The Heir of Mondolfo (2 page)

She did not hear Ludovico enter, or, at least, she made no sign
that indicated that she was conscious of it. The sick person
murmured; as she bent her head down to catch the sound, she
replied, in an accent of despair:

"I can get no more leaves, for the snow is on the ground;
nor have I any other earthly thing to place over you."

"Is she cold?" said Ludovico, creeping near, and
bending down beside the afflicted girl.

"Oh, very cold!" she replied, "and there is no
help."

Ludovico had gone to the chase in a silken mantle lined with the
choicest furs: he had thrown it off, and left it with his horse
that it might not impede his descent. He hastened from the cottage,
he ran down the lane, and, following the marks of his footsteps, he
arrived where his steed awaited him. He did not again descend by
the same path, reflecting that it might be necessary for him to
seek assistance for the dying woman. He led his horse down the bill
by a circuitous path, and, although he did this with all possible
speed, night closed in, and the glare of the snow alone permitted
him to see the path that he desired to follow. When he arrived at
the lane he saw that the cottage, before so dark, was illuminated,
and, as he approached, he heard the solemn hymn of death as it was
chanted by the priests who filled it. The change had taken place,
the soul had left its mortal mansion, and the deserted ruin was
attended with more of solemnity than had been paid to the mortal
struggle. Amid the crowd of priests Ludovico entered unperceived,
and he looked around for the lovely female he had left She sat,
retired from the priests, on a heap of leaves in a corner of the
cottage. Her clasped hands lay on her knees, her head was bent
downward, and every now and then she wiped away her fast-falling
tears with her hair. Ludovico threw his cloak over her. She looked
up, and drew the covering round her, more to hide her person than
for the sake of warmth, and then, again turning away, was absorbed
in her melancholy thoughts.

Ludovico gazed on her in pity. For the first time since his
mother's death, tears filled his eyes, and his softened
countenance beamed with tender sympathy. He said nothing, but he
continued to look on as a wish arose in his mind that he might wipe
the tears that one by one fell from the shrouded eyes of the
unfortunate girl. As he was thus engaged, he heard his name called
by one of the attendants of the castle, and, throwing the few
pieces of gold he possessed into the lap of the sufferer, he
suddenly left the cottage, and, joining the servant who had been in
search of him, rode rapidly toward his home.

As Ludovico rode along, and the first emotions of pity having,
as it were, ceased to throb in his mind, these feelings merged into
the strain of thought in which he habitually indulged, and turned
its course to something new.

"I call myself wretched," he cried--"I, the
well-clad and fed, and this lovely peasant-girl, half famished,
parts with her necessary clothing to cover the dying limbs of her
only friend. I also have lost my only friend, and that is my true
misfortune, the cause of all my real misery---sycophants would
assume that name--spies and traitors usurp that office. I have cast
these aside--shaken them from me as yon bough shakes to earth its
incumbrance of snow, not as cold as their iced hearts, but I am
alone--solitude gnaws my heart and makes me
savage---miserable--worthless."

Yet, although he thought in this manner, the heart of Ludovico
was softened by what he had seen, and milder feelings pressed upon
him. He had felt sympathy for one who needed it; he had conferred a
benefit on the necessitous; tenderness molded his lips to a smile,
and the pride of utility gave dignity to the fire of his eye. The
people about him saw the change, and, not meeting with the usual
disdain of his manner, they also became softened, and the
alteration apparent in his character seemed ready to effect as
great a metamorphosis in his external situation. But the time was
not come when this change would become permanent.

On the day that succeeded to this hunt, Prince Fernando removed
to Naples, and commanded his son to accompany him. The residence at
Naples was peculiarly irksome to Ludovico. In the country he
enjoyed comparative freedom. Satisfied that he was in the castle,
his father sometimes forgot him for days together; but it was
otherwise here. Fearful that he should form friends and
connections, and knowing that his commanding figure and peculiar
manners excited attention and often curiosity, he kept him ever in
sight; or, if he left him for a moment, he first made himself sure
of the people around him, and left such of his own confidants whose
very presence was venom to the eye of Ludovico. Add to which,
Prince Mondolfo delighted to insult and browbeat his son in public,
and, aware of his deficiencies in the more elegant accomplishments,
he exposed him even to the derision of his friends. They remained
two months at Naples, and then returned to Mondolfo.

It was spring; the air was genial and spirit-stirring. The white
blossoms of the almond-trees and the pink ones of the peach just
began to be contrasted with the green leaves that shot forth among
them. Ludovico felt little of the exhilarating effects of spring.
Wounded in his heart's core, he asked nature why she painted a
sepulcher; he asked the airs why they fanned the sorrowful and the
dead. He wandered forth to solitude. He rambled down the path that
led to the sea; he sat on the beach, watching the monotonous flow
of the waves; they danced and sparkled; his gloomy thoughts refused
to imbibe cheerfulness from wave or sun.

A form passed near him--a peasant-girl, who balanced a pitcher,
urn- shaped, upon her head; she was meanly clad, but she attracted
Ludovico's regard, and when, having approached the fountain,
she took her pitcher and turned to fill it, he recognized the
cottager of the foregoing winter. She knew him also, and, leaving
her occupation, she approached him and kissed his hand with that
irresistible grace that southern climes seem to instill into the
meanest of their children.

At first she hesitated, and began to thank him in broken
accents, but words came as she spoke, and Ludovico listened to her
eloquent thanks--the first he had heard addressed to him by any
human being. A smile of pleasure stole over his face--a smile whose
beauty sank deep into the gazer's heart. In a minute they were
seated on the bank beside the fountain, and Viola told the story of
her poverty-stricken youth--her orphan lot--the death of her best
friend--and it was now only the benign climate which, in
diminishing human wants, made her appear less wretched than then.
She was alone in the world--living in that desolate
cottage--providing for her daily fare with difficulty. Her pale
cheek, the sickly languor that pervaded her manner, gave evidence
of the truth of her words; but she did not weep, she spoke words of
good heart, and it was only when she alluded to the benefaction of
Ludovico that her soft dark eyes swam with tears.

The youth visited her cottage the next day. He rode up the lane,
now grass-grown and scented by violets, which Viola was gathering
from the banks. She presented her nosegay to him. They entered the
cottage together. It was dilapidated and miserable. A few flowers
placed in a broken vase was a type only of poor Viola herself--a
lovely blossom in the midst of utter poverty; and the rose-tree
that shaded the window could only tell that sweet Italy, even in
the midst of wretchedness, spares her natural wealth to adorn her
children.

Ludovico made Viola sit down on a bench by the window, and stood
opposite to her, her flowers in his hand, listening. She did not
talk of her poverty, and it would be difficult to recount what was
said. She seemed happy and smiled and spoke with a gleeful voice,
which softened the heart of her friend, so that he almost wept with
pity and admiration. After this, day by day, Ludovico visited the
cottage and bestowed all his time on Viola. He came and talked with
her, gathered violets with her, consoled and advised her, and
became happy. The idea that he was of use to a single human being
instilled joy into his heart; and yet he was wholly unconscious how
entirely he was necessary to the happiness of his protégée. He felt
happy beside her, he was delighted to bestow benefits on her, and
to see her profit by them; but he did not think of love, and his
mind, unawakened to passion, reposed from its long pain without a
thought for the future. It was not so with the peasant-girl. She
could not see his eyes bent in gentleness on her, his mouth lighted
by its tender smile, or listen to his voice as he bade her trust in
him, for that he would be father, brother, all to her, without
deeply, passionately loving him. He became the sun of her day, the
breath of her life--her hope, joy, and sole possession. She watched
for his coming, she watched him as he went, and for a long time she
was happy. She would not repine that he replied to her earnest love
with calm affection only--she was a peasant, he a noble--and she
could claim and expect no more; he was a god--she might adore him;
and it were blasphemy to hope for more than a benign acceptation of
her worship.

Prince Mondolfo was soon made aware of Ludovico's visits to
the cottage of the forest, and he did not doubt that Viola had
become the mistress of his son. He did not endeavor to interrupt
the connection, or put any bar to his visits. Ludovico, indeed,
enjoyed more liberty than ever, and his cruel father confined
himself alone to the restricting of him more than ever in money.
His policy was apparent: Ludovico had resisted every temptation of
gambling and other modes of expense thrown in his way. Fernando had
long wished to bring his son to a painful sense of his poverty and
dependence, and to oblige him to seek the necessary funds in such a
career as would necessitate his desertion of the paternal roof. He
had wound many snares around the boy, and all were snapped by his
firm but almost unconscious resistance; but now, without seeking,
without expectation, the occasion came of itself which would lead
him to require far more than his father had at any time allowed
him, and now that allowance was restricted, yet Ludovico did not
murmur--and until now he had had enough.

A long time Fernando abstained from all allusion to the
connection of his son; but one evening, at a banquet, gayety
overcame his caution--a gayety which ever led him to sport with his
son's feelings, and to excite a pain which might repress the
smile that his new state of mind ceased to make frequent visits to
his countenance.

"Here," cried Fernando, as he filled a
goblet--"here, Ludovico, is to the health of your
violet-girl!"

and he concluded his speech with some indecorous allusion that
suffused Ludovico's cheek with red. Without replying he arose
to depart.

"And whither are you going, sir?" cried his father.
"Take yon cup to answer my pledge, for, by Bacchus! none that
sit at my table shall pass it uncourteously by."

Ludovico, still standing, filled his cup and raised it as he was
about to speak and retort to his father's speech, but the
memory of his words and the innocence of Viola pressed upon him and
filled his heart almost to bursting. He put down his cup, pushed
aside the people who sought to detain him, and left the castle, and
soon the laughter of the revelers was no more heard by him, though
it had loudly rung and was echoed through the lofty halls. The
words of Fernando had awakened a strange spirit in Ludovico.
"Viola! Can she love me? Do I love her?" The last
question was quickly answered. Passion, suddenly awake, made every
artery tingle by its thrill-ing presence. His cheeks burned and his
heart danced with strange exultation as he hastened toward the
cottage, unheeding all but the universe of sensation that dwelt
within him. He reached its door. Blank and dark the walls rose
before him, and the boughs of the wood waved and sighed over him.
Until now he had felt impatience alone--the sickness of fear--fear
of finding a cold return to his passion's feeling now entered
his heart; and, retreating a little from the cottage, he sat on a
bank, and hid his face in his hands, while passionate tears gushed
from his eyes and trickled from between his fingers. Viola opened
the door of her cottage; Ludovico had failed in his daily visit,
and she was unhappy. She looked on the sky--the sun had set, and
Hesperus glowed in the West; the dark ilex- trees made a deep
shade, which was broken by innumerable fire-flies, which flashed
now low on the ground, discovering the flowers as they slept hushed
and closed in night, now high among the branches, and their light
was reflected by the shining leaves of ilex and laurel. Viola's
wandering eye unconsciously selected one and followed it as it
flew, and ever and anon cast aside its veil of darkness and shed a
wide pallor around its own form. At length it nestled itself in a
bower of green leaves formed by a clump of united laurels and
myrtles; and there it stayed, flashing its beautiful light, which,
coming from among the boughs, seemed as if the brightest star of
the heavens had wandered from its course, and, trembling at its
temerity, sat panting on its earthly perch. Ludovico sat near the
laurel--Viola saw him--her breath came quick--she spoke not--but
stepped lightly to him--and looked with such mazed ecstasy of
thought that she felt, nay, almost heard, her heart beat with her
emotion. At length she spoke--she uttered his name, and he looked
up on her gentle face, her beaming eyes and her sylph-like form
bent over him. He forgot his fears, and his hopes were soon
confirmed. For the first time he pressed the trembling lips of
Viola, and then tore himself away to think with rapture and wonder
on all that had taken place.

Ludovico ever acted with energy and promptness. He returned only
to plan with Viola when they might be united. A small chapel in the
Apennines, sequestered and unknown, was selected; a priest was
easily procured from a neighboring convent and easily bribed to
silence. Ludovico led back his bride to the cottage in the forest.
There she continued to reside; for worlds he would not have had her
change her habitation; all his wealth was expended in decorating
it; yet his all only sufliced to render it tolerable. But they were
happy. The small circlet of earth's expanse that held in his
Viola was the universe to her husband. His heart and imagination
widened and filled it until it encompassed all of beautiful, and
was inhabited by all of excellent, this world contains.