At that moment I first pretended to notice her, and said:
"Good morning, Francesca."
Without seeming in at all a better temper than the previous night, she murmured, "Good morning."
When I asked her whether she slept well, she nodded _Yes_, and jumping out of bed, I went and kissed her.
She turned her face towards me like a child who is being kissed against its will; but I took her tenderly in my arms, and gently put my lips on her large eyes, which she closed with evident distaste under my kisses on her fresh cheeks and full lips which she turned away.
"You don"t seem to like being kissed," I said to her.
"_Mica_" was her only answer.
I sat down on the trunk by her side, and, pa.s.sing my arm through hers, I said: "_Mica! mica! mica_! in reply to everything. I shall call you Mademoiselle _Mica_, I think."
For the first time I fancied that I saw the shadow of a smile on her lips, but it pa.s.sed by so quickly that I may have been mistaken.
"But if you never say anything but _Mica_ I shall not know what to do to try to please you. Let us see; what shall we do to-day?"
She hesitated a moment as if some fancy had flitted through her head, and then she said carelessly: "It is all the same to me; whatever you like."
"Very well, Mademoiselle _Mica_, we will have a carriage and go for a drive."
"As you please," she said.
Paul was waiting for us in the dining-room, looking as bored as third parties generally do in love affairs. I a.s.sumed a delighted air, and shook hands with him with triumphant energy.
"What are you thinking of doing?" he asked.
"First of all we will go and see a little of the town, and then we might take a carriage, for a drive in the neighborhood."
We breakfasted nearly in silence and then started. I dragged Francesca from palace to palace, and she either looked at nothing or merely just glanced carelessly at all the various masterpieces. Paul followed us, growling all sorts of disagreeable things. Then we all three took a silent drive into the country and returned to dinner.
The next day it was the same thing and the next day again; so on the third Paul said to me: "Look here, I am going to leave you; I am not going to stop here for three weeks watching you make love to this creature."
I was perplexed and annoyed, for to my great surprise I had become singularly attached to Francesca. A man is but weak and foolish, carried away by the merest trifle, and a coward every time that his senses are excited or mastered. I clung to this unknown girl, silent and dissatisfied as she always was. I liked her somewhat ill-tempered face, the dissatisfied droop of her mouth, the weariness of her look; I liked her fatigued movements, the contemptuous way in which she yielded to my desires, the very indifference of her caresses. A secret bond, that mysterious bond of animal love, the secret attachment of that possession which does not satiate, bound me to her. I told Paul so, quite frankly.
He treated me as if I had been a fool, and then said:
"Very well, take her with you."
But she obstinately refused to leave Genoa, without giving any reason. I besought, I reasoned, I promised, but all was of no avail, and so I stayed on.
Paul declared that he would go by himself, and went so far as to pack up his portmanteau; but he remained all the same.
Thus a fortnight pa.s.sed. Francesca was always silent and irritable, lived beside me rather than with me, responded to all my desires, all my demands, and all my propositions with her perpetual _Che mi fa_, or with her no less perpetual _Mica_.
My friend got more and more furious, but my only answer was, "You can go if you are tired of staying. I am not detaining you."
Then he called me names, overwhelmed me with reproaches, and exclaimed: "Where do you think I can go to now? We had three weeks at our disposal, and here is a fortnight gone! I cannot continue my journey now; and, in any case, I am not going to Venice, Florence, and Rome all by myself.
But you will pay for it, and more dearly than you think for, most likely. You are not going to bring a man all the way from Paris in order to shut him up at an hotel in Genoa with an Italian adventuress."
When I told him, very calmly, to return to Paris, he exclaimed that he was going to do so the very next day; but the next day he was still there, still in a rage and swearing.
By this time we began to be known in the streets through which we wandered from morning till night. Sometimes French people would turn round astonished at meeting their fellow-countrymen in the company of this girl with her striking costume, and who looked singularly out of place, not to say compromising, beside us.
She used to walk along, leaning on my arm, without looking at anything.
Why did she remain with me, with us, who seemed to procure her so little pleasure? Who was she? Where did she come from? What was she doing? Had she any plan or idea? Where did she live? As an adventuress, or by chance meetings? I tried in vain to find out and to explain it. The better I knew her the more enigmatical she became. She was not one of those who make a living by any profession of venal love. She rather seemed to me to be a girl of poor family who had been seduced and taken away, and then cast aside and lost. What did she think was going to become of her, or whom was she waiting for? She certainly did not appear to be trying to make a conquest of me, or to get any real profit out of me.
I tried to question her, to speak to her of her childhood and family; but she never gave me an answer. I stayed with her, my heart unfettered and my senses enchained, never wearied of holding her in my arms, that proud and quarrelsome woman, captivated by my senses, or rather seduced, overcome by a youthful, healthy, powerful charm, which emanated from her sweet-smelling person and from the robust lines of her body.
Another week pa.s.sed, and the term of my journey was drawing on, for I had to be back in Paris by July 11. By this time Paul had come to take his part in the adventure, though still grumbling at me, while I invented pleasures, distractions, and excursions to amuse my mistress and my friend; and in order to do this I gave myself a large amount of trouble.
One day I proposed an excursion to Sta Margarita, that charming little town in the midst of gardens, hidden at the foot of a slope which stretches far into the sea up to the village of Portofino. We all three were following the excellent road which goes along the foot of the mountain. Suddenly Francesca said to me: "I shall not be able to go with you to-morrow; I must go and see some of my relations."
That was all; I did not ask her any questions, as I was quite sure she would not answer me.
The next morning she got up very early; then, as I remained in bed, she sat down at the foot of it, and said in a constrained and hesitating voice:
"If I do not come back to-night, shall you come and fetch me?"
"Most certainly I shall," was my reply. "Where must I come to?"
Then she explained: "You must go into the Street Victor-Emmanuel, down the Pa.s.sage Falene, and go into the furniture shop at the bottom, in a court, and there you must ask for Mme. Rondoli--That is where it is."
And so she went away, leaving me rather astonished.
When Paul saw that I was alone he stammered out: "Where is Francesca?"
And when I told him what had happened he exclaimed:
"My dear fellow, let us make use of our chance, and bolt; as it is, our time is up. Two days, more or less, make no difference. Let us start at once; go and pack up your things. Off we go!"
But I refused. I could not, as I told him, leave the girl in such a manner, after having lived with her for nearly three weeks. At any rate, I ought to say good-bye to her, and make her accept a present; I certainly had no intention of behaving badly to her.
But he would not listen; he pressed and worried me, but I would not give way.
I remained indoors for several hours, expecting Francesca"s return, but she did not come, and at last, at dinner, Paul said with a triumphant air: "She has thrown you over, my dear fellow; it is certainly very strange."
I must acknowledge that I was surprised and rather vexed. He laughed in my face, and made fun of me.
"It is not exactly a bad way of getting rid of you, though rather primitive. "Just wait for me, I shall be back in a moment," they often say. How long are you going to wait? I should not wonder if you were foolish enough to go and look for her at the address she gave you. "Does Mme. Rondoli live here, please?" "No, Sir." I"ll bet that you are longing to go there."
"Not in the least," I protested, "and I a.s.sure you that if she does not come back to-morrow morning I shall start by the express at eight o"clock. I shall have waited twenty-four hours, and that is enough; my conscience will be quite clear."
I spent an uneasy and unpleasant evening, for I really had at heart a very tender feeling for her. I went to bed at twelve o"clock, and hardly slept at all. I got up at six, called Paul, packed up my things, and two hours later we started for France together.
III