Complete Works of Wilkie Collins (1534 page)

In an agony of apprehension lest she should lose a word of the momentous conversation, she made a desperate attempt to appeal to the dog’s fondness for her, by suddenly flinging both her arms round his neck, and kissing his rough, hairy cheek. The stratagem succeeded. Scarammuccia had, for many years past, never received any greater marks of his mistress’s kindness for him than such as a pat on the head or a present of a lump of sugar might convey. His dog’s nature was utterly confounded by the unexpected warmth of Nanina’s caress, and he struggled up vigorously in her arms to try and return it by licking her face. She could easily prevent him from doing this, and could so gain a few minutes more to listen behind the summer-house without danger of discovery.

She had lost Brigida’s answer to Father Rocco’s question; but she was in time to hear her next words.

“We are alone here,” said Brigida. “I am a woman, and I don’t know that you may not have come armed. It is only the commonest precaution on my part not to give you a chance of getting at the wax mask till I have made my conditions.”

“You never said a word about conditions before.”

“True. I remember telling you that I wanted nothing but the novelty of going to the masquerade in the character of my dead enemy, and the luxury of being able to terrify the man who had brutally ridiculed me in old days in the studio. That was the truth. But it is not the less the truth that our experiment on Count Fabio has detained me in this city much longer than I ever intended, that I am all but penniless, and that I deserve to be paid. In plain words, will you buy the mask of me for two hundred scudi?”

“I have not twenty scudi in the world, at my own free disposal.”

“You must find two hundred if you want the wax mask. I don’t wish to threaten — but money I must have. I mention the sum of two hundred scudi, because that is the exact amount offered in the public handbills by Count Fabio’s friends for the discovery of the woman who wore the yellow mask at the Marquis Melani’s ball. What have I to do but to earn that money if I please, by going to the palace, taking the wax mask with me, and telling them that I am the woman. Suppose I confess in that way; they can do nothing to hurt me, and I should be two hundred scudi the richer. You might be injured, to be sure, if they insisted on knowing who made the wax model, and who suggested the ghastly disguise — ”

“Wretch! do you believe that my character could be injured on the unsupported evidence of any words from your lips?”

“Father Rocco, for the first time since I have enjoyed the pleasure of your acquaintance, I find you committing a breach of good manners. I shall leave you until you become more like yourself. If you wish to apologize for calling me a wretch, and if you want to secure the wax mask, honour me with a visit before four o’clock this afternoon, and bring two hundred scudi with you. Delay till after four, and it will be too late.”

An instant of silence followed; and then Nanina judged that Brigida must be departing, for she heard the rustling of a dress on the lawn in front of the summer-house. Unfortunately, Scarammuccia heard it too. He twisted himself round in her arms and growled.

The noise disturbed Father Rocco. She heard him rise and leave the summer-house. There would have been time enough, perhaps, for her to conceal herself among some trees if she could have recovered her self-possession at once; but she was incapable of making an effort to regain it. She could neither think nor move — her breath seemed to die away on her lips — as she saw the shadow of the priest stealing over the grass slowly from the front to the back of the summer-house. In another moment they were face to face.

He stopped a few paces from her, and eyed her steadily in dead silence. She still crouched against the summer-house, and still with one hand mechanically kept her hold of the dog. It was well for the priest that she did so. Scarammuccia’s formidable teeth were in full view, his shaggy coat was bristling, his eyes were starting, his growl had changed from the surly to the savage note; he was ready to tear down, not Father Rocco only, but all the clergy in Pisa, at a moment’s notice.

“You have been listening,” said the priest, calmly. “I see it in your face. You have heard all.”

She could not answer a word; she could not take her eyes from him. There was an unnatural stillness in his face, a steady, unrepentant, unfathomable despair in his eyes that struck her with horror. She would have given worlds to be able to rise to her feet and fly from his presence.

“I once distrusted you and watched you in secret,” he said, speaking after a short silence, thoughtfully, and with a strange, tranquil sadness in his voice. “And now, what I did by you, you do by me. You put the hope of your life once in my hands. Is it because they were not worthy of the trust that discovery and ruin overtake me, and that you are the instrument of the retribution? Can this be the decree of Heaven — or is it nothing but the blind justice of chance?”

He looked upward, doubtingly, to the lustrous sky above him, and sighed. Nanina’s eyes still followed his mechanically. He seemed to feel their influence, for he suddenly looked down at her again.

“What keeps you silent? Why are you afraid?” he said. “I can do you no harm, with your dog at your side, and the workmen yonder within call. I can do you no harm, and I wish to do you none. Go back to Pisa; tell what you have heard, restore the man you love to himself, and ruin me. That is your work; do it! I was never your enemy, even when I distrusted you. I am not your enemy now. It is no fault of yours that a fatality has been accomplished through you — no fault of yours that I am rejected as the instrument of securing a righteous restitution to the Church. Rise, child, and go your way, while I go mine, and prepare for what is to come. If we never meet again, remember that I parted from you without one hard saying or one harsh look — parted from you so, knowing that the first words you speak in Pisa will be death to my character, and destruction to the great purpose of my life.”

Speaking these words, always with the same calmness which had marked his manner from the first, he looked fixedly at her for a little while, sighed again, and turned away. Just before he disappeared among the trees, he said “Farewell,” but so softly that she could barely hear it. Some strange confusion clouded her mind as she lost sight of him. Had she injured him, or had he injured her? His words bewildered and oppressed her simple heart. Vague doubts and fears, and a sudden antipathy to remaining any longer near the summer-house, overcame her. She started to her feet, and, keeping the dog still at her side, hurried from the garden to the highroad. There, the wide glow of sunshine, the sight of the city lying before her, changed the current of her thoughts, and directed them all to Fabio and to the future.

A burning impatience to be back in Pisa now possessed her. She hastened toward the city at her utmost speed. The doctor was reported to be in the palace when she passed the servants lounging in the courtyard. He saw the moment, she came into his presence, that something had happened, and led her away from the sick-room into Fabio’s empty study. There she told him all.

“You have saved him,” said the doctor, joyfully. “I will answer for his recovery. Only let that woman come here for the reward; and leave me to deal with her as she deserves. In the meantime, my dear, don’t go away from the palace on any account until I give you permission. I am going to send a message immediately to Signor Andrea D’Arbino to come and hear the extraordinary disclosure that you have made to me. Go back to read to the count, as usual, until I want you again; but, remember, you must not drop a word to him yet of what you have said to me. He must be carefully prepared for all that we have to tell him; and must be kept quite in the dark until those preparations are made.”

D’Arbino answered the doctor’s summons in person; and Nanina repeated her story to him. He and the doctor remained closeted together for some time after she had concluded her narrative and had retired. A little before four o’clock they sent for her again into the study. The doctor was sitting by the table with a bag of money before him, and D’Arbino was telling one of the servants that if a lady called at the palace on the subject of the handbill which he had circulated, she was to be admitted into the study immediately.

As the clock struck four Nanina was requested to take possession of a window-seat, and to wait there until she was summoned. When she had obeyed, the doctor loosened one of the window-curtains, to hide her from the view of any one entering the room.

About a quarter of an hour elapsed, and then the door was thrown open, and Brigida herself was shown into the study. The doctor bowed, and D’Arbino placed a chair for her. She was perfectly collected, and thanked them for their politeness with her best grace.

“I believe I am addressing confidential friends of Count Fabio d’Ascoli?” Brigida began. “May I ask if you are authorized to act for the count, in relation to the reward which this handbill offers?”

The doctor, having examined the handbill, said that the lady was quite right, and pointed significantly to the bag of money.

“You are prepared, then,” pursued Brigida, smiling, “to give a reward of two hundred scudi to any one able to tell you who the woman is who wore the yellow mask at the Marquis Melani’s ball, and how she contrived to personate the face and figure of the late Countess d’Ascoli?”

“Of course we are prepared,” answered D’Arbino, a little irritably. “As men of honour, we are not in the habit of promising anything that we are not perfectly willing, under proper conditions, to perform.”

“Pardon me, my dear friend,” said the doctor; “I think you speak a little too warmly to the lady. She is quite right to take every precaution. We have the two hundred scudi here, madam,” he continued, patting the money-bag; “and we are prepared to pay that sum for the information we want. But” (here the doctor suspiciously moved the bag of scudi from the table to his lap) “we must have proofs that the person claiming the reward is really entitled to it.”

Brigida’s eyes followed the money-bag greedily.

“Proofs!” she exclaimed, taking a small flat box from under her cloak, and pushing it across to the doctor. “Proofs! there you will find one proof that establishes my claim beyond the possibility of doubt.”

The doctor opened the box, and looked at the wax mask inside it; then handed it to D’Arbino, and replaced the bag of scudi on the table.

“The contents of that box seem certainly to explain a great deal,” he said, pushing the bag gently toward Brigida, but always keeping his, hand over it. “The woman who wore the yellow domino was, I presume, of the same height as the late countess?”

“Exactly,” said Brigida. “Her eyes were also of the same colour as the late countess’s; she wore yellow of the same shade as the hangings in the late countess’s room, and she had on, under her yellow mask, the colourless wax model of the late countess’s face, now in your friend’s hand. So much for that part of the secret. Nothing remains now to be cleared up but the mystery of who the lady was. Have the goodness, sir, to push that bag an inch or two nearer my way, and I shall be delighted to tell you.”

“Thank you, madam,” said the doctor, with a very perceptible change in his manner. “We know who the lady was already.”

He moved the bag of scudi while he spoke back to his own side of the table. Brigida’s cheeks reddened, and she rose from her seat.

“Am I to understand, sir,” she said, haughtily, “that you take advantage of my position here, as a defenseless woman, to cheat me out of the reward?”

“By no means, madam,” rejoined the doctor. “We have covenanted to pay the reward to the person who could give us the information we required.”

“Well, sir! have I not given you part of it? And am I not prepared to give you the whole?”

“Certainly; but the misfortune is, that another person has been beforehand with you. We ascertained who the lady in the yellow domino was, and how she contrived to personate the face of the late Countess d’Ascoli, several hours ago from another informant. That person has consequently the prior claim; and, on every principle of justice, that person must also have the reward. Nanina, this bag belongs to you — come and take it.”

Nanina appeared from the window-seat. Brigida, thunderstruck, looked at her in silence for a moment; gasped out, “That girl!” — then stopped again, breathless.

“That girl was at the back of the summer-house this morning, while you and your accomplice were talking together,” said the doctor.

D’Arbino had been watching Brigida’s face intently from the moment of Nanina’s appearance, and had quietly stolen close to her side. This was a fortunate movement; for the doctor’s last words were hardly out of his mouth before Brigida seized a heavy ruler lying, with some writing materials, on the table. In another instant, if D’Arbino had not caught her arm, she would have hurled it at Nanina’s head.