CHAPTER VII.
Monsieur Gouache"s studio was on the second floor. The narrow flight of steps ended abruptly against a green door, perforated by a slit for the insertion of letters, by a shabby green cord which, being pulled, rang a feeble bell, and adorned by a visiting-card, whereon with many superfluous flourishes and ornaments of caligraphy was inscribed the name of the artist--ANASTASE GOUACHE.
The door being opened by a string, Donna Tullia and Del Ferice entered, and mounting half-a-dozen more steps, found themselves in the studio, a s.p.a.cious room with a window high above the floor, half shaded by a curtain of grey cotton. In one corner an iron stove gave out loud cracking sounds, pleasant to hear on the damp winter"s morning, and the flame shone red through c.h.i.n.ks of the rusty door. A dark-green carpet in pa.s.sably good condition covered the floor; three or four broad divans, spread with oriental rugs, and two very much dilapidated carved chairs with leathern seats, const.i.tuted the furniture; the walls were hung with sketches of heads and figures; half-finished portraits stood upon two easels, and others were leaning together in a corner; a couple of small tables were covered with colour-tubes, brushes, and palette-knives; mingled odours of paint, varnish, and cigarette-smoke pervaded the air; and, lastly, upon a high stool before one of the easels, his sleeves turned up to the elbow, and his feet tucked in upon a rail beneath him, sat Anastase Gouache himself.
He was a man of not more than seven-and-twenty years, with delicate pale features, and an abundance of glossy black hair. A small and very much pointed moustache shaded his upper lip, and the extremities thereof rose short and perpendicular from the corners of his well-shaped mouth. His eyes were dark and singularly expressive, his forehead low and very broad; his hands were sufficiently nervous and well knit, but white as a woman"s, and the fingers tapered delicately to the tips. He wore a brown velvet coat more or less daubed with paint, and his collar was low at the throat.
He sprang from his high stool as Donna Tullia and Del Ferice entered, his palette and mahl-stick in his hand, and made a most ceremonious bow; whereat Donna Tullia laughed gaily.
"Well, Gouache," she said familiarly, "what have you been doing?"
Anastase motioned to her to come before his canvas and contemplate the portrait of herself upon which he was working. It was undeniably good--a striking figure in full-length, life-size, and breathing with Donna Tullia"s vitality, if also with something of her coa.r.s.eness.
"Ah, my friend," remarked Del Ferice, "you will never be successful until you take my advice."
"I think it is very like," said Donna Tullia, thoughtfully.
"You are too modest," answered Del Ferice. "There is the foundation of likeness, but it lacks yet the soul."
"Oh, but that will come," returned Madame Mayer. Then turning to the artist, she added in a more doubtful voice, "Perhaps, as Del Ferice says, you might give it a little more expression--what shall I say?--more poetry."
Anastase Gouache smiled a fine smile. He was a man of immense talent; since he had won the Prix de Rome he had made great progress, and was already half famous with that young celebrity which young men easily mistake for fame itself. A new comet visible only through a good gla.s.s causes a deal of talk and speculation in the world; but unless it comes near enough to brush the earth with its tail, it is very soon forgotten.
But Gouache seemed to understand this, and worked steadily on. When Madame Mayer expressed a wish for a little more poetry in her portrait, he smiled, well knowing that poetry was as far removed from her nature as dry champagne is different in quality from small beer.
"Yes," he said; "I know--I am only too conscious of that defect." As indeed he was--conscious of the defect of it in herself. But he had many reasons for not wishing to quarrel with Donna Tullia, and he swallowed his artistic convictions in a rash resolve to make her look like an inspired prophetess rather than displease her.
"If you will sit down, I will work upon the head," he said; and moving one of the old carved chairs into position for her, he adjusted the light and began to work without any further words. Del Ferice installed himself upon a divan whence he could see Donna Tullia and her portrait, and the sitting began. It might have continued for some time in a profound silence as far as the two men were concerned, but silence was not bearable for long to Donna Tullia.
"What were you and Saracinesca talking about yesterday?" she asked suddenly, looking towards Del Ferice.
"Politics," he answered, and was silent.
"Well?" inquired Madame Mayer, rather anxiously.
"I am sure you know his views as well as I," returned Del Ferice, rather gloomily. "He is stupid and prejudiced."
"Really?" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Gouache, with innocent surprise. "A little more towards me, Madame. Thank you--so." And he continued painting.
"You are absurd, Del Ferice!" exclaimed Donna Tullia, colouring a little.
"You think every one prejudiced and stupid who does not agree with you."
"With me? With you, with us, you should say. Giovanni is a specimen of the furious Conservative, who hates change and has a cold chill at the word "republic" Do you call that intelligent?"
"Giovanni is intelligent for all that," answered Madame Mayer. "I am not sure that he is not more intelligent than you--in some ways," she added, after allowing her rebuke to take effect.
Del Ferice smiled blandly. It was not his business to show that he was hurt.
"In one thing he is stupid compared with me," he replied. "He is very far from doing justice to your charms. It must be a singular lack of intelligence which prevents him from seeing that you are as beautiful as you are charming. Is it not so, Gouache?"
"Does any one deny it?" asked the Frenchman, with an air of devotion.
Madame Mayer blushed with annoyance; both because she coveted Giovanni"s admiration more than that of other men, and knew that she had not won it, and because she hated to feel that Del Ferice was able to wound her so easily. To cover her discomfiture she returned to the subject of politics.
"We talk a great deal of our convictions," she said; "but in the meanwhile we must acknowledge that we have accomplished nothing at all.
What is the good of our meeting here two or three times a-week, meeting in society, whispering together, corresponding in cipher, and doing all manner of things, when everything goes on just the same as before?"
"Better give it up and join Don Giovanni and his party," returned Del Ferice, with a sneer. "He says if a change comes he will make the best of it. Of course, we could not do better."
"With us it is so easy," said Gouache, thoughtfully. "A handful of students, a few paving-stones, "Vive la Republique!" and we have a tumult in no time."
That was not the kind of revolution in which Del Ferice proposed to have a hand. He meditated playing a very small part in some great movement; and when the fighting should be over, he meant to exaggerate the part he had played, and claim a substantial reward. For a good t.i.tle and twenty thousand francs a-year he would have become as stanch for the temporal power as any canon of St. Peter"s. When he had begun talking of revolutions to Madame Mayer and to half-a-dozen harebrained youths, of whom Gouache the painter was one, he had not really the slightest idea of accomplishing anything. He took advantage of the prevailing excitement in order to draw Donna Tullia into a closer confidence than he could otherwise have aspired to obtain. He wanted to marry her, and every new power he could obtain over her was a step towards his goal. Neither she nor her friends were of the stuff required for revolutionary work; but Del Ferice had hopes that, by means of the knot of malcontents he was gradually drawing together, he might ruin Giovanni Saracinesca, and get the hand of Donna Tullia in marriage. He himself was indeed deeply implicated in the plots of the Italian party; but he was only employed as a spy, and in reality knew no more of the real intentions of those he served than did Donna Tullia herself. But the position was sufficiently lucrative; so much so that he had been obliged to account for his accession of fortune by saying that an uncle of his had died and left him money.
"If you expected Don Giovanni to join a mob of students in tearing up paving-stones and screaming "Vive la Republique!" I am not surprised that you are disappointed in your expectations," said Donna Tullia, rather scornfully.
"That is only Gouache"s idea of a popular movement," answered Del Ferice.
"And yours," returned Anastase, lowering his mahl-stick and brushes, and turning sharply upon the Italian--"yours would be to begin by stabbing Cardinal Antonelli in the back."
"You mistake me, my friend," returned Del Ferice, blandly. "If you volunteered to perform that service to Italy, I would certainly not dissuade you. But I would certainly not offer you my a.s.sistance."
"Fie! How can you talk like that of murder!" exclaimed Donna Tullia. "Go on with your painting, Gouache, and do not be ridiculous."
"The question of tyrannicide is marvellously interesting," answered Anastase in a meditative tone, as he resumed his work, and glanced critically from Madame Mayer to his canvas and back again.
"It belongs to a cla.s.s of actions at which Del Ferice rejoices, but in which he desires no part," said Donna Tullia.
"It seems to me wiser to contemplate accomplishing the good result without any unnecessary and treacherous bloodshed," answered Del Ferice, sententiously. Again Gouache smiled in his delicate satirical fashion, and glanced at Madame Mayer, who burst into a laugh.
"Moral reflections never sound so especially and ridiculously moral as in your mouth, Ugo," she said.
"Why?" he asked, in an injured tone.
"I am sure I do not know. Of course, we all would like to see Victor Emmanuel in the Quirinal, and Rome the capital of a free Italy. Of course we would all like to see it accomplished without murder or bloodshed; but somehow, when you put it into words, it sounds very absurd."
In her brutal fashion Madame Mayer had hit upon a great truth, and Del Ferice was very much annoyed. He knew himself to be a scoundrel; he knew Madame Mayer to be a woman of very commonplace intellect; he wondered why he was not able to deceive her more effectually. He was often able to direct her, he sometimes elicited from her some expression of admiration at his astuteness; but in spite of his best efforts, she saw through him and understood him better than he liked.
"I am sorry," he said, "that what is honourable should sound ridiculous when it comes from me. I like to think sometimes that you believe in me."
"Oh, I do," protested Donna Tullia, with a sudden change of manner. "I was only laughing. I think you are really in earnest. Only, you know, nowadays, it is not the fashion to utter moralities in a severe tone, with an air of conviction. A little dash of cynicism--you know, a sort of half sneer--is so much more _chic_; it gives a much higher idea of the morality, because it conveys the impression that it is utterly beyond you. Ask Gouache--"
"By all means," said the artist, squeezing a little more red from the tube upon his palette, "one should always sneer at what one cannot reach.
The fox, you remember, called the grapes sour. He was probably right, for he is the most intelligent of animals."
"I would like to hear what Giovanni had to say about those grapes,"
remarked Donna Tullia.