Vivalanti was astir early in the morning—early, that is, for the villa. Castel Vivalanti had been at work two hours and more when Pietro went the rounds of the bedroom doors with his very , ‘Buon giorno, Excellency; if it suits your convenience, coffee will be served in the ilex in half an hour.’ Coffee in the ilex grove was a new departure in accordance with Marcia’s inspiration of the night before. And the ilex grove to-day, as Bianca exclaimed with clasped hands, reminded one of paradise. The week of rain had left it a study in green; the deep, rich tone of ilex leaves arching overhead, the blue green on dark tree trunks, the tender of young grass in the paths, and the yellow sunlight glancing everywhere. Out on the terrace the peacock was trailing his feathers over the marble pavement with a conscious air of being in with the day.
Marcia was first to appear. She stepped on to the loggia with a little of delight at the beauty of the morning. In a pale summer gown, her hair by the sun, she herself was not out of touch with the scene. She crossed the terrace and stood by the balustrade, looking off through a golden and purple to the on the 152 horizon of Rome and St. Peter’s. The peacock called her back, with wide-spread tail.
‘You ridiculous bird!’ she laughed. ‘I suppose you have been posing here for two hours, waiting for some one to come and admire,’ and she hurried off to the grove to make sure that Pietro had carried out her orders.
The table was spread by the fountain, where the green arched paths and the ilexes grew in an open circle. The sunlight flickering through on dainty and silver and glass and on little cakes of golden honey—fresh from a farm in the Alban hills—made a feast which would not have been out of place in a Watteau painting. Marcia echoed Bianca’s enthusiasm as her eyes fell upon the scene, and Pietro flew about with an ardour, placing rugs and cushions and wicker chairs.
‘It is perfect,’ she cried, as she retreated down one of the paths to get a perspective. ‘But there are no flowers,’ she added. ‘That will never do; we must have some lilies-of-the-valley, Pietro. You fix a bowl in the centre, while I run and pick them,’ and she started off toward the garden borders.
Here Paul Dessart found her five minutes later. He greeted her with a friendly, ‘Felicissimo giorno, signorina!’ The transient clouds of yesterday had disappeared from his brow as well as from the sky, and he joined in her task.
‘There!’ said Marcia as she rose to her feet and shook back the stray hair from her eyes. ‘Could anything be more in keeping with a breakfast than these?’ She held at arm’s length for him to admire a great bunch of delicate bells in green. ‘Come,’ she cried; ‘the artist must arrange them’; and together they turned toward the fountain.
A spray of bluest forget-me-nots hung over one of the garden borders. The young man stooped and, breaking it, presented it with his hand on his heart.
‘Signorina,’ he begged in a tone of mock-Italian sentiment—‘dearest signorina, I am going where duty calls—far, far away to Perugia. Non-te-scordar-di-me!’
She laughed as she put the flowers in her belt, but with a slightly deeper on her cheek. Paul, in a mood like this, was very attractive.
153 As they entered the grove they heard the of childish voices, and presently Gerald and Gervasio appeared down the walk, carrying each a saucer of for their friends of the fountain. They stopped with big eyes at the sight of the table spread for breakfast.
‘Oh, Cousin Marcia!’ Gerald delightedly, ‘are we doin’ to eat out uv doors? May Gervas’ an’ me eat wif you? Please! Please!’
Marcia to consider.
‘Yes,’ said she finally, ‘this is my party, and if you’ll be good boys and not talk, I’ll invite you. And when you’ve finished your bread and milk, if you’ve been very good, you may have some—’ she paused and lowered her voice dramatically while the two hung upon her words—‘honey!’
Paul Dessart laughed at what struck him as an , but the boys received the assurance with acclamation. Gervasio was presented to the young painter, and he acknowledged the introduction with a grace equal to Gerald’s own. He had almost forgotten that he was not born a prince. As Gerald shook hands he invited the guest, with visible hesitancy, to throw the crumbs; but Paul generously refused the invitation, and two minutes later the little fellows were kneeling side by side on the coping of the fountain, while the arching pathways rang with their laughter.
The rest of their excellencies soon appeared in a humour to fit the morning, and the usually uneventful ‘first breakfast’ partook of the nature of a fête. Gerald’s and Gervasio’s laughter rang free and unchecked. The two were sitting side by side on a stone garden-seat (the broken-nosed of a forgotten emperor brooding over them), engaged for the present with twin silver bowls of bread and milk, but with eyes turned honeyward. The ghost of overnight was resurrected and at, while the ghost himself gravely passed the cups. The stepping peacock, who had joined the feast uninvited, became the point of many morals as he lowered his feathers in the dust to for crumbs. Before the party ended, Sybert and Dessart engaged in a good-natured on Sybert’s theme of yesterday concerning Italy’s beauty.
154 ‘Paul has missed his calling!’ declared Eleanor Royston. ‘He should have been a politician in New York. It is a pity to see such a gift for wasted in private life.’
For a time Paul , but their closed with the laugh on his side. of riots, his thesis was that they were on the whole very jolly. And he upheld this shockingly barbaric view with the plea that he always liked to see people having a good time, and that next to sleeping in the sun and eating macaroni the Italians were never so happy as when engaged in a row. For his part, he affirmed, he expected to find them tearing up the golden paving-stones of paradise to heave at each other!
The image a smile from even Sybert’s gravity; It contained just enough of truth, and not too much, to make it funny. Pietro’s announcement, at this point, that the carriages were ready to drive their excellencies to the festa dissolved the party in a for hats and wraps. Sybert at first had declined the festa, on the plea that he had business in Rome. Marcia had accepted his excuse with the simply polite statement that they would be sorry not to have him, but Eleanor Royston had refused to let him off.
‘I’ve known a great many diplomats,’ she affirmed; ‘and though they are supposed to be engaged with the business of nations, I have never yet seen one who was too busy to attend a party. We shan’t let you off on that score.’
Somewhat to Paul’s secret , and not to Marcia’s gratification, he finally consented to change his mind. As the carriage started, Marcia glanced back toward the loggia steps, where the two little boys, one with yellow curls and one with black, were hand in hand, wistfully watching the departure.
‘Good-bye, Gerald and Gervasio,’ she called. ‘If you are very good, I’ll bring you something nice from the festa.’
The Copley pilgrimage was not the only one bound for Genazzano that day. They passed on the road bands of contadini, both on foot and on donkey-back, journeying toward the festa, their babies and provisions in baskets on their heads. Genazzano, on St Mark’s day, wisely unites pleasure and , with masses in the cathedral and jugglers in the . The party from 155 the villa the larger share of their time to the piazza, laughing good-naturedly at the ‘Inglese! which was shouted after them at every turn. They lunched on the terrace of the very modest village inn, in company with a party of young Irish students from the Propaganda who seemed to treat the miracles of the wonder-working Madonna in the light of an ecclesiastical joke. The afternoon found the sight-seeing ardour of the two elder ladies somewhat damped. There was to be a function in the cathedral at three, and they stated their intention of stopping quietly in the low-raftered parlour of the inn until it should commence. Eleanor Royston issued a frank invitation to Sybert to explore the old Colonna castle which the town, and he accepted with what struck Marcia as a flattering show of interest.
In regard to Laurence Sybert she herself was of many minds. A very considerable amount of her old for him remained, mixed with a curiosity and interest in his movements out of all proportion to the interest he had ever upon her. And to-day she was experiencing a fresh in the feeling that his attitude toward Eleanor was more than toward herself. It was a venturesome act for any man to Marcia’s .
Meanwhile she had Paul; and the slight cloud upon her brow vanished quickly as she and Margaret and the young man turned toward the piazza. Paul was in holiday humour, and the of his fun was impossible to escape. He wore a favour in his hat and a medal of the Madonna in his buttonhole; he laughed and joked with the people in the booths; he offered his assistance to a prestidigitator who called for volunteers; he shot dolls with an air-rifle and carried off the prize, a decorated pipe, which he presented with a courtly bow to a pretty peasant girl who, with frank , had applauded the . Finally he brought to a close a bargain of Marcia’s. She had expressed a desire for a style of head-dress—a long silver pin with a closed fist on the end—worn by the women from the Volscian villages. Paul readily agreed to acquire one for her. The spillo was plucked from an astonished woman’s head and the bargaining began.
Sell it! But that was impossible. It was an heirloom! 156 it had been in the family for many generations; she could not think of parting with it—not perhaps for its weight in silver?—the money was before her eyes. She wavered visibly. Paul demanded scales. They were brought from the tobacco-shop, the tobacconist importantly presiding. The spillo was placed on one side; lire on the other—six—seven—eight. The woman clasped her hands ecstatically as the pile grew. Nine—ten—the scales hesitated. At eleven they went down with a thud, and the bargain was completed. A pleased through the crowd, and some one suggested, ‘Now is the signorina sposata.’ For, according to Volscian , only married woman might wear the head-dress.
Marcia shook her head with a laugh. She and Paul, standing side by side, made an effective couple, and the peasants it with pleased . Italians are quick to sympathize with a romance. ‘Promessi sposi,’ some one murmured, this time with an accent of delighted assurance. Paul cast a sidewise glance at Marcia to see how she would accept this somewhat public . She the charge again, but with a slightly heightened colour, and the crowd laughed gaily. As the two turned up the steep street toward the cathedral, Paul held out his hand.
‘Give me the pin,’ he said. ‘I will carry it in my pocket for you, since you are not entitled—as yet—to wear it.’
Marcia handed it over, trying not to look conscious of the undertone in his voice. He was very convincing to-day; she was reconsidering her problem.
In the crowded little piazza before the cathedral they found the rest of the party. They all mounted the steps and stood in a group, watching the processions of pilgrims with votive offerings. They came in bands of fifty and a hundred, bearing banners and chanting litanies. As they approached the church they broke off their singing to shout ‘Ave Marias,’ mounting on their knees and kissing the steps as they came. Marcia, looking down over the tossing mass of and yellow kerchiefs, compared it with the great function she had witnessed in St. Peter’s. These peasants approaching the Madonna’s on their knees, shouting themselves , their faces glowing with religious 157 ardour, were to her mind far the more impressive sight of the two. She turned into the church, half carried away by the movement and colour and of the scene. There was something about the simple energy of their devotion.
The interior was packed with closely kneeling peasants, the air filled with a blue haze of through which the candles on the altar glowed dimly. The Copley party wedged their way through and stood back at the shadow of one of the side , watching the scene. Paul dropped on his knees with the peasants, and, sketch-book in hand, set himself surreptitiously to copying the head of a girl in front. Marcia watched him for a few moments with an amused smile; then she glanced away over the sea of kneeling figures. There was no mechanical devotion here: it came from the heart, if any ever did. Ah, they were too believing! she thought suddenly. Their piety carried them too far; it robbed them of dignity, of individuality, of self-reliance. Almost at her feet a woman was on the floor, kissing the stones of the pavement in a of devotion. She turned away in a quick revulsion of feeling such as she had experienced in St. Peter’s. And as she turned her eyes met Laure............