his forehead, tried to recall himself to reason. ‘Where am I?’ exclaimed he, and the very sound of his own voice, echoed by the deep-vaulted room, almost affrighted him. ‘How came I here?’ muttered he, hoping to extricate himself from the realm of fancy by the utterance of the words. He hastened to the door, but the handle was broken and would not turn; he tried to burst it open, but it was strong and firm as the deep wall at either side of it; he shouted aloud, he beat loudly on the oaken panels, but though the deep-arched ceiling made the noise seem like thunder, no answer was returned to his call. He next turned to the window, and saw to his dismay that it was at a great height from the ground, which was a flagged terrace beneath. He yelled and cried at the very top of his voice; he waved his cap, hoping that some one at a distance might catch the signal; but all in vain. Wearied at last by all his attempts to attract notice, he sat moodily down to think over his position and devise what was to be done. Wild thoughts flashed at times across him – that this was some deep-laid scheme to entrap him; that he had been enticed here that he might meet his death without marks of violence; that, somehow, his was a life of consequence enough to provoke a crime. The Prince that he resembled had some share in it – or Marietta had vowed a vengeance – or the Jesuit Fathers had sent an emissary to despatch him. What were not the wild and terrible fancies that filled his mind: all that he had read of cruel torturings, years’ long suffering, lives passed in dreary dungeons, floated mistily before him, till reason at last gave way, and he lost himself in these sad imaginings.

The ringing of a church bell, faint and far away as it sounded, recalled him from his dreamings, and he remembered it was the ‘Angelus,’ when long ago he used to fall into line, and walk along to the chapel of the college. ‘That, too, was imprisonment,’ thought he, but how gladly would he have welcomed it now! He leaned from the window to try and make out whence the sounds came, but he could not find the spot. He fancied he could detect something moving up the hillside, but a low olive scrub shaded the path, and it was only as the branches stirred that he conjectured some one was passing underneath. The copse, however, extended but a short way, and Gerald gazed wistfully to see if anything should emerge from where it finished. His anxiety was intense as he waited; a feverish impatience thrilled through him, and he strained his eyes until they ached.

At last a long shadow was projected-on the road; it was broken, irregular, and straggling. It must be more than one – several – a procession, perhaps, and yet not that – there was no uniformity in it. He leaned out as far as he could venture. It was coming. Yes, there it was! A donkey with heavy panniers at his side, driven by an old man; a woman followed, and after her a girl’s figure. Yes, he knew them and her now! It was the Babbo! and there was Marietta herself, with bent-down head, creeping sadly along, her arms crossed upon her breast, her whole air unspeakably sad and melancholy. With a wild scream Gerald called to them to turn back, that he, their companion, their comrade, was a captive. He shouted till his hoarse throat grew raw with straining, but they heard him not.

A deep, narrow gorge lay between them, with a brawling rivulet far below, and though the boy shouted with all his might, the voice never reached them. There they walked along up the steep path, whither to, he knew not. That they meant to desert him was, however, clear enough. Already in that far-away land to which they journeyed no part was assigned him. And Marietta! – she to whom he had given his heart, she whom he bound up with all his future fortunes – she to leave him thus without a word of farewell, without one wish to meet again, without one prayer for his welfare! Half-maddened with grief and rage – for in his heart now each sentiment had a share – he sprang wildly to the window, and gazed downward at the terrace. Heaven knows what terrible thoughts ebbed and flowed within him as he looked! Life had little to attract him to it; his heart was well-nigh broken; a reckless indifference was momentarily gaining on him; and he crept farther and farther out upon the window-sill, till he seemed almost to hang over the depth beneath him. He wanted to remember a prayer, to recall some words of a litany he had often recited, but in his troubled brain, where confusion reigned supreme, no memory could prevail; thoughts came and went, clashing, mingling, conflicting, like the storm-tossed sea in a dark night, and already a stupid and fatalist indifference dulled his senses, and one only desire struggled with him – a wish for rest!