Гарриет Бичер-Стоу
Agnes of Sorrento

Полная версия

CHAPTER XVI
ELSIE PUSHES HER SCHEME

The good Father Antonio returned from his conference with the cavalier with many subjects for grave pondering. This man, as he conjectured, so far from being an enemy either of Church or State, was in fact in many respects in the same position with his revered master, – as nearly so as the position of a layman was likely to resemble that of an ecclesiastic. His denial of the Visible Church, as represented by the Pope and cardinals, sprang not from an irreverent, but from a reverent spirit. To accept them as exponents of Christ and Christianity was to blaspheme and traduce both, and therefore he only could be counted in the highest degree Christian who stood most completely opposed to them in spirit and practice.

His kind and fatherly heart was interested in the brave young nobleman. He sympathized fully with the situation in which he stood, and he even wished success to his love; but then how was he to help him with Agnes, and above all with her old grandmother, without entering on the awful task of condemning and exposing that sacred authority which all the Church had so many years been taught to regard as infallibly inspired? Long had all the truly spiritual members of the Church who gave ear to the teachings of Savonarola felt that the nearer they followed Christ the more open was their growing antagonism to the Pope and the Cardinals; but still they hung back from the responsibility of inviting the people to an open revolt.

Father Antonio felt his soul deeply stirred with the news of the excommunication of his saintly master; and he marveled, as he tossed on his restless bed through the night, how he was to meet the storm. He might have known, had he been able to look into a crowded assembly in Florence about this time, when the unterrified monk thus met the news of his excommunication: —

"There have come decrees from Rome, have there? They call me a son of perdition. Well, thus may you answer: He to whom you give this name hath neither favorites nor concubines, but gives himself solely to preaching Christ. His spiritual sons and daughters, those who listen to his doctrine, do not pass their time in infamous practices. They confess, they receive the communion, they live honestly. This man gives himself up to exalt the Church of Christ: you to destroy it. The time approaches for opening the secret chamber: we will give but one turn of the key, and there will come out thence such an infection, such a stench of this city of Rome, that the odor shall spread through all Christendom, and all the world shall be sickened."

But Father Antonio was of himself wholly unable to come to such a courageous result, though capable of following to the death the master who should do it for him. His was the true artist nature, as unfit to deal with rough human forces as a bird that flies through the air is unfitted to a hand-to-hand grapple with the armed forces of the lower world. There is strength in these artist natures. Curious computations have been made of the immense muscular power that is brought into exercise when a swallow skims so smoothly through the blue sky; but the strength is of a kind unadapted to mundane uses, and needs the ether for its display. Father Antonio could create the beautiful; he could warm, could elevate, could comfort; and when a stronger nature went before him, he could follow with an unquestioning tenderness of devotion: but he wanted the sharp, downright power of mind that could cut and cleave its way through the rubbish of the past, when its institutions, instead of a commodious dwelling, had come to be a loathsome prison. Besides, the true artist has ever an enchanted island of his own; and when this world perplexes and wearies him, he can sail far away and lay his soul down to rest, as Cytherea bore the sleeping Ascanius far from the din of battle, to sleep on flowers and breathe the odor of a hundred undying altars to Beauty.

Therefore, after a restless night, the good monk arose in the first purple of the dawn, and instinctively betook him to a review of his drawings for the shrine, as a refuge from troubled thought. He took his sketch of the Madonna and Child into the morning twilight and began meditating thereon, while the clouds that lined the horizon were glowing rosy purple and violet with the approaching day.

"See there!" he said to himself, "yonder clouds have exactly the rosy purple of the cyclamen which my little Agnes loves so much; – yes, I am resolved that this cloud on which our Mother standeth shall be of a cyclamen color. And there is that star, like as it looked yesterday evening, when I mused upon it. Methought I could see our Lady's clear brow, and the radiance of her face, and I prayed that some little power might be given to show forth that which transports me."

And as the monk plied his pencil, touching here and there, and elaborating the outlines of his drawing, he sung, —

 
"Ave, Maris Stella,
Dei mater alma,
Atque semper virgo,
Felix cœli porta!
 
 
"Virgo singularis,
Inter omnes mitis,
Nos culpis solutos
Mites fac et castos!
 
 
"Vitam præsta puram,
Iter para tutum,
Ut videntes Jesum
Semper collætemur!"⁷
 

As the monk sung, Agnes soon appeared at the door.

"Ah, my little bird, you are there!" he said looking up.

"Yes," said Agnes, coming forward, and looking over his shoulder at his work.

"Did you find that young sculptor?" she asked.

"That I did, – a brave boy, too, who will row down the coast and dig us marble from an old heathen temple, which we will baptize into the name of Christ and his Mother."

"Pietro was always a good boy," said Agnes.

"Stay," said the monk, stepping into his little sleeping room; "he sent you this lily; see, I have kept it in water all night."

"Poor Pietro, that was good of him!" said Agnes. "I would thank him, if I could. But, uncle," she added, in a hesitating voice, "did you see anything of that – other one?"

"That I did, child, – and talked long with him."

"Ah, uncle, is there any hope for him?"

"Yes, there is hope, – great hope. In fact, he has promised to receive me again, and I have hopes of leading him to the sacrament of confession, and after that" —

"And then the Pope will forgive him!" said Agnes, joyfully.

The face of the monk suddenly fell; he was silent, and went on retouching his drawing.

"Do you not think he will?" said Agnes, earnestly. "You said the Church was ever ready to receive the repentant."

"The True Church will receive him," said the monk, evasively; "yes, my little one, there is no doubt of it."

"And it is not true that he is captain of a band of robbers in the mountains?" said Agnes. "May I tell Father Francesco that it is not so?"

"Child, this young man hath suffered a grievous wrong and injustice; for he is lord of an ancient and noble estate, out of which he hath been driven by the cruel injustice of a most wicked and abominable man, the Duke di Valentinos,⁸ who hath caused the death of his brothers and sisters, and ravaged the country around with fire and sword, so that he hath been driven with his retainers to a fortress in the mountains."

"But," said Agnes, with flushed cheeks, "why does not our blessed Father excommunicate this wicked duke? Surely this knight hath erred; instead of taking refuge in the mountains, he ought to have fled with his followers to Rome, where the dear Father of the Church hath a house for all the oppressed. It must be so lovely to be the father of all men, and to take in and comfort all those who are distressed and sorrowful, and to right the wrongs of all that are oppressed, as our dear Father at Rome doth!"

The monk looked up at Agnes's clear glowing face with a sort of wondering pity.

"Dear little child," he said, "there is a Jerusalem above which is mother of us all, and these things are done there.

 
'Cœlestis urbs Jerusalem,
Beata pacis visio,
Quæ celsa de viventibus
Saxis ad astra tolleris
Sponsæque ritu cingeris
Mille angelorum millibus!'"
 

The face of the monk glowed as he repeated this ancient hymn of the Church,⁹ as if the remembrance of that general assembly and church of the first-born gave him comfort in his depression.

Agnes felt perplexed, and looked earnestly at her uncle as he stooped over his drawing, and saw that there were deep lines of anxiety on his usually clear, placid face, – a look as of one who struggles mentally with some untold trouble.

"Uncle," she said, hesitatingly, "may I tell Father Francesco what you have been telling me of this young man?"

"No, my little one, – it were not best. In fact, dear child, there be many things in his case impossible to explain, even to you; – but he is not so altogether hopeless as you thought; in truth, I have great hopes of him. I have admonished him to come here no more, but I shall see him again this evening."

Agnes wondered at the heaviness of her own little heart, as her kind old uncle spoke of his coming there no more. Awhile ago she dreaded his visits as a most fearful temptation, and thought perhaps he might come at any hour; now she was sure he would not, and it was astonishing what a weight fell upon her.

"Why am I not thankful?" she asked herself. "Why am I not joyful? Why should I wish to see him again, when I should only he tempted to sinful thoughts, and when my dear uncle, who can do so much for him, has his soul in charge? And what is this which is so strange in his case? There is some mystery, after all, – something, perhaps, which I ought not to wish to know. Ah, how little can we know of this great wicked world, and of the reasons which our superiors give for their conduct! It is ours humbly to obey, without a question or a doubt. Holy Mother, may I not sin through a vain curiosity or self-will! May I ever say, as thou didst, 'Behold the handmaid of the Lord! be it unto me according to His word!'"

And Agnes went about her morning devotions with fervent zeal, and did not see the monk as he dropped the pencil, and, covering his face with his robe, seemed to wrestle in some agony of prayer.

"Shepherd of Israel," he said, "why hast Thou forgotten this vine of Thy planting? The boar out of the wood doth waste it, the wild beast of the field doth devour it. Dogs have encompassed Thy beloved; the assembly of the violent have surrounded him. How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost Thou not judge and avenge?"

"Now, really, brother," said Elsie, coming towards him, and interrupting his meditations in her bustling, business way, yet speaking in a low tone that Agnes should not hear, "I want you to help me with this child in a good common-sense fashion: none of your high-flying notions about saints and angels, but a little good common talk for every-day people that have their bread and salt to look after. The fact is, brother, this girl must be married. I went last night to talk with Antonio's mother, and the way is all open as well as any living girl could desire. Antonio is a trifle slow, and the high-flying hussies call him stupid; but his mother says a better son never breathed, and he is as obedient to all her orders now as when he was three years old. And she has laid up plenty of household stuff for him, and good hard gold pieces to boot: she let me count them myself, and I showed her that which I had scraped together, and she counted it, and we agreed that the children that come of such a marriage would come into the world with something to stand on. Now Agnes is fond of you, brother, and perhaps it would be well for you to broach the subject. The fact is, when I begin to talk, she gets her arms round my old neck and falls to weeping and kissing me at such a rate as makes a fool of me. If the child would only be rebellious, one could do something; but this love takes all the stiffness out of one's joints; and she tells me she never wants a husband, and she will be content to live with me all her life. The saints know it isn't for my happiness to put her out of my old arms; but I can't last forever, – my old back grows weaker every year; and Antonio has strong arms to defend her from all these roystering fellows who fear neither God nor man, and swoop up young maids as kites do chickens. And then he is as gentle and manageable as a this-year ox; Agnes can lead him by the horn, – she will be a perfect queen over him; for he has been brought up to mind the women."

"Well, sister," said the monk, "hath our little maid any acquaintance with this man? Have they ever spoken together?"

"Not much. I have never brought them to a very close acquaintance; and that is what is to be done. Antonio is not much of a talker; to tell the truth, he does not know as much to say as our Agnes: but the man's place is not to say fine things, but to do the hard work that shall support the household."

"Then Agnes hath not even seen him?"

"Yes, at different times I have bid her regard him, and said to her, 'There goes a proper man and a good Christian, – a man who minds his work and is obedient to his old mother: such a man will make a right good husband for some girl some day.'"

"And did you ever see that her eye followed him with pleasure?"

"No, neither him nor any other man, for my little Agnes hath no thought of that kind; but, once married, she will like him fast enough. All I want is to have you begin the subject, and get it into her head a little."

Father Antonio was puzzled how to meet this direct urgency of his sister. He could not explain to her his own private reasons for believing that any such attempt would be utterly vain, and only bring needless distress on his little favorite. He therefore answered, —

"My good sister, all such thoughts lie so far out of the sphere of us monks, that you could not choose a worse person for such an errand. I have never had any other communings with the child than touching the beautiful things of my art, and concerning hymns and prayers and the lovely world of saints and angels, where they neither marry nor are given in marriage; and so I should only spoil your enterprise, if I should put my unskillful hand to it."

"At any rate," said Elsie, "don't you approve of my plan?"

"I should approve of anything that would make our dear little one safe and happy, but I would not force the matter against her inclinations. You will always regret it, if you make so good a child shed one needless tear. After all, sister, what need of haste? 'Tis a young bird yet. Why push it out of the nest? When once it is gone, you will never get it back. Let the pretty one have her little day to play and sing and be happy. Does she not make this garden a sort of Paradise with her little ways and her sweet words? Now, my sister, these all belong to you; but, once she is given to another, there is no saying what may come. One thing only may you count on with certainty: that these dear days, when she is all day by your side and sleeps in your bosom all night, are over, – she will belong to you no more, but to a strange man who hath neither toiled nor wrought for her, and all her pretty ways and dutiful thoughts must be for him."

"I know it – I know it," said Elsie, with a sudden wrench of that jealous love which is ever natural to strong, passionate natures. "I'm sure it isn't for my own sake I urge this. I grudge him the girl. After all, he is but a stupid head. What has he ever done, that such good fortune should befall him? He ought to fall down and kiss the dust of my shoes for such a gift, and I doubt me much if he will ever think to do it. These men think nothing too good for them. I believe, if one of the crowned saints in heaven were offered them to wife, they would think it all quite natural, and not a whit less than their requirings."

"Well, then, sister," said the monk, soothingly, "why press this matter? why hurry? The poor little child is young; let her frisk like a lamb, and dance like a butterfly, and sing her hymns every day like a bright bird. Surely the Apostle saith, 'He that giveth his maid in marriage doeth well, but he that giveth her not doeth better.'"

"But I have opened the subject already to old Meta," said Elsie; "and if I don't pursue it, she will take it into her head that her son is lightly regarded, and then her back will be up, and one may lose the chance; and on the whole, considering the money and the fellow, I don't know a safer way to settle the girl."

"Well, sister, as I have remarked," said the monk, "I could not order my speech to propose anything of this kind to a young maid; I should so bungle that I might spoil all. You must even propose it yourself."

"I would not have undertaken it," said Elsie, "had I not been frightened by that hook-nosed old kite of a cavalier that has been sailing and perching round. We are two lone women here, and the times are unsettled, and one never knows, that hath so fair a prize, but she may be carried off, and then no redress from any quarter."

"You might lodge her in the convent," said the monk.

"Yes, and then, the first thing I should know, they would have got her away from me entirely. I have been well pleased to have her much with the sisters hitherto, because it kept her from hearing the foolish talk of girls and gallants, – and such a flower would have had every wasp and bee buzzing round it. But now the time is coming to marry her, I much doubt these nuns. There's old Jocunda is a sensible woman, who knew something of the world before she went there, – but the Mother Theresa knows no more than a baby; and they would take her in, and make her as white and as thin as that moon yonder now the sun has risen; and little good should I have of her, for I have no vocation for the convent, – it would kill me in a week. No, – she has seen enough of the convent for the present. I will even take the risk of watching her myself. Little has this gallant seen of her, though he has tried hard enough! But to-day I may venture to take her down with me."

Father Antonio felt a little conscience-smitten in listening to these triumphant assertions of old Elsie; for he knew that she would pour all her vials of wrath on his head, did she know, that, owing to his absence from his little charge, the dreaded invader had managed to have two interviews with her grandchild, on the very spot that Elsie deemed the fortress of security; but he wisely kept his own counsel, believing in the eternal value of silence. In truth, the gentle monk lived so much in the unreal and celestial world of Beauty, that he was by no means a skillful guide for the passes of common life. Love, other than that ethereal kind which aspires towards Paradise, was a stranger to his thoughts, and he constantly erred in attributing to other people natures and purposes as unworldly and spiritual as his own. Thus had he fallen, in his utter simplicity, into the attitude of a go-between protecting the advances of a young lover with the shadow of his monk's gown, and he became awkwardly conscious that, if Elsie should find out the whole truth, there would be no possibility of convincing her that what had been done in such sacred simplicity on all sides was not the basest manœuvring.

Elsie took Agnes down with her to the old stand in the gateway of the town. On their way, as had probably been arranged, Antonio met them. We may have introduced him to the reader before, who likely enough has forgotten by this time our portraiture; so we shall say again, that the man was past thirty, tall, straight, well-made, even to the tapering of his well-formed limbs, as are the generality of the peasantry of that favored region. His teeth were white as sea-pearl; his cheek, though swarthy, had a deep, healthy flush; and his great velvet black eyes looked straight out from under their long silky lashes, just as do the eyes of the beautiful oxen of his country, with a languid, changeless tranquillity, betokening a good digestion, and a well-fed, kindly animal nature. He was evidently a creature that had been nourished on sweet juices and developed in fair pastures, under genial influences of sun and weather, – one that would draw patiently in harness, if required, without troubling his handsome head how he came there, and, his labor being done, would stretch his healthy body to rumination, and rest with serene, even unreflecting quietude.

He had been duly lectured by his mother, this morning, on the propriety of commencing his wooing, and was coming towards them with a bouquet in his hand.

"See there," said Elsie, "there is our young neighbor Antonio coming towards us. There is a youth whom I am willing you should speak to; none of your ruffian gallants, but steady as an ox at his work, and as kind at the crib. Happy will the girl be that gets him for a husband!"

Agnes was somewhat troubled and saddened this morning, and absorbed in cares quite new to her life before; but her nature was ever kindly and social, and it had been laid under so many restrictions by her grandmother's close method of bringing up, that it was always ready to rebound in favor of anybody to whom she allowed her to show kindness. So, when the young man stopped and shyly reached forth to her a knot of scarlet poppies intermingled with bright vetches and wild blue larkspurs, she took it graciously, and, frankly beaming a smile into his face, said, —

"Thank you, my good Antonio!" Then fastening them in the front of her bodice, "There, they are beautiful!" she said, looking up with the simple satisfaction of a child.

"They are not half so beautiful as you are," said the young peasant; "everybody likes you."

"You are very kind, I am sure," said Agnes. "I like everybody, as far as grandmamma thinks it best."

"I am glad of that," said Antonio, "because then I hope you will like me."

"Oh, yes, certainly, I do; grandmamma says you are very good, and I like all good people."

"Well, then, pretty Agnes," said the young man, "let me carry your basket."

"Oh, you don't need to; it does not tire me."

"But I should like to do something for you," insisted the young man, blushing deeply.

"Well, you may, then," said Agnes, who began to wonder at the length of time her grandmother allowed this conversation to go on without interrupting it, as she generally had done when a young man was in the case. Quite to her astonishment, her venerable relative, instead of sticking as close to her as her shadow, was walking forward very fast without looking behind.

"Now, Holy Mother," said that excellent matron, "do help this young man to bring this affair out straight, and give an old woman, who has had a world of troubles, a little peace in her old age!"

Agnes found herself, therefore, quite unusually situated, alone in the company of a handsome young man, and apparently with the consent of her grandmother. Some girls might have felt emotions of embarrassment, or even alarm, at this new situation; but the sacred loneliness and seclusion in which Agnes had been educated had given her a confiding fearlessness, such as voyagers have found in the birds of bright foreign islands which have never been invaded by man. She looked up at Antonio with a pleased, admiring smile, – much such as she would have given, if a great handsome stag, or other sylvan companion, had stepped from the forest and looked a friendship at her through his large liquid eyes. She seemed, in an innocent, frank way, to like to have him walking by her, and thought him very good to carry her basket, – though, as she told him, he need not do it, it did not tire her in the least.

"Nor does it tire me, pretty Agnes," said he, with an embarrassed laugh. "See what a great fellow I am, – how strong! Look, – I can bend an iron bar in my hands! I am as strong as an ox, – and I should like always to use my strength for you."

"Should you? How very kind of you! It is very Christian to use one's strength for others, like the good Saint Christopher."

"But I would use my strength for you because – I love you, gentle Agnes!"

"That is right, too," replied Agnes. "We must all love one another, my good Antonio."

"You must know what I mean," said the young man. "I mean that I want to marry you."

"I am sorry for that, Antonio," replied Agnes, gravely, "because I do not want to marry you. I am never going to marry anybody."

"Ah, girls always talk so, my mother told me; but nobody ever heard of a girl that did not want a husband; that is impossible," said Antonio, with simplicity.

"I believe girls generally do, Antonio; but I do not: my desire is to go to the convent."

"To the convent, pretty Agnes? Of all things, what should you want to go to the convent for? You never had any trouble. You are young, and handsome, and healthy, and almost any of the fellows would think himself fortunate to get you."

"I would go there to live for God and pray for souls," said Agnes.

"But your grandmother will never let you; she means you shall marry me. I heard her and my mother talking about it last night; and my mother bade me come on, for she said it was all settled."

"I never heard anything of it," said Agnes, now for the first time feeling troubled. "But, my good Antonio, if you really do like me and wish me well, you will not want to distress me?"

"Certainly not."

"Well, it will distress me very, very much, if you persist in wanting to marry me, and if you say any more on the subject."

"Is that really so?" said Antonio, fixing his great velvet eyes with an honest stare on Agnes.

"Yes, it is so, Antonio; you may rely upon it."

"But look here, Agnes, are you quite sure? Mother says girls do not always know their mind."

"But I know mine, Antonio. Now you really will distress and trouble me very much, if you say anything more of this sort."

"I declare, I am sorry for it," said the young man. "Look ye, Agnes, I did not care half as much about it this morning as I do now. Mother has been saying this great while that I must have a wife, that she was getting old; and this morning she told me to speak to you. I thought you would be all ready, – indeed I did."

"My good Antonio, there are a great many very handsome girls who would be glad, I suppose, to marry you. I believe other girls do not feel as I do. Giulietta used to laugh and tell me so."

"That Giulietta was a splendid girl," said Antonio. "She used to make great eyes at me, and try to make me play the fool; but my mother would not hear of her. Now she has gone off with a fellow to the mountains."

"Giulietta gone?"

"Yes, haven't you heard of it? She's gone with one of the fellows of that dashing young robber-captain that has been round our town so much lately. All the girls are wild after these mountain fellows. A good, honest boy like me, that hammers away at his trade, they think nothing of; whereas one of these fellows with a feather in his cap has only to twinkle his finger at them, and they are off like a bird."

The blood rose in Agnes's cheeks at this very unconscious remark; but she walked along for some time with a countenance of grave reflection.

They had now gained the street of the city, where old Elsie stood at a little distance waiting for them.

"Well, Agnes," said Antonio, "so you really are in earnest?"

"Certainly I am."

"Well, then, let us be good friends, at any rate," said the young man.

"Oh, to be sure, I will," said Agnes, smiling with all the brightness her lovely face was capable of. "You are a kind, good man, and I like you very much. I will always remember you kindly."

"Well, good-by, then," said Antonio, offering his hand.

"Good-by," said Agnes, cheerfully giving hers.

Elsie, beholding the cordiality of this parting, comforted herself that all was right, and ruffled all her feathers with the satisfied pride of a matron whose family plans are succeeding.

"After all," she said to herself, "brother was right, – best let young folks settle these matters themselves. Now see the advantage of such an education as I have given Agnes! Instead of being betrothed to a good, honest, forehanded fellow, she might have been losing her poor silly heart to some of these lords or gallants who throw away a girl as one does an orange when they have sucked it. Who knows what mischief this cavalier might have done, if I had not been so watchful? Now let him come prying and spying about, she will have a husband to defend her. A smith's hammer is better than an old woman's spindle, any day."

Agnes took her seat with her usual air of thoughtful gravity, her mind seeming to be intensely preoccupied, and her grandmother, though secretly exulting in the supposed cause, resolved not to open the subject with her till they were at home or alone at night.

"I have my defense to make to Father Francesco, too," she said to herself, "for hurrying on this betrothal against his advice; but one must manage a little with these priests, – the saints forgive me! I really think sometimes, because they can't marry themselves, they would rather see every pretty girl in a convent than with a husband. It's natural enough, too. Father Francesco will be like the rest of the world: when he can't help a thing, he will see the will of the Lord in it."

Thus prosperously the world seemed to go with old Elsie. Meantime, when her back was turned, as she was kneeling over her basket, sorting out lemons, Agnes happened to look up, and there, just under the arch of the gateway, where she had seen him the first time, sat the cavalier on a splendid horse, with a white feather streaming backward from his black riding-hat and dark curls.

He bowed low and kissed his hand to her, and before she knew it her eyes met his, which seemed to flash light and sunshine all through her; and then he turned his horse and was gone through the gate, while she, filled with self-reproach, was taking her little heart to task for the instantaneous throb of happiness which had passed through her whole being at that sight. She had not turned away her head nor said a prayer, as Father Francesco told her to do, because the whole thing had been sudden as a flash; but now it was gone, she prayed, "My God, help me not to love him! – let me love Thee alone!" But many times in the course of the day, as she twisted her flax, she found herself wondering whither he could be going. Had he really gone to that enchanted cloud-land, in the old purple Apennines, whither he wanted to carry her, – gone, perhaps, never to return? That was best. But was he reconciled with the Church? Was that great, splendid soul that looked out of those eyes to be forever lost, or would the pious exhortations of her uncle avail? And then she thought he had said to her, that, if she would go with him, he would confess and take the sacrament, and be reconciled with the Church, and so his soul be saved.