_ CHAPTER XXIX
The yellow lamp flames were burning late in the cabinet of Girolamo Magagnati, who took less note of the difference between evening hours and those of early dawn since there was no longer in his household a beloved one to guard from weariness. Nay, the night was rather the time in which he might forget himself and plunge more whole-heartedly into his schemes of work--financial or creative. For the world was surely on the eve of discoveries important to his art, and it would be well if he might secure them, before his working days should pass, for the Stabilimento Magagnati.
Piero Salin stood in the doorway as he glanced up from the drawings that littered his table--the dark oak table which had seemed a centre of cheer to Girolamo, when, in this very chamber, his child had made a radiance for him in which the lines of his life shone large and satisfying.
Girolamo never seemed to remember that this son-in-law was a great man among the people; to him he was only Piero Salin, barcariol; the single token of the old man's favor was that in his thought he no longer added the despicable word
toso; and it was a proof that he was mellowing with the years, for Girolamo never forgot this unwelcome and dishonorable past, and Piero was always ill at ease in his presence.
"Messer Magagnati," he began awkwardly, twirling his black cap in his hand rather after the fashion of a gondolier than of the Chief of the Nicolotti, "I must crave, by dawn of the morrow, the blessing of San Nicolo--of holy memory."
"Enter," said Girolamo, with a reluctance not wholly concealed by his attempt at courtesy, for he felt the moments to be the more precious that the dawn was near; but the invocation of the sailor's patron saint portended a journey. "Verily, Piero, thy comings and goings have been, of late, so frequent that one learns the wisdom of not mourning over-much when thou dost crave an ave at the shrine of San Nicolo. May he grant thee favoring breezes! Thou art in favor with the Ten, they tell me."
Piero shrugged his shoulders. "Favor or disfavor," he said, "it is but the turning of the head--and both may lead to that place of unsought distinction between San Marco and San Teodoro, if the orders of their Excellencies bring not the end they sought. But it matters little--a candle flame is better blown out than dying spent."
"And whither art thou bent on the morrow?"
"Nay, Messer Girolamo, that is not mine own secret. But this word would I leave with thee; if, perchance, I return not before many days, seek me on the border-land--at the point nearest Roman dominions." He had come close to the old merchant, and uttered the last words in a tone very low and full of meaning.
Girolamo started. "On the border-land of Rome!" he echoed. "This mission of thine is then weighty; and thou fearest----"
"Nay, I fear naught," said Piero haughtily. "But the times are perilous; and later, if thou would'st seek me, thou hast the clew. But of the mission, to which I am sworn in secrecy, let it not be known that I have so much as named it--it would argue ill for me and thee. And the clew is for thy using only. Meanwhile, forget that I have spoken. The Ave Maria will soon waken the fishers of Murano.
Addio!"
But he still waited as if he had not uttered all his mind. Girolamo studied his face closely.
"There is more," he said. "Speak!"
"By the Holy Madonna of San Donato!" said Piero, casting off his restraint with a sudden impulse, "if I come not back, I would have thee know that if ever there came a chance to me to serve Marina--the Lady Marina of the Giustiniani--I, Piero, barcariol or gastaldo, would serve her as a soldier may serve a saint. For she hath been good to the Zuanino. Ay, though it cost me my life, I would serve her like a saint in heaven!" he repeated. Then, flushed with the shame of such unwonted speech and confession, he hastened to the door, and his steps were already resounding on the stone floor of the passage when Girolamo recovered from his astonishment sufficiently to follow him into the shadow and command him to stop.
"Thou hast seen my daughter--thou hast news of her?"
"Ay, yestere'en, at the Ave Maria, I spoke with her, in Santa Maria dell' Orto, coming upon her kneeling before the great picture of Jacopo Robusti--she, saint enough already to wear a gloria and looking as if the heart of her were worn away from grief! She hath need of thee daily, for her love for thee is great, and death not far."
"Tell it plainly!" commanded Girolamo, hastening after the retreating figure and violently grasping his arm to detain him. "Have I failed to her in aught? She is soul of my soul! Maledetto! why dost thou break my heart?"
"Look to thine other son-in-law!" Piero retorted wrathfully; "him of the crimson robe who sits in the Councils of Venice, and findeth no cure for thy daughter--dying of terror beside him."
"It is a base slander!" cried old Girolamo, trembling with anger and fear. "Never was wife more beloved and petted! Marcantonio hath no thought, save for Marina and Venice!"
"Ay, 'for Marina and Venice,'" was the scornful answer, "
but Venice first. Splendor and gifts and the pleasing of every whim, if he could but guess it--gold for her asking, and her palace no better than a cross for her dwelling; for the one thing she needeth for her peace and life he giveth not!"
"What meanest thou?" cried Girolamo, furiously. "Hath he not spent a fortune on physicians--sparing nothing, save to torment her no more, since their skill is but weariness to her! She is eating her heart out for this quarrel with Rome--which no man may help, and it is but foolishness for women to meddle with; and she hath ever been too much under priestly sway. Why earnest thou hither this night?"
"For this cause and for no other," said Piero solemnly, "that thou mightest find me, if need should be for any service to her. And to swear to thee, by the Madonna and every saint of Venice, that I would give my life for her!"
But old Girolamo grew the angrier for Piero's professions of loyalty. "Shall her father do less than thou?" he questioned, wrathfully. "On the morrow will I go to her, and leave her no more until she forgets."
"By all the saints in heaven, and every Madonna in Venice, and our Lady of every traghetto!" Piero exclaimed, as he wrenched himself away from Girolamo's angry grasp, while the old man staggered against the wall, still holding a bit of cloth from the gondolier's cloak in his closed hand, "I am vowed to my mission before this dawn! What I have spoken is for duty to thine house, and not in anger--though I could color my stiletto in good patrician blood and die for it gaily, if that would help her!"
But Girolamo could not yet find his voice, and Piero, with his hand on the latch of the great iron gates of the water-story, turned and called back: "Women are not like men, and Marina is like no other woman that ever was born in Venice. Whether it be the priests that have bewitched her--may the Holy Madonna have mercy, and curse them for it!--or whether she be truly the Blessed Virgin of San Donato come to earth again, one knows not. But, Messer Magagnati,"--and the voice came solemnly from the dark figure dimly outlined against the gray darkness beyond the iron bars,--"thy daughter is dying for this curse of the Most Holy Father--'il mal anno che Dio le dia!' (may heaven make him suffer for it!)--and she hath no peace in Venice.
She will never forget nor change. If thy love be great, as thou hast said, thou wilt find some way to help her.
For in Venice she hath no peace."
The old merchant, dazed by Piero's hot words, was a pitiful figure, standing, desolate, behind the closed bars of his gate, the night wind lifting his long beard and parting the thin gray locks that flowed from under his cap, while he called and beckoned impotently to Piero to return, repeating meanwhile mechanically, with no perception of their meaning, those strange words of Piero's--"
In Venice she hath no peace." He stood, peering out into the gray gloom and listening to the lessening plash of the oar, until the gondola of the gastaldo was already far on the way to San Marco, where sat the Ten.
But it was not of Piero's mission he was thinking, but of his child--saying over and over again those fateful words, "In Venice she hath no peace." Had Piero said that?
Suddenly the entire speech recurred to him--insistent, tense with meaning. She could not live in Venice. Marina had no peace in Venice. She would never forget nor change. She had need of him--of her father's love; and if he loved enough,
he would find a way!
Chilled and heart-sick he turned, and with no torch and missing the voice which had guided him through the long, dark passage, he groped his way to his cabinet and sat down to confront a graver problem than any he had ever conquered with Marina's aid. He
would find a way--but "it must not be in Venice!" How could they leave Venice? Were they not Venetians born, and was not Venice in trouble? To leave her now were to deny her.
It could not be!
He put the argument many times, feverishly at first, then more calmly--coming always to the same conclusion, "it could not be." It was a comfort to reach so sensible and positive a decision. To-morrow he would go to his daughter, and meanwhile he must continue his work; he needed to reassert his power, for he had been strangely shaken.
He drew the scattered papers together, but the lines, blurred and confused, carried no meaning; the fragments of broken glass in the little trays beside him were a dull, untranslucent gray, and written all over papers and fragments, in vivid letters that burned into his brain, were those other terrible words of Piero's which he had tried in vain to forget--"Thy daughter is dying for this curse."
Marina--dying!
How should Piero know more about Marina than her own father knew? Did he profess to be a physician that one should credit his every word? What did he mean by his impudent boast of "dying for her, if need should be!" Had she not her husband and father to care for her? Her husband "who was denying her the only thing that could give her life and peace," Piero had said.--What was the matter with his insulting words, that he could not forget them?--Had she not her father, who was going to her on the morrow, when he had matured his plans, and would do whatever she wished--"in Venice"? Her father "who loved her, as his own soul"--that was what he had said to Piero, with the memory of all those dear years when they had been all in all to each other, in this home.
Was it for hours or moments only that he sat in torture--enduring, reasoning, placing love against pride, Marina against Venice, Venice against a father's weakness, duty to the Republic before the need of this only child who was "soul of his soul"?
The last of his race--inheriting the traditions and passionate attachments of that long line of loyal men who had founded and built up the stabilimento which was the pride of Murano; of the people, yet ennobled by the proffer of the Senate, and grandsire to the son of one of the highest nobles of the Republic--what was there left in life for him away from Venice? How should he bear to die dishonored and disinherited by the country which he had deserted in her hour of struggle? For never any more might one return who should desert Venice for Rome!
And those panes of brilliant, crystal clarity which he had dreamed of adding to the honors of the Stabilimento Magagnati--so strong that a single sheet might be framed in the great spaces of the windows of the palaces and show neither curve nor flaw--so pure that their only trace of color should come from a chance reflection which would but lend added charm--these might not be the discovery of his later days, though the time was near in which this gift
must come to Venice. He had not dreamed that he could ever say, while strength yet remained to think and plan, "The house of Magagnati has touched its height, and others may come forward to do the rest for Venice."
And the secret lay so near--scarcely eluding him!
It was no mere empty jealousy, nor trivial wish for fame, nor greed of recompense--of which he had enough--that forced the veins out on the strong forehead of this master-worker, as he struggled with this question of surrendering all for his daughter's peace. It was the art in which his ancestors had taken the lead from the earliest industrial triumphs of the Republic--an art in which Venice stood first--and in his simple belief it was not less to their glory than the work of a Titian or a Sansovino. In this field he wrought whole-hearted, with the passion of an artist who has achieved, and his place and part in the Republic, as in life, was bounded for him by his art. "To stand with folded hands--always, hereafter, to be unnecessary to Venice!"
How should one who had not been born in Venice ever guess the strange fascination of that magic city for her sons, or dream with what a passion the blood of generations of Venetian ancestry surged in one's veins, compelling patriotism, so that it was not possible to do aught with one's gifts and life that did not enhance the greatness of so fair a kingdom! It was the wonderful secret of the empire of Venice that here the pride of self was counted only as a factor in the superior pride of her dominion.
Marina had been proud of his cabinet, and he took the little antique lamp she used to hold for him and unlocked the door with a tremulous hand, standing unsteadily before it and trying to hearten himself, as he ruthlessly flashed the light so that each fantastic bit came out in perfect beauty, glowing with the wonderful coloring of transparent gems.
But suddenly those fearful words of Piero's played riot among them, obliterating every trace of beauty, every claim of Venice, every question as to his own judgment or Marina's reasoning--even the ignominy of the secret flight. "
Thy daughter dying!"
The letters blazed like stars, gleaming among his papers--glittering around the chair where Marina used to sit, climbing up into the air, closing nearer to him--wavering, writhing lines of living fire, tracing those awful words he could not forget----
"My God!" he cried, "is not Marina more than all!" There was no longer anything in life that he willed to do but to win peace for her, according to her whim.
"Stino!" he shrieked, with a voice louder than the clang of the rude iron bell whose rope had broken in his impetuous hand.
"Light me a fire in the brazier, and burn me this rubbish!" he commanded of the foreman who entered, aghast at the imperious summons, and yet more amazed at the destruction of those precious pages over which his master had spent days of brooding; but he ventured no protest.
"And here," said Girolamo, with a look of relief, as the last paper shrivelled and curled into smoke, "are the keys of these cabinets--thou knowest their contents, and that they are precious. And here shalt thou remain, as master, until my return--keeping all in order, as thou knowest how, and loyally serving the interest of the stabilimento. All moneys which I may send for thou shalt instantly remit by trusty messenger."
"How long doth the Master remain away?"
"So long as it may please the Lady Marina, who hath need of change. And if I return not," Girolamo resumed, after a moment's pause which gave solemnity to his words, "my will shall be found filed with the Avvogadori del Commun; and thou, Stino, shalt answer to the summons they will send thee--if I come no more."
"Master!" cried the faithful Stino, greatly troubled, for these preparations filled him with dread, and were strange indeed for so old a man who had never yet left Venice for a night. "Life is other than we know it away from Venice; and the heart of us goes mourning for the sight and sound of the sea and the color of our skies!"
"Nay, Stino, I have said it," his master answered, unmoved by his imploring eyes.
"When goest thou--that all may be ready?"
"Now; ere the dawn!" Girolamo cried with sudden resolution. "I would say my Ave Maria in the chapel of the Lady Marina. Rouse the gondolier, and lift the curtain that I may see how soon the day cometh."
"Master, dear Master," said Stino tenderly, as he drew the heavy draperies aside. "Already the sun is high, and the household hath been, these many hours, awake."
"So!" Girolamo answered with deep gravity, for the battle had been longer than he had dreamed, yet with his habitual control. "I knew not the time--my thoughts held me. Stino, if I return not, may the saints bless thee for all thou hast been to me since the Lady Marina hath dwelt in the palazzo Giustiniani. And in my will thou art not forgotten."
As Girolamo issued from his own portal, closely followed by Stino and the other superintendents of the great stabilimento who were filled with foreboding at this sudden and surprising decision of their good master, several gondolas wearing the colors of the Giustiniani floated into the waterway from the broad lagoon; and with them, like a flock of sea-birds in their habits of gray and their cowls of white, came the sisters of San Donato, returning from that early chanted Mass at the palazzo Giustiniani which had been a dream of the Lady Marina's happier days.
The young Senator had urged his boatmen to feverish speed, and his own gondola was far in advance of the train. He bounded from his bark the moment it neared the steps, and, rushing blindly toward the dwelling, encountered his father-in-law on the threshold.
"She is here--Marina?" he questioned, half crazed with grief; and, forgetful of the usual courtesies, would have pushed him aside to enter. "I have come with her maidens and her child to take her home. Let me go to her!"
And, as Girolamo stood, dumb and dazed, "I beseech thee--conceal her not!"
Looking into each other's faces for one anguished moment, they knew, without need of further speech, that she had gone from them both.
Girolamo gave a great and bitter cry, "My son!" folding his arms about the younger man in measureless grief and compassion.
And when they could trust their footsteps they went desolately into the house together.
* * * * *
"Nay," Girolamo had answered to every argument. "It is for thee to remain in Venice with her child, that the Signoria be not wroth with the Ca' Giustiniani, and for me to seek and care for her--mayhap, if heaven be merciful, to bring her to thee again! She cannot be far to seek."
"In Padua!" cried Marcantonio, with sudden conviction. "They will sleep in Padua to-night. It
was the voice of the Lady Beata!" _