The Gadfly, E. L. Voynich [best books to read for self development .txt] 📗
- Author: E. L. Voynich
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recent sabre-cut across face; stammers.’ Then
there’s a note put: ‘Very expert shot; care should
be taken in arresting.’”
“It’s an extraordinary thing that he can have
managed to deceive the search-party with such a
formidable list of identification marks.”
“It was nothing but sheer audacity that carried
him through, of course. If it had once occurred
to them to suspect him he would have been lost.
But the air of confiding innocence that he can put
on when he chooses would bring a man through
anything. Well, gentlemen, what do you think of
the proposal? Rivarez seems to be pretty well
known to several of the company. Shall we suggest
to him that we should be glad of his help
here or not?”
“I think,” said Fabrizi, “that he might be
sounded upon the subject, just to find out whether
he would be inclined to think of the plan.”
“Oh, he’ll be inclined, you may be sure, once
it’s a case of fighting the Jesuits; he is the most
savage anti-clerical I ever met; in fact, he’s rather
rabid on the point.”
“Then will you write, Riccardo?”
“Certainly. Let me see, where is he now? In
Switzerland, I think. He’s the most restless
being; always flitting about. But as for the pamphlet
question–-”
They plunged into a long and animated discussion.
When at last the company began to disperse Martini
went up to the quiet young woman.
“I will see you home, Gemma.”
“Thanks; I want to have a business talk with
you.”
“Anything wrong with the addresses?” he
asked softly.
“Nothing serious; but I think it is time to make
a few alterations. Two letters have been stopped
in the post this week. They were both quite unimportant,
and it may have been accidental; but
we cannot afford to have any risks. If once the
police have begun to suspect any of our addresses,
they must be changed immediately.”
“I will come in about that to-morrow. I am
not going to talk business with you to-night;
you look tired.”
“I am not tired.”
“Then you are depressed again.”
“Oh, no; not particularly.”
CHAPTER II.
“Is the mistress in, Katie?”
“Yes, sir; she is dressing. If you’ll just step
into the parlour she will be down in a few
minutes.”
Katie ushered the visitor in with the cheerful
friendliness of a true Devonshire girl. Martini
was a special favourite of hers. He spoke English,
like a foreigner, of course, but still quite respectably;
and he never sat discussing politics at the top
of his voice till one in the morning, when the mistress
was tired, as some visitors had a way of
doing. Moreover, he had come to Devonshire to
help the mistress in her trouble, when her baby
was dead and her husband dying there; and ever
since that time the big, awkward, silent man had
been to Katie as much “one of the family” as was
the lazy black cat which now ensconced itself upon
his knee. Pasht, for his part, regarded Martini
as a useful piece of household furniture. This
visitor never trod upon his tail, or puffed tobacco
smoke into his eyes, or in any way obtruded upon
his consciousness an aggressive biped personality.
He behaved as a mere man should: provided a
comfortable knee to lie upon and purr, and at table
never forgot that to look on while human beings
eat fish is not interesting for a cat. The friendship
between them was of old date. Once, when
Pasht was a kitten and his mistress too ill to think
about him, he had come from England under Martini’s
care, tucked away in a basket. Since then,
long experience had convinced him that this
clumsy human bear was no fair-weather friend.
“How snug you look, you two!” said Gemma,
coming into the room. “One would think you
had settled yourselves for the evening.”
Martini carefully lifted the cat off his knee. “I
came early,” he said, “in the hope that you will
give me some tea before we start. There will
probably be a frightful crush, and Grassini won’t
give us any sensible supper—they never do in
those fashionable houses.”
“Come now!” she said, laughing; “that’s as
bad as Galli! Poor Grassini has quite enough sins
of his own to answer for without having his wife’s
imperfect housekeeping visited upon his head.
As for the tea, it will be ready in a minute. Katie
has been making some Devonshire cakes specially
for you.”
“Katie is a good soul, isn’t she, Pasht? By the
way, so are you to have put on that pretty dress.
I was afraid you would forget.”
“I promised you I would wear it, though it is
rather warm for a hot evening like this.”
“It will be much cooler up at Fiesole; and
nothing else ever suits you so well as white cashmere.
I have brought you some flowers to wear with it.”
“Oh, those lovely cluster roses; I am so fond
of them! But they had much better go into water.
I hate to wear flowers.”
“Now that’s one of your superstitious fancies.”
“No, it isn’t; only I think they must get so
bored, spending all the evening pinned to such a
dull companion.”
“I am afraid we shall all be bored to-night. The
conversazione will be dull beyond endurance.”
“Why?”
“Partly because everything Grassini touches
becomes as dull as himself.”
“Now don’t be spiteful. It is not fair when we
are going to be a man’s guests.”
“You are always right, Madonna. Well then,
it will be dull because half the interesting people
are not coming.”
“How is that?”
“I don’t know. Out of town, or ill, or something.
Anyway, there will be two or three ambassadors
and some learned Germans, and the usual
nondescript crowd of tourists and Russian princes
and literary club people, and a few French officers;
nobody else that I know of—except, of course,
the new satirist, who is to be the attraction of the
evening.”
“The new satirist? What, Rivarez? But I
thought Grassini disapproved of him so strongly.”
“Yes; but once the man is here and is sure to
be talked about, of course Grassini wants his house
to be the first place where the new lion will be on
show. You may be sure Rivarez has heard nothing
of Grassini’s disapproval. He may have guessed
it, though; he’s sharp enough.”
“I did not even know he had come.”
“He only arrived yesterday. Here comes the
tea. No, don’t get up; let me fetch the kettle.”
He was never so happy as in this little study.
Gemma’s friendship, her grave unconsciousness of
the charm she exercised over him, her frank and
simple comradeship were the brightest things for
him in a life that was none too bright; and whenever
he began to feel more than usually depressed
he would come in here after business hours and
sit with her, generally in silence, watching her as
she bent over her needlework or poured out tea.
She never questioned him about his troubles or
expressed any sympathy in words; but he always
went away stronger and calmer, feeling, as he put
it to himself, that he could “trudge through
another fortnight quite respectably.” She possessed,
without knowing it, the rare gift of consolation;
and when, two years ago, his dearest
friends had been betrayed in Calabria and shot
down like wolves, her steady faith had been perhaps
the thing which had saved him from despair.
On Sunday mornings he sometimes came in to
“talk business,” that expression standing for anything
connected with the practical work of the
Mazzinian party, of which they both were active
and devoted members. She was quite a different
creature then; keen, cool, and logical, perfectly
accurate and perfectly neutral. Those who saw
her only at her political work regarded her as a
trained and disciplined conspirator, trustworthy,
courageous, in every way a valuable member of
the party, but somehow lacking in life and individuality.
“She’s a born conspirator, worth any
dozen of us; and she is nothing more,” Galli had
said of her. The “Madonna Gemma” whom
Martini knew was very difficult to get at.
“Well, and what is your ‘new satirist’ like?”
she asked, glancing back over her shoulder as she
opened the sideboard. “There, Cesare, there are
barley-sugar and candied angelica for you. I wonder,
by the way, why revolutionary men are always
so fond of sweets.”
“Other men are, too, only they think it beneath
their dignity to confess it. The new satirist? Oh,
the kind of man that ordinary women will rave
over and you will dislike. A sort of professional
dealer in sharp speeches, that goes about the world
with a lackadaisical manner and a handsome ballet-girl
dangling on to his coat-tails.”
“Do you mean that there is really a ballet-girl,
or simply that you feel cross and want to imitate
the sharp speeches?”
“The Lord defend me! No; the ballet-girl is
real enough and handsome enough, too, for those
who like shrewish beauty. Personally, I don’t.
She’s a Hungarian gipsy, or something of that
kind, so Riccardo says; from some provincial
theatre in Galicia. He seems to be rather a cool
hand; he has been introducing the girl to people
just as if she were his maiden aunt.”
“Well, that’s only fair if he has taken her away
from her home.”
“You may look at things that way, dear Madonna,
but society won’t. I think most people
will very much resent being introduced to a woman
whom they know to be his mistress.”
“How can they know it unless he tells them
so?”
“It’s plain enough; you’ll see if you meet her.
But I should think even he would not have the
audacity to bring her to the Grassinis’.”
“They wouldn’t receive her. Signora Grassini
is not the woman to do unconventional things of
that kind. But I wanted to hear about Signor
Rivarez as a satirist, not as a man. Fabrizi told
me he had been written to and had consented to
come and take up the campaign against the
Jesuits; and that is the last I have heard. There
has been such a rush of work this week.”
“I don’t know that I can tell you much more.
There doesn’t seem to have been any difficulty
over the money question, as we feared there would
be. He’s well off, it appears, and willing to work
for nothing.”
“Has he a private fortune, then?”
“Apparently he has; though it seems rather
odd—you heard that night at Fabrizi’s about
the state the Duprez expedition found him
in. But he has got shares in mines somewhere
out in Brazil; and then he has been immensely
successful as a feuilleton writer in Paris and
Vienna and London. He seems to have half a
dozen languages at his finger-tips; and there’s
nothing to prevent his keeping up his newspaper
connections from here. Slanging the Jesuits
won’t take all his time.”
“That’s true, of course. It’s time to start,
Cesare. Yes, I will wear the roses. Wait just a
minute.”
She ran upstairs, and came back with the roses
in the bosom of her dress, and a long scarf of black
Spanish lace thrown over her head. Martini surveyed
her with artistic approval.
“You look like a queen, Madonna mia; like
the great and wise Queen of Sheba.”
“What an unkind speech!” she retorted,
laughing; “when you know how hard I’ve been
trying to mould myself into the image of the typical
society lady! Who wants a conspirator to
look like the Queen of
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