"And the Lady of the Bernardini to leave her splendid palace! Venice without the Lady of the Bernardini!"
"Where hast thou been that thou knowest it not? It is even so!"
"Thou dost verily flatter the vanity of a man, Querini, to forget that I am but two days returned with my cargoes from Flanders."
"Nay--thy pardon, friend. I mind it well enough and shall mind it better when thou hast a chance to make us envious of the wares thou wilt unburden from thy c.u.mbrous, carven chests, for there is much talk of their richness. But the ear of Venice is so attuned to these wedding-chimes that it hath no chance to vibrate to another theme until the rejoicings of the morrow be past."
"And the great estates of the Bernardini? I remember some rumor in the Broglio, before this matter of Cyprus came uppermost, that the houses would have been allied--a marriage between the little Caterina and the cousin Aluisi--a dispensation to be gotten from His Holiness. It would have been well for the estates and the Casa Cornaro."
"Aye, it would have been well for the Casa Cornaro: better perchance than this dazzling foreign marriage, and more fortune in it for the Cornari. For the estates of the Bernardini are princely; and it is well known in the Senate, though it be uttered in decorous whispers, that the dower of the charming bride hath left small remainder to her n.o.ble uncle. And Messer Andrea also, is large lender to a king--for war-debts and the like--Ja.n.u.s having nothing until he had regained his kingdom.
But as well buy a King as a vast estate for one"s toy, if one hath the _zecchini_."
"Thou art verily more a merchant than I had esteemed thee, Messer Querini, if thou hast no thought in this marriage but for the _zecchini_--as well those of her uncle Andrea for the maid Caterina, as those of the Bernardini."
The Signor Querini gave a long, contemptuous sniffle.
"May gold buy a man like our young Senator Bernardini! Nay:--but it is the fuss and manner of this marriage that turneth me somewhat against it: and because the father of the Bernardini was in truth my friend.
But Caterina was still a child when a king appeared as suitor, and the question of the Bernardini was never made; and Marco Cornaro--Marco is a delighted _magnifico_. _Ebbene_--San Marco might see many of us wise, old fools choosing a king for a son-in-law, if one came our way to beg the favor. And Messer Andrea hath it that King Ja.n.u.s is full winsome.
One should not be hard upon Marco Cornaro--it is not the first alliance that his n.o.ble house hath made with royalty. May happy fortune befall the maid--who is verily charming and of a consummate dignity."
"The King hath sent an emba.s.sy, that doeth honor to any royal house, to bring his bride to Cyprus. His Excellency the Amba.s.sador, Messer Filippo Podacatharo, is a princely escort; and yesterday when he gave banquet to the merchants of Venice, all were in admiration at the sumptuousness of the fleet of Cyprus."
"I would have been there, but some matters of moment for the Bernardini held me. It is not easy for him to leave Venice, with his vast holdings.
And his father was my friend. I command his galleys to-morrow, which follow the Bucentoro to the fleet of Cyprus, outside our harbor--San Marco favor the day!"
VI
When the Senator Bernardini had first made known to his stately patrician Mother his acceptance of the appointment to Cyprus, she had met him with surprise and keen disappointment.
"There is surely some great error," she said; "for I had it in confidence that the Emba.s.sy to France hath been offered thee by the Senate."
He confessed as much.
"Thou wilt revise thy decision: I would gladly see thee wear thy Father"s honors. Thou hast the gift of statesmanship."
He waited to choose his words, for her tone betrayed more than her speech, and he grieved to thwart her ambitions for him.
"So may it fit me the better for the Cyprian post," he answered with an attempt at playfulness.
"Thou wilt verily give up this Emba.s.sy to France to go with the Caterina to her new land! There is some reason of which thou sayest naught--else were it hard to comprehend thy choice. We are but two, Aluisi; may not thy mother hold thy confidence?"
For answer he raised her hand to his lips, smiling upon her. Her brow cleared.
"It is not that the little cousin hath touched thy heart?" she questioned half seriously--"thou who art known as gracious for all and tender for none! I have not this to bear for thee--now that the marriage which thy Father would have favored is no longer possible? Then France were surely wiser for thee--the Fates are kind."
"Nay, nay," he answered frankly--"have no fear. When I set sail from Venetia for my long voyage, the Caterina was still a child. And when, returning, I found her grown a charming maid, she was already set apart from all such dreaming for any honorable knight of Venice. Thou dost not guess the spell that holdeth me?"
"It is not one of her fair maids of honor who go with her to her court of Cyprus?"
"Nay, Madre carissima; thou art still before all others with thy wayward son."
"Yet my wish for thee--of France--thou dost pa.s.s by," she interrupted eagerly.
"It is but for duty to the Casa Cornaro,--in which thou wouldst be last to see me fail, dear Lady of Venice!"
She laid her hand upon his arm as if she would constrain him.
"Tell me," she urged.
"Mother, when thy name and mine shall have been forgotten, _one_ name of the Casa Cornaro shall stand out never to be lost--since Fortune doth weave it into history. For honor to our house, we will not fail our Caterina."
"And thou?"
"As thou wouldst have me--thou, my Mother--than whom among the Cornari are none found prouder--I have sworn as solemnly as any knight may take his vow,--were it even in Crusade--to spend myself in service of the little Queen, my cousin--as in that far land there may be need."
But for the Lady of the Bernardini--Venetian to her heart"s core--the island of Cyprus had little charm; she had dreamed of a brilliant career for her only son which should open to him the best that Venice could give--and she was not satisfied.
"There is no fault with that dear child," she said; "and as thy bride--if this had been--I could have loved her well. But if thy fortunes need be bound with hers--and all thine honors for which thou art so meet, and with which thy Venice would fain endow thee, must be surrendered for her sake,--"twere pity that this marriage which thy Father willed, went not forward."
"Sweet Mother--the "might-have-beens" make faincants of men. It is not love--but duty that calleth me. _There is no choice._ Where is thine honorable teaching?"
"Bethink thee, Aluisi, of this post of dignity in France--a place of power--of service to thy country. How sayest thou "there is no choice"?"
"Mother--when our stars have ordered otherwise--there is no more to it than that--why then--if men lack strength to bend their wills to meet their destiny,--it is not as they will,--it is not as their honor wills--but far otherwise. And theirs the fault."
She looked up into his n.o.ble face as he bent over her--a face not often yielded so fully to her gaze--dear as this widowed mother and her son were to each other, and intimate in friendship; and as she looked a calm fell upon her and she saw strength, truth, valor, judgment--the soul of the man like a rock beneath the light play of his speech.
She no longer willed to oppose his choice. She put up her hand and drew him down beside her on the couch.
"There will be much to think of," she said after a long silence; "thine interests in Venice will be hard to leave. Why--if some of Caterina"s house must escort her and abide with her--why not her brother Zorzi? Who should be fitter in her defense?"
"Zorzi is but a youth--less in years than her own. How should she lean on such a boy?"
"Aluisi--thou hast some fear which thou hast not spoken."
He was silent though she waited. How might he declare the bitter need of watchfulness, yet not betray the knowledge gotten in those secret councils of the Republic!
"_Madre mia_," he said at last, when she had reminded him of her question. "Without cause I had made no vow. Canst thou not trust thy knight? And of my fealty, so solemnly sworn, Caterina knoweth naught. It is for me and thee alone--_and least of all for the ear of Venice_. But thou knowest--if it were no more than that the way of a crown be not easy for a young and guileless maid--some one of her own should be with her in that strange land; and he should be wise in counsel."
"As thou?--who dost so qualify thyself?" she asked with a pitiful attempt to rally him--for her heart was sore. "What shall I do without thee--Aluisi!" Her voice had suddenly broken in yearning. It was not often that such emotion escaped her. He folded her hand more closely as they sat on in the silence, in the falling twilight, and his eyes wandered down the length of the splendid ancestral hall, while his resolve strengthened within him--the knights and ladies of the house of Cornaro for centuries back leaning to him out of the quaint carving of their time-dimmed frames--fading from him, like ghosts, into the gloom of the distant corners, yet holding him with a strange, vital fascination--for it was much to leave. The very tapestries rustled with the legends of the Cornelii of long, long ago, on the sh.o.r.es of the Rivo Alto, before the story of Venice had won its honored place in the chronicles of nations--yet not the less for their indistinguishable outlines and mythical color were they woven into the proud consciousness of the duty the Cornari owed their own.
Memories of the state his Mother had held here rose to meet him--memories of his Father, who had been a power in Venice. How could he ask the Lady of the Bernardini, with her whitening hair, to leave it all for Cyprus? Yet that was in his thought. He could not frame the words; it was too much to ask--he must leave it to come from her.
"Is thy fear not to be spoken?" she asked at last. "And must we accept it for the Caterina--who is very fair and tender?"