Page:Once a Week Volume 7.djvu/263

. 30, 1862.] reach me. I throw from me that word forgiveness as a reproach.”

I saw her erect, superb, defiant; she stood before him like a flame, thrilling with an indignation which words seemed powerless to express.

“Santa, you are mad.”

“Not yet, Giovanni; I shall be driven so perhaps.”

“A woman owes submission, obedience, humility to her husband.”

“Her husband owes protection, love, fidelity to her. There is no tampering with these reciprocal duties. Think not I would make his broken faith an excuse, had I broken mine. Thank God, the evil of others has not produced evil in me—but how could I yield when I was commanded to sin? how could I obey, when guilt was enforced upon me? how could I humble myself when my husband had sunk into such an abyss of moral inferiority? Even in your tame interpretation of conjugal duties, there is a flaw here. Who was it exposed me to a perilous temptation, when I would have fled from it? Who sought to force me back to endure it? And because I would not swerve from my duties, abandoned me in the bloom and inexperience of my youth, to solitude, calumny, sorrow? Hear me, Giovanni, I will return with you, I will put a veil over the past—but do not talk of forgiveness.”

“And Rupert Rabenfels?”

I saw her shrink back as if a weapon had reached her.

“Does your conscience speak there?”

My heart bled for her (writhing as I was with a sense of bitter impotent jealousy) when I saw her burst into a flood of tears and sink helpless into a chair.

“Did not your own words condemn you there? And since then, what has been your life? Instead of penance, mortification, self-denial, have you not led a worldly life, incessantly occupied with all which feeds the pride of the eye, the vain glory of the intellect, and the corrupt enjoyment of the senses?”

He looked round the room: it was sumptuously furnished, and bore striking evidence in its pictures, its statues, its books, its flowers, of the artistic and costly tastes of its mistress. “I have striven,” she said, “humbly to fill up the void of my existence by the cultivation of tastes and powers for which I must render an account, and which you, Giovanni, in our young days, (have you forgotten them?) encouraged and cherished.”

“It is no longer to my sister I speak,” said the priest, brutally. “I have no ties with the world; I am of those who have forsaken father and mother, sisters and brethren, for God.”

She started up (beautiful in her anger)—“Hypocrite! the God for whom you have forsaken your human ties, is ambition! Had I consented to gratify you and my husband by sinning against my own soul, you would not have broken your ties with your sister,—he, his obligations towards his wife; but,” and her voice sank into an inexpressible mournfulness, “recrimination is of no use; you and I have drifted too far apart to be able to understand each other, but, after all, let us not forget we are brother and sister.” How did the tender, warm heart subdue the fiery spirit! I felt the moisture rise in my own eyes as I listened.

“You are prepared, then, to accompany me to Rome to-morrow?”

“To-morrow? No.”

“Why not?”

“No matter” (faintly): “a day or two I must have—”

“You have partings, I suppose?” (contemptuously).

“Giovanni,” said she, gravely, “you have insulted me long enough. Had not the same mother borne us, you should repent the longest day you live the words you have said to-night.”

“Will you deny that Rupert Rabenfels is in Paris, and that you must see him before you go?”

Again she sank down on her seat, overcome, vanquished by that fatal name. “Oh!” she murmured, “to think that one human being can so torture another.” There was a pause, then she spoke in a hollow, broken voice—“I must end this, I feel it is killing me. Yes, Rupert is in Paris—I must see him once more.”

“Shameless, and yet you have denied!”

“I deny everything,” she said, passionately.

“Yet you must see him again—and you said there was no love between you.”

“I swear,” she said, wildly, “by this sacred representation of our faith,” she touched what looked like a casket upon the table, “that Rupert hates me even more than my husband does, even more than you do.” There was such a piercing grief in her tone that her brother was silenced. “Now let us part,” she said, “I need repose.” She pointed to the door opposite to where I stood, and crest-fallen and subdued, the haughty priest left the room.

I waited only till the door had closed upon him, and lifting the curtain, had entered the room, and was at her feet almost before she was conscious of my presence. I poured out before her apologies, protestations, excuses for having overheard so unintentionally the scene between her brother and herself, offers of service, assurances of my admiration, reverence, and of my most respectful love. I could have said with Balzac’s hero—“Je sens en moi le désir d’occuper ma vie à vous faire oublier vos chagrins, à vous aimer pour tous ceux qui vous ont haïe ou blessée.” I pleaded too earnestly not to be believed. Passion gave me eloquence—impulse—fire! My soul spoke to her soul and was understood.

I thought not of myself. May I not lay claim to a certain heroism in thus entirely ignoring, absorbed as I was in the impulse of chivalric devotion which stirred through my whole being and cast me at her feet, that the words I had heard that night cut up by the roots all the fond dreams of my love—Santa was married! my love, my suffering, my passion were vain. But, alas! not vain, if it were to be my privilege to serve her.

Annunziata had rushed in behind me, and with rapid words and more rapid exclamations, accused herself and praised herself in one breath, for the precaution she had taken of keeping me. Gradually I saw Madame Rabenfels’ countenance soften and