The Wheat Princess

‘Ah, Sybert! Miss Marcia!’ Melville’s voice rang through the house.

‘I’d forgotten there was any one in the world but us,’ Marcia whispered as they turned back into the hall.

‘Here’s a young gentleman calling for you, Miss Marcia.’ Melville’s hand rested on the shoulder of a barefooted little figure covered with the white dust of the Roman road.

‘Gervasio!’ Marcia cried, with a quick spasm of self-reproach. She had forgotten him.

The boy drew himself up proudly and pointed through the open door to the soldiers pacing the length of the terrace.

‘Ecco! signorina. I soldati!’

Marcia dropped on her knees beside him with a little laugh. ‘You darling!’ she cried as she gathered him into her arms and kissed him.

Sybert bent over him and shook his hand. ‘You’re a brave boy, Gervasio,’ he said; ‘and you’ve probably saved our lives to-night.’

‘Am I going to live with you now,’ he asked, ‘like Gerald?’

‘Always,’ said Marcia, ‘just like Gerald.’

He opened his eyes wide. ‘And will I be an Americano then?’

‘No, Gervasio,’ said Sybert, quickly. ‘You’ll never be an Americano. You were born Italiano, and you’ll be Italiano till you die. You should be proud of it—it’s your birthright. We are Americani, and we are going—home. You may come with us and study and learn, but when you get to be a man you must come back to your own country. It will need you—and now run to bed. And you too, Miss Marcia,’ he added. ‘You are tired and there’s nothing to be done. Melville and I will attend to locking up.’

‘Locking up!’ cried Melville. ‘Good Lord, man, how many locking-ups does this house require?’ He watched them a moment in silence, and then he added bluntly: ‘Oh, see here, what’s the good of secrets between friends? I’ve known it all along.’ He held out a hand to each of them. ‘It’s eminently fitting; my congratulations come from my heart.’

‘You’re too discerning by far,’ Sybert retorted, his hands fast in his pockets.

Marcia, with a laugh and a quick flush, held out both of hers. ‘It’s a secret,’ she said. ‘I don’t know how you guessed it, but you must promise on your honour as a gentleman and a diplomat not to tell a single soul!’

‘I must tell my wife,’ he pleaded. ‘It’s a case of “I told you so,” and she usually comes out ahead in such cases. You can’t ask me to hide what little light I have under a bushel.’

‘I don’t care so much about Mrs. Melville,’ Marcia gave a reluctant consent. ‘But promise me one thing: that you’ll never, never breathe a word to—I don’t know her name—the Lady who Writes.’

‘The Lady who Writes? Who on earth is she talking about, Sybert?’

‘The greatest gossip in Rome,’ appended Marcia.

‘Madame Laventi!’ Melville laughed. ‘You’re too late, Miss Marcia. She knows it already. Madame Laventi does not get her news by word of mouth; the birds carry it to her. Good night,’ he added, and he strolled discreetly into the salon. But his caution was unnecessary; their parting was blatantly innocent.

Sybert chose a tall brass candlestick from the row on the mantelpiece and handed it to her with a bow.

‘Thank you,’ said Marcia.

She paused on the landing and smiled down.

‘Buona notte, Signor Siberti,’ she murmured.

He smiled back from the foot of the stairs.

‘Buona notte, signorina. Pleasant dreams!’

Hearing the sound of voices within, Marcia paused at Mrs. Copley’s door to ask about her uncle. She found the room strewn with the contents of several wardrobes, and her aunt and Granton kneeling each before an open trunk.

‘Good gracious, Aunt Katherine!’ she exclaimed in amazement. ‘What are you doing? It’s one o’clock.’

‘We are packing, my dear.’

Marcia sat down on the bed with a hysterical giggle. ‘Aunt Katherine, if I didn’t know the contrary, I should swear you were born a Copley.’

Mrs. Copley withdrew her head from the trunk and looked about for something further to fit in. In passing she cast her niece a reproachful glance. ‘I don’t see how you can be so flippant, Marcia, after what we’ve been through to-night—and with your uncle lying wounded in the next room! It’s only one chance in a hundred that we aren’t all in our graves by now. I shall not draw an easy breath until we have landed safely in the streets of New York. Just hand me that pile of things on the chair there.’ Her gaze rested upon a parti-coloured assortment of ribbons and laces and gloves.

Marcia suppressed another smile. ‘I know it isn’t the time to laugh, Aunt Katherine, but I can’t help it. You’re so—sort of businesslike. It never would have occurred to me to pack to-night.’

‘We are going into Rome the first thing to-morrow morning, and with only Granton to help there is no time to lose. We might as well begin while we are waiting for the doctor—he surely ought to be here by now,’ she added, her anxiety coming to the fore. ‘What do you suppose takes him so long? It’s been an hour since we sent.’

‘It’s four miles to Palestrina, Aunt Katherine. And you must remember it’s the middle of the night; the man was probably in bed and asleep. It will be another half hour at least before he can get here.’

‘Yes, I suppose so’—Mrs. Copley turned back to her packing—‘but I can’t help being worried! One suspects everybody after an experience like this. I am really feeling very nervous over your uncle’s arm; he makes light of it, but it may be more serious than any of us think. There’s always so much danger of lockjaw or blood-poisoning from a wound of that sort. I shall not feel satisfied about it until we can get into Rome and consult an American doctor.’

‘May I see him?’ Marcia asked, ‘or is he asleep?’

‘No, he’s awake; but you must not excite him.’

Marcia tapped lightly on Mr. Copley’s door and entered. He was propped up on pillows, his arm in a sling. She crossed over and sat down on the edge of the bed. ‘I’m so sorry, Uncle Howard,’ she murmured.

‘Oh, it’s nothing to make a fuss over. I got off very easily.’

‘I don’t mean just your arm—I mean—everything.’

‘Ah,’ said Copley, and shut his eyes.

‘But, after all,’ she added, ‘it may be for the best. The Italians don’t understand what you are doing. I don’t believe two such different races can understand each other.’

He opened his eyes with a humorous smile. ‘It’s rather a comic-opera ending,’ he agreed. ‘I have a feeling that before the curtain goes down I should join hands with the bandits and come out and make my bow.’

‘There are lots of things to be done in America, and they’ll appreciate you more at home.’

‘I think I’ll buy a yacht and go in for racing, as your aunt suggests. I may come off in that—if I have a captain.’

Marcia sat silent a moment, looking down on his finely lined, sensitive face.

‘Uncle Howard,’ she said slowly, ‘it seems as if the good you do is some way cast up to the credit side of the world’s account and helps just so much to overcome the bad, whether any one knows about it or not. You may go away and leave it all behind and never be appreciated, but it’s a positive quantity just the same. It’s so much accomplished on the right side.’

Her uncle smiled again.

‘I’m afraid that’s rather too idealistic a philosophy for this generation. We’re living in a material age, and it takes something more solid than good intentions to make much impression on it. I have a sneaking suspicion that I wasn’t born to set the world to rights. Many men are reformers in their youth, but I’m reaching the age when a club and a good dinner are excellent anodynes for my own and other people’s troubles.’

A shadow fell over her face and she looked down in her lap without answering.

After a moment he asked suddenly, ‘Where’s Sybert, Marcia?’

‘I think he’s downstairs waiting for the doctor.’

‘Ah!’ said Copley again, with a little sigh.

Marcia slipped down on her knees beside the bed. ‘Uncle Howard,’ she whispered, ‘I want to tell you something. I’m—going to marry Mr. Sybert.’

Copley raised himself on his elbow and stared at her.

‘You are going to marry Sybert?’ he repeated incredulously.

‘Yes, uncle,’ she smiled. ‘He asked me to.’

‘Sybert!’ Copley repeated, with an astonished laugh. ‘Holy St. Francis! What a change is here!’

‘I thought you would be pleased,’ she said a little tremulously.

He stretched out his hand and laid it over hers. ‘My dear Marcia, nothing could have pleased me more. He’s the finest man I have ever known, and I begin to suspect that you are the finest girl. But—good gracious! Marcia, I must be blind and deaf and dumb. I had a notion you didn’t like each other.’

‘We’ve changed our minds,’ she said; ‘and I wanted you to know it because I thought it would make you feel better.’

‘And so it does, Marcia,’ he said heartily. ‘The year has accomplished something, after all; and I’m glad for Sybert’s sake that he’s got this just now, for, poor fellow, he’s in a deeper hole than I.’

Marcia pressed his hand gratefully as her aunt came bustling in with her arms full of clothes.

‘Howard,’ she asked, ‘shall I have Granton pack your heavy flannels, or shall you want them on the steamer?’

Her husband attempted a shrug and found the bandages would not permit it.

‘I think perhaps I’d better leave them out. It’s June, of course; but I’ve known very cold crossings even in July.’

Copley turned on his side and wrenched his arm again.

‘Oh, for heaven’s sake! Katherine,’ he groaned, ‘pack them, throw them away, burn them, do anything you please.’

Mrs. Copley came to the bedside and bent over him anxiously. ‘What’s the matter, dear? Is your arm very painful? You don’t suppose,’ she added in sudden alarm, that the stiletto was poisoned, do you?’

‘Lord, no!’ he laughed. ‘Poisoned daggers went out two centuries ago—it’s a mere scratch, Katherine; don’t worry about it. Go on with your packing—I should hate to miss that first steamer.’

His wife patted the pillows and turned toward the door. ‘Marcia,’ she called over her shoulder, ‘go to bed, child. You will be absolutely worn out to-morrow—and don’t talk to your uncle any more. I’m afraid you will get him excited.’

Marcia bent over and lightly kissed him on the forehead. ‘Good night,’ she whispered. ‘I hope you will feel better in the morning,’ and she turned back to her own room.

She sat down on the couch by the open window and drew the muslin curtains back. The moon was low in the west, hanging over Rome. A cool night breeze was stirring, and the little chill that precedes dawn was in the air. She drew a rug about her and sat looking out, listening to the shuffling tramp of the soldiers and thinking of the long day that had passed. When she waked that morning it had been like any other day, and now everything was changed. This was her last night in the villa, and her heart was full of happiness and sorrow—sorrow for her uncle and Laurence Sybert and the poor peasants. It was Italy to the end—beauty and moonlight and love, mingled with tragedy and death and disappointment. She had a great many things to think about, but she was very, very tired, and with a half-sigh and a half-smile her head drooped on the cushions and she fell asleep.

CHAPTER XXVI

Marcia woke at dawn with the sun in her eyes. She started up dazedly at finding herself dressed in her white evening gown, lying on the couch instead of in bed. Then in a moment the events of yesterday flashed back. The floor was covered with broken glass, and on the wall opposite a dark spot among the rose-garlands showed where Pietro’s misaimed bullet had lodged. On the terrace balustrade below her window two soldiers were sitting, busily throwing dice. They lent an absurd air of unreality to the scene. She stepped to the open doors of the balcony and drew a deep, delighted breath of the fresh morning air. Rome in the west was still sleeping, but every separate crag of the Sabines was glowing a soft pink, and the newly risen sun was hanging like a halo behind the old monastery. It was a day filled with promise.

The next moment she had brought her thoughts back from the distant horizon to the contemplation of homelier matters nearer at hand. Mingled with the early fragrance of roses and dew was the subtly penetrating odour of boiling coffee. Marcia sniffed and considered. Some one was making coffee for the soldiers, who were to be relieved at the ‘Ave Maria.’ She reviewed the possible cooks. Not Granton. The soldiers were Italians, and, for all Granton cared, they could perish from hunger on their way back to Palestrina. Not her aunt. In all probability, she did not know how to make coffee. Not her uncle. He was hors de concours with his wounded arm. The Melvilles! They would not have known where to look for the kitchen. She interrupted her speculations to exchange last night’s evening gown for a fresh blue muslin, and her hasty glance at the mirror as she stole out on tiptoe told her that the slight pallor which comes from three hours’ sleep was not unbecoming. She crept downstairs through the dim hall and paused a second by the open door of the loggia; her eyes involuntarily sought the spot outside the salon window. The rug was back in its place again, and everything was in its usual order. She felt thankful to some one; it was easier so to throw the matter from her mind.

She approached the kitchen softly and paused on the threshold with a reconnoitring glance. The big stone-floored room, with its smoky rafters overhead, was dark always, but especially so at the sunrise hour; its deep-embrasured windows looked to the west. In the farthest, darkest corner, before the big, brick-walled stove, some one was standing with his back turned toward her, and her heart quickened its beating perceptibly. She stood very still for several minutes, watching him; she would hypnotise him to turn around; but before she had fairly commenced with the business, he had picked up the poker by the wrong end and dropped it again. The observation which he made in Italian was quite untranslatable. Marcia tittered and he wheeled about.

‘That’s not fair,’ he objected. ‘I shouldn’t have said anything so bad if I had known you were listening.’

‘Do you know what we do with Gerald when he swears in Italian?’

He shook his head.

‘We wash his mouth with soap.’

‘I hope it doesn’t happen often,’ he shuddered.

‘He speaks very fluent Italian—nearly as fluent as yours.’

‘Suppose we change the subject.’

‘Very well,’ she agreed, advancing to the opposite side of the long central table. ‘What shall we talk about?’

‘We haven’t said good morning.’

She dropped him a smiling curtsy. ‘Good morning, Mr. Sybert.’

‘Mr. Sybert! You haven’t changed your mind overnight, have you?’

Her eyes were more reassuring than her speech. ‘N-no.’

‘No what?’

‘Sir!’ She laughed.

He came around to her side of the table, and faced her with his hands in his jacket pockets.

‘You’ve never in your life pronounced my name. I don’t believe you know it!’

She whispered.

‘Say it louder.’

‘It sounds too familiar,’ she objected, backing against the wall with impudently laughing eyes. ‘You’re so—so sort of old—like Uncle Howard.’

‘Oh, I know you’re young, but you needn’t put on such airs about it. You don’t own all the youth in the world.’

‘Thirty-five!’ she murmured, with a wondering shake of her head.

‘Ah—thirty-five. A very nice age. Just the right age, in fact, to make you mind me. Oh, you needn’t laugh; I’m going to do it fast enough. And right here we’ll begin.’ He folded his arms with a very fierce frown, but with a smile on his lips, quizzical, humorous, comprehending, kindly—the finished result of so many smiles that had gone before. ‘The business in hand, my dear young woman, is to find out whether or not you happen to know the name of the man you’ve promised to marry. Come, let me hear it; say it out loud.’

Marcia looked back tantalizingly a moment, and then, after an inquiring glance about the room as if she were searching to recall it, she dropped her lids and pronounced it with her eyes on the floor.

‘Laurence.’

He unfolded his arms.

‘The coffee’s boiling over!’ Marcia exclaimed.

‘Kiss me good morning.’

‘The coffee’s boiling over.’

‘I don’t care if it is.’

The coffee boiled over with an angry spurt that deluged the stove with hissing steam. Marcia was patently too anxious for its safety to give her attention to anything else. Sybert stalked over and viciously jerked it back, and she picked up the plate of rolls and ran for the door. He caught up with her in the hall.

‘I know why you discharged Marietta,’ he threw out.

‘Why?’

‘If I were a French cook with a moustache and a goatee and a fetching white cap, and you were a black-eyed little Italian nursemaid with gold ear-rings in your ears, I should very frequently let things burn.’

‘Oh,’ Marcia laughed. ‘And I should probably let the little boy I ought to be looking after fall over the balustrade and break his front tooth while I was sitting on the door-step smiling at you.’

‘And so we should be torn apart—there was a tragedy!’ he mused compassionately. ‘I hadn’t realized it before. It proves that you must suffer yourself before you can appreciate the sufferings of others.’

‘French cooks with fetching caps have elastic hearts.’

‘Ah,’ said he, ‘and so have black-eyed little Italian nursemaids—I’m glad you’re not an Italian nursemaid, Marcia.’

‘I’m glad you’re not a French cook—Laurence.’ And then she laughed. ‘Will you tell me something?’

‘Anything you wish.’

‘Were you ever in love with the Contessa Torrenieri?’

‘I used to fancy I was something of the sort nine or ten years ago. But, thank heaven, she was looking for a count.’

‘I’m glad she found him!’ Marcia breathed.

As they crossed the terrace to the little table at the corner of the grove where the afternoon before—it seemed a century—Mrs. Copley and Marcia had taken tea, one of the soldiers came hastily forward. ‘Permit me, signorina,’ he said with a bow, taking the plate from her hands. Marcia relinquished it with a ‘Grazia tanto’ and a friendly smile. They were so polite, so good-natured, these Italians! Cups were brought, the table was spread, and Marcia poured the coffee with as much ceremony as if she were presiding at an afternoon reception. The two, at the soldiers’ invitation, stayed and shared the meal with them. Marcia never forgot that sunrise breakfast-party on the terrace—it was Villa Vivalanti’s last social function.

She watched Sybert’s intercourse with these men with something like amazement, feeling that she had still to know him, that, his character was in the end the mystery it had seemed. With his hand on their shoulders, he was chatting to the group as if he had known them all his life, cordial, friendly, intimate, with an air of good-comradeship, of perfect comprehension, that she had never seen him employ toward even his staunchest friends of the Embassy. One of the soldiers, noticing the direction of her glance, informed her that the signore had been up all night, alternately talking to them and pacing the walks of the ilex grove, and he added that the signore was a galantuomo—a gentleman and a good fellow.

‘What did he talk about?’ she asked.

‘Many, many things,’ said the man. ‘Italia, and the people’s miseria, and the priests, and the wine of Sicily, and the King and the Camorra, and (he looked a trifle conscious) our sweethearts. He is not like other forestieri, the signore; he understands. He is a good fellow.’

And then the young soldier—he was most confiding—told her about his own sweetheart. Her name was Lucia and she lived in Lucca. She was waiting for him to finish his service, and then they would be married and keep a carved-wood shop in Florence. That was his trade—carving wood to sell to the forestieri. It was a beautiful trade; he had learned it in Switzerland, and he had learned it well. The signorina should judge if she ever came to Florence. How much longer did he have to serve? Four months, and then!—He rolled his eyes in the direction where Lucca might be supposed to lie.

Marcia smiled sympathetically. Lucia was a beautiful name, she said.

Was it not a beautiful name? he returned in an ecstasy. But the signorina should see Lucia herself! Words failed him at this point. ‘Santa Lucia,’ he murmured softly, and he hummed the tune under his breath.

Marcia unclasped a chain of gold beads from her neck and slipped it into his hand. ‘When you go back to Lucca give this to Lucia from me—con amore.’

‘Here, here! what is this?’ said Sybert in English, coming up behind. ‘Do I find you giving love-tokens to a strange young man?’

Marcia flushed guiltily at the detection. ‘It’s for a friend of mine in Lucca,’ she said, nodding over her shoulder to the young soldier as they turned back toward the loggia.

Sybert laughed softly.

‘What are you laughing at?’ she asked.

‘I sent a wedding present to Lucia myself.’

They strolled to the end of the loggia and stood by the balustrade, looking off into the hills. The fresh, dewy scents of early morning were in the air, and all the world seemed beautiful and young. Marcia thought of Sybert pacing up and down the dark ilex walks while the villa slept, and of the dreadful thing he had spoken last night in that wild moment of despair. She searched his face questioningly. There were shadows under his eyes, the marks of last night’s vigil; but in his eyes a steady calm. He caught the look and read her thoughts.

‘That’s all over, Marcia,’ he said quietly. ‘I’ve fought it out. You mustn’t think of it again. I don’t very often lose control of myself, but I did last night. Once in thirty-five years,’ he smiled, ‘a man ought to be forgiven for being a little melodramatic.’

‘Will you—really be happy?’ she asked.

‘Marcia, America is for me, as for so many poor Italians, the promised land. I’m going home to you.’

She shook her head sadly. ‘That—won’t be enough.’

‘It’s all I have, and it’s all I want. There’s not room in my heart for anything but you, Marcia.’

‘Don’t say that,’ she cried. ‘That’s why I love you—because there’s room in your heart for so many other people. America is your own country. Let it take the place of Italy.’

He studied the Campagna, silent, a moment, while a shadow crossed his face. He shook his head slowly and looked back with melancholy eyes.

‘I don’t know, Marcia. That may come later—but—not just now. You can’t understand what Italy means to me. I was born here; I learned to speak the language before I did English; all that other men feel for their country, for their homes, I feel for Italy. And these poor, hard-working, patient people—I’ve done them harm instead of good. Oh, I see the truth; Italy must do for herself. The foreigners can’t help, and I’m a foreigner like the rest.’

‘Ah, Laurence,’ she pleaded, ‘don’t you see that you’re an American, and that nothing, nothing can stamp it out? It’s all a mistake; your place isn’t here—it’s at home. Every man can surely do his best work in his own country, and America needs good men. Do you remember what you said at Uncle Howard’s dinner that last night we were in Rome? That to be a loyal citizen of the world was the best a man could do? But you can’t be a loyal citizen of the world unless you are first of all a loyal citizen of your own country. America may be crude and it may have a good many faults, but it’s our country just the same, and we ought to love it better than any other. You do love it, don’t you? Tell me you do. Tell me you’re glad that you’re an American.’

She put her hands on his shoulders and looked up with glowing eyes and cheeks that burned.

As he watched her a picture flashed over him of what it meant. He thought of the vast country, with its richness, its possibilities, its contrasts. He thought of its vitality and force; its energy and nervousness and daring. And for a brief instant he felt himself a part of it. A sudden wave swept over him of that strange, irrational, romantic love of fatherland which is fundamental underneath the polish, underneath the wickedness, in every man in every land. For a second he thrilled with it too; and then, as his eye wandered to the great plain beneath them, the old love—his first love—rushed back. He bent over and kissed her with sudden tears in his eyes.