A Roman Singer by F. Marion Crawford

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"What is the matter?" asked De Pretis.

For all answer, Nino, standing in the dark street below, lifted up his
voice and sang the first notes of the air he always associated with
his beautiful contessina. Before he had sung a dozen bars the window
opened, and the girl's figure could be seen, black against the light
within. He went on for a few notes, and then ceased suddenly.

"Let us go," he said in a low voice to Ercole; and they went away,
leaving the contessina listening in the stillness to the echo of their
feet. A Roman girl would not have done that; she would have sat
quietly inside, and never have shown herself. But foreigners are so
impulsive!

Nino never heard the last of those few notes, any more than the
contessina, literally speaking, ever heard the end of the song.

"Your cousin, about whom you make so much mystery, passed under my
window last night," said the young lady the next day, with the usual
display of carnation in her cheeks at the mention of him.

"Indeed, signorina?" said Nino, calmly, for he expected the remark.
"And since you have never seen him, pray how did you know it was he?"

"How should one know?" she asked, scornfully. "There are not two such
voices as his in Italy. He sang."

"He sang?" cried Nino, with an affectation of alarm. "I must tell the
maestro not to let him sing in the open air; he will lose his voice."

"Who is his master?" asked Hedwig, suddenly.

"I cannot remember the name just now," said Nino, looking away. "But
I will find out, if you wish." He was afraid of putting De Pretis to
any inconvenience by saying that the young singer was his pupil.
"However," he continued, "you will hear him sing as often as you
please, after he makes his _debut_ next month." He sighed when he
thought that it would all so soon be over. For how could he disguise
himself any longer, when he should be singing in public every night?
But Hedwig clapped her hands.

"So soon?" she cried. "Then there will be an end of the mystery."

"Yes," said Nino, gravely "there will be an end of the mystery."

"At least you can tell me his name, now that we shall all know it."

"Oh, his name--his name is Cardegna, like mine. He is my cousin, you
know." And they went on with the lesson. But something of the kind
occurred almost every time he came, so that he felt quite sure that,
however indifferent he might be in her eyes, the singer, the Nino of
whom she knew nothing, interested her deeply.

Meanwhile he was obliged to go very often to the baroness' scented
boudoir, which smelled of incense and other Eastern perfumes, whenever
it did not smell of cigarettes; and there he sang little songs, and
submitted patiently to her demands for more and more music. She would
sit by the piano and watch him as he sang, wondering whether he were
handsome or ugly, with his square face and broad throat and the black
circles round his eyes. He had a fascination for her, as being
something utterly new to her.

One day she stood and looked over the music as he sang, almost
touching him, and his hair was so curly and soft to look at that she
was seized with a desire to stroke it, as Mariuccia strokes the old
gray cat for hours together. The action was quite involuntary, and her
fingers rested only a moment on his head.

"It is so curly," she said, half playfully, half apologetically. But
Nino started as though he had been stung, and his dark face grew pale.
A girl could not have seemed more hurt at a strange man's touch.

"Signora!" he cried, springing to his feet. The baroness, who is as
dark as he, blushed almost red, partly because she was angry, and
partly because she was ashamed.

"What a boy you are!" she said, carelessly enough, and turned away to
the window, pushing back one heavy curtain with her delicate hand, as
if she would look out.

"Pardon me, signora, I am not a boy," said Nino, speaking to the back
of her head as he stood behind her. "It is time we understood each
other better. I love like a man and I hate like a man. I love someone
very, much."

"Fortunate contessina!" laughed the baroness, mockingly, without
turning round.

"It does not concern you, signora, to know whom I love, nor, if you
know, to speak of her. I ask you a simple question. If you loved a man
with your whole soul and heart, would you allow another man to stand
beside you and stroke your hair, and say it was curly?" The baroness
burst out laughing. "Do not laugh," he continued. "Remember that I am
in your power only so long as it pleases me to submit to you. Do not
abuse your advantage, or I will be capable of creating for myself
situations quite as satisfactory as that of Italian master to the
Signorina di Lira."

"What do you mean?" she asked, turning suddenly upon him. "I suppose
you would tell me that you will make advantages for yourself which
you will abuse against me? What do you mean?"

"I do not mean that. I mean only that I may not wish to give lessons
to the contessina much longer." By this time the baroness had
recovered her equanimity; and as she would have been sorry to lose
Nino, who was a source of infinite pleasure and amusement to her, she
decided to pacify him instead of teasing him any more.

"Is it not very foolish for us to quarrel about your curly hair?" said
she. "We have been such good friends always." It might have been three
weeks, her "always."

"I think it is," answered Nino, gravely. "But do not stroke my hair
again, Signora Baronessa, or I shall be angry." He was quite serious,
if you believe it, though he was only twenty. He forthwith sat down to
the piano again and sang on. The baroness sat very silent and scarcely
looked at him; but she held her hands clasped on her knee, and seemed
to be thinking. After a time Nino stopped singing and sat silent also,
absently turning over the sheets of music. It was warm in the room,
and the sounds from the street were muffled and far away.

"Signor Nino," said the lady at last, in a different voice, "I am
married."

"Yes, signora," he replied, wondering what would come next.

"It would be very foolish of me to care for you."

"It would also be very wicked," he said, calmly; for he is well
grounded in religion. The baroness stared at him in some surprise, but
seeing he was perfectly serious, she went on.

"Precisely, as you say, very wicked. That being the case, I have
decided not to care for you any more--I mean not to care for you at
all. I have made up my mind to be your friend."

"I am much obliged to your ladyship," he answered, without moving a
muscle. For you see, he did not believe her.

"Now tell me, then, Signor Nino, are you in earnest in what you are
doing? Do you really set your heart on doing this thing?"

"What?" asked Nino, annoyed at the persistence of the woman.

"Why need you be afraid to understand me? Can you not forgive me? Can
you not believe in me that I will be your friend? I have always
dreamed of being the friend of a great artist. Let me be yours, and
believe me, the thing you have in your heart shall be done."

"I would like to hope so," he said. But he smiled incredulously. "I
can only say that if you can accomplish what it is in my heart to do,
I will go through fire and water at your bidding; and if you are not
mocking me, I am very grateful for the offer. But if you please,
signora, we will not speak any more of this at present. I may be a
great artist some day. Sometimes I feel sure that I shall. But now I
am simply Giovanni Cardegna, teacher of literature; and the highest
favour you can confer on me is not to deprive me of my means of
support by revealing to the Conte di Lira my other occupation. I may
fail hopelessly at the outset of my artistic career, and in that case
I shall certainly remain a teacher of language."

"Very well," said the baroness, in a subdued voice; for, in spite of
her will and wilfulness, this square-faced boy of mine was more than a
match for her. "Very well, you will believe me another day, and now I
will ask you to go, for I am tired."

I cannot be interrupted by your silly questions about the exact way in
which things happened. I must tell this story in my own way or not at
all; and I am sacrificing a great deal to your taste in cutting out
all the little things that I really most enjoy telling. Whether you
are astonished at the conduct of the baroness, after a three weeks'
acquaintance, or not, I care not a fig. It is just the way it
happened, and I daresay she was really madly in love with Nino. If I
had been Nino I should have been in love with her. But I would like
you to admire my boy's audacity, and to review the situation, before I
go on to speak of that important event in his life, his first
appearance on the boards of the opera. At the time of his _debut_ he
was still disguised as a teacher of Italian to the young contessina.
She thought him interesting and intelligent, but that was all. Her
thoughts were entirely, though secretly, engrossed by the mysterious
singer whom she had heard twice but had not seen as far as she knew.
Nino, on the other hand, loved her to desperation, and would have
acted like a madman had he been deprived of his privilege of speaking
to her three times a week. He loved her with the same earnest
determination to win her that he had shown for years in the study of
his art, and with all the rest of his nature besides, which is saying
much--not to mention his soul, of which he thinks a great deal more
than I do.

Besides this, the baroness had apparently fallen in love with him, had
made him her intimate, and flattered him in a way to turn his head.
Then she seemed to have thought better of her passion, and had
promised him her friendship,--a promise which he himself considered of
no importance whatever. As for the old Conte de Lira, he read the
German newspapers, and cared for none of these things. De Pretis took
an extra pinch of his good snuff, when he thought that his liberal
ideas might yet be realised, and a man from the people marry a great
lady by fairly winning her. Do not, after this, complain that I have
left you in the dark, or that you do not know how it happened. It is
as clear as water, and it was about four months from the time Nino saw
Hedwig in St. Peter's to the time when he first sang in public.

Christmas passed by,--thank heaven the municipality has driven away
those most detestable pifferari who played on their discordant
bagpipes at every corner for a fortnight, and nearly drove me
erazy,--and the Befana, as we call the Epiphany in Rome, was gone,
with its gay racket, and the night fair in the Piazza Navona, and the
days for Nino's first appearance drew near. I never knew anything
about the business arrangements for the _debut_, since De Pretis
settled all that with Jacovacci, the impresario; but I know that there
were many rehearsals, and that I was obliged to stand security to the
theatrical tailor, together with De Pretis, in order that Nino might
have his dress made. As for the cowl in the last act, De Pretis has a
brother who is a monk, and between them they put together a very
decent friar's costume; and Mariuccia had a good piece of rope which
Nino used for a girdle.

"What does it matter?" he said, with much good sense. "For if I sing
well, they will not look at my monk's hood; and if I sing badly, I may
be dressed like the Holy Father and they will hiss me just the same.
But in the beginning I must look like a courtier, and be dressed like
one."

"I suppose so," said I; "but I wish you had taken to philosophy."

CHAPTER VI

I shall never forget the day of Nino's first appearance. You may
imagine whether we were in a state of excitement or not, after all
these years of studying and waiting. There was much more trouble and
worry than if he had written a great book, and was just to publish it,
and receive the homage of all the learning and talent in Europe; which
is the kind of _debut_ I had hoped he would make in life, instead
of putting on a foolish dress and stamping about on a stage, and
squalling love songs to a packed house, making pantomime with his
hands, and altogether behaving like an idiot,--a crowd of people ready
to hiss him at the slightest indication of weakness, or to carry him
on their shoulders if they fancied his voice to their taste.

No wonder Nino was sad and depressed all day, and when he tried his
voice in the afternoon thought it was less clear than usual, and
stared at himself in the looking-glass, wondering whether he were not
too ugly altogether, as I always told him. To tell the truth, he was
not so ugly as he had been; for the months with the contessina had
refined him singularly, and perhaps he had caught a certain grace of
manner from the baroness. He had grown more silent too, and seemed
always preoccupied, as well he might be: but he had concealed his
affair with the Lira family from me until that day, and I supposed him
anxious about his appearance.

Early in the morning came De Pretis, and suggested that it would be
better for Nino to take a walk and breathe the fresh air a little; so
I bade him go, and I did not see him again until the afternoon. De
Pretis said that the only cause for anxiety was from stage fright, and
went away taking snuff and flourishing his immense cotton
handkerchief. I thought a man must be a fool to work for years in
order to sing, and then, when he had learned to do it quite well, to
be afraid of showing what he knew. I did not think Nino would be
frightened.

Of course there was a final rehearsal at eleven, and Nino put off the
hour of the lesson with the contessina to three in the afternoon, by
some excuse or other. He must have felt very much pressed for time,
having to give her a lesson on the very day of his coming out; and
besides, he knew very well that it might be the last of his days with
her, and that a great deal would depend on the way he bore himself at
his trial. He sang badly, or thought he did, at the rehearsal, and
grew more and more depressed and grave as the day advanced. He came
out of the little stage door of the Apollo theatre at Tor di Nona, and
his eyes fell upon the broad bills and posters announcing the first
appearance of "Giovanni Cardegna, the most distinguished pupil of the
Maestro Ercole de Pretis, in Donizetti's opera the 'Favorita.'" His
heart sank at the sight of his own name, and he turned towards the
Bridge of Sant' Angelo to get away from it. He was the last to leave
the theatre, and De Pretis was with him.

At that moment he saw Hedwig von Lira sitting in an open carriage in
front of the box office. De Pretis bowed low; she smiled; and Nino
took off his hat, but would not go near her, escaping in the opposite
direction. He thought she looked somewhat surprised, but his only idea
was to get away, lest she should call him and put some awkward
question.

An hour and a half later he entered her sitting-room. There she sat,
as usual, with her books, awaiting him perhaps for the last time, a
fair, girlish figure with gold hair, but oh, so cold!--it makes me
shiver to think of how she used to look. Possibly there was a
dreaminess about her blue eyes that made up for her manner; but how
Nino could love her I cannot understand. It must have been like making
love to a pillar of ice.

"I am much indebted to you for allowing me to come at this hour,
signorina," he said, as he bowed.

"Ah, professore, it looks almost as though it were you yourself who
were to make your _debut_" said she, laughing and leaning back in her
chair. "Your name is on every corner in Rome, and I saw you coming out
of a side door of the theatre this morning." Nino trembled, but
reflected that if she had suspected anything she would not have made
so light of it.

"The fact is, signorina, my cousin is so nervous that he begged me
earnestly to be present at the rehearsal this morning; and as it is
the great event of his life, I could not easily refuse him. I presume
you are going to hear him, since I saw your carriage at the theatre."

"Yes. At the last minute my father wanted to change our box for one
nearer the stage, and so we went ourselves. The baroness--you know,
the lady who went with us to the Pantheon--is going with us to-night."
It was the first time Hedwig had mentioned her, and it was evident
that Nino's intimacy with the baroness had been kept a secret. How
long would it be so? Mechanically he proceeded with the lesson,
thinking mournfully that he should never give her another. But Hedwig
was more animated than he had ever seen her, and often stopped to ask
questions about the coming performance. It was evident that she was
entirely absorbed with the thought of at last hearing to its fullest
extent the voice that had haunted her dreams; most of all, with the
anticipation of what this wonderful singer would be like. Dwelling on
the echo of his singing for months had roused her interest and
curiosity to such a pitch that she could hardly be quiet a moment, or
think calmly of what she was to enjoy; and yet she looked so very cold
and indifferent at most times. But Nino had noticed all this, and
rejoiced at it; young as he was, however, he understood that the
discovery she was about to make would be a shock that would certainly
produce some palpable result, when she should see him from her box in
the theatre. He trembled for the consequences.

The lesson was over all too soon, and Nino lingered a moment to see
whether the very last drops of his cup of happiness might not still be
sweet. He did not know when he should see her again, to speak with
her; and though he determined it should not be long, the future seemed
very uncertain, and he would look on her loveliness while he might.

"I hope you will like my cousin's singing," he said, rather timidly.

"If he sings as he has sung before he is the greatest artist living,"
she said calmly, as though no one would dispute it. "But I am curious
to see him as well as to hear him."

"He is not handsome," said Nino, smiling a little. "In fact, there is
a family resemblance; he is said to look like me."

"Why did you not tell me that before?" she asked quickly, and fixed
her blue eyes on Nino's face as though she wished to photograph the
features in her mind.

"I did not suppose the signorina would think twice about a singer's
appearance," said Nino quietly. Hedwig blushed and turned away,
busying herself with her books. At that moment Graf von Lira entered
from the next room. Nino bowed.

"Curious is it," said the count, "that you and the about-to-make-his-
appearance tenor should the same name have."

"He is a near relation, Signor Conte,--the same whom you heard sing in
the Pantheon. I hope you will like his voice."

"That is what we shall see, Signor Professore," answered the other
severely. He had a curious way of bowing, as though he were made only
in two pieces, from his waist to his heels, and from his waist to the
crown of his head. Nino went his way sadly, and wondering how Hedwig
would look when she should recognise him from her box in the theatre
that very evening.

It is a terrible and a heart-tearing thing to part from the woman one
loves. That is nothing new, you say. Everyone knows that, Perhaps so,
though I think not. Only those can know it who have experienced it,
and for them no explanations are in any way at all necessary. The mere
word "parting" calls up such an infinity of sorrow that it is better
to draw a veil over the sad thing and bury it out of sight and put
upon it the seal on which is graven "No Hope."

Moreover, when a man only supposes, as Nino did, that he is leaving
the woman he loves, or is about to leave her, until he can devise some
new plan for seeing her, the case is not so very serious.
Nevertheless, Nino, who is of a very tender constitution of the
affections, suffered certain pangs which are always hard to bear, and
as he walked slowly down the street he hung his head low, and did not
look like a man who could possibly be successful in anything he might
undertake that day. Yet it was the most important day of his life, and
had it not been that he had left Hedwig with little hope of ever
giving her another lesson, he would have been so happy that the whole
air would have seemed dancing with sunbeams and angels and flowers. I
think that when a man loves he cares very little for what he does.
The greatest success is indifferent to him, and he cares not at all
for failure in the ordinary undertakings of life. These are my
reflections, and they are worth something, because I once loved very
much myself, and was parted from her I loved many times before the
last parting.

It was on this day that Nino came to me and told me all the history of
the past months, of which I knew nothing; but, as you know all about
it, I need not tell you what the conversation was like, until he had
finished. Then I told him he was the prince and chief of donkeys,
which was no more than the truth, as everybody will allow. He only
spread out his palms and shrugged his shoulders, putting his head on
one side, as though to say he could not help it.

"Is it perhaps my fault that you are a little donkey?" I asked; for
you may imagine whether I was angry or not.

"Certainly not, Sor Cornelio," he said. "It is entirely my own doing;
but I do not see that I am a donkey."

"Blood of Bacchus!" I ejaculated, holding up my hands. "He does not
believe he is a great stupid!" But Nino was not angry at all. He
busied himself a little with his costume, which was laid out on the
piano, with the sword and the tinsel collar and all the rest of it.

"I am in love," he said. "What would you have?"

"I would have you put a little giudizio, just a grain of judgment and
common sense, into your love affairs. Why, you go about it as though
it were the most innocent thing in the world to disguise yourself, and
present yourself as a professor in a nobleman's house, in order to
make love to his daughter! You, to make love to a noble damigella, a
young countess, with a fortune! Go back to Serveti, and marry the
first contadina girl you meet, it is much more fitting, if you must
needs marry at all. I repeat it, you are an ignorant donkey!"

"Eh!" cried Nino, perfectly unmoved, "if I am ignorant, it is not for
lack of your teaching; and as for being the beast of burden to which
you refer, I have heard it said that you were once in love yourself.
Meanwhile, I have told you this, because there will perhaps be
trouble, and I did not intend you to be surprised."

"Surprised?" said I. "I would not be surprised at anything you might
fancy doing now. No, I would not dream of being surprised!"

"So much the better," answered Nino, imperturbably. He looked sad and
weary, though, and as I am a prudent man I put my anger away to cool
for a little while, and indulged in a cigar until it should be time to
go to the theatre; for of course I went with him, and Mariuccia too,
to help him with his dress. Poor old Mariuccia! she had dressed him
when he was a ragged little boy, and she was determined to put the
finishing touches to his appearance now that he was about to be a
great man, she said. His dressing-room was a narrow little place,
sufficiently ill lighted, and there was barely space to turn round.
Mariuccia, who had brought the cat and had her pocket full of roasted
chestnuts, sat outside on a chair until he was ready for her; and I am
sure that if she had spent her life in the profession of adorning
players she could not have used her fingers more deftly in the
arrangement of the collar and sword. Nino had a fancy to wear a
moustache and a pointed beard through the first part of the opera;
saying that a courtier always had hair on his face, but that he would
naturally shave if he turned monk. I represented to him that it was
needless expense, since he must deposit the value of the false beard
with the theatre barber, who lives opposite; and it was twenty-three
francs. Besides, he would look like a different man--two separate
characters.

"I do not care a cabbage for that," said Nino. If they cannot
recognise me with their ears, they need not trouble themselves to
recognise me at all."

"It is a fact that their ears are quite long enough," said Mariuccia.

"Hush, Mariuccia!" I said. "The Roman public is the most intelligent
public in the world." And at this she grumbled.

But I knew well enough why he wanted to wear the beard. He had a fancy
to put off the evil moment as long as possible, so that Hedwig might
not recognise him till the last act,--a foolish fancy, in truth, for a
woman's eyes are not like a man's; and though Hedwig had never thought
twice about Nino's personality, she had not sat opposite him three
times a week for nearly four months without knowing all his looks and
gestures. It is an absurd idea, too, to attempt to fence with time,
when a thing must come in the course of an hour or two. What is it,
after all, the small delay you can produce? The click of a few more
seconds in the clock-work, before the hammer smites its angry warning
on the bell, and leaves echoes of pain writhing through the poor
bronze, that is Time. As for Eternity, it is a question of the
calculus, and does not enter into a singer's first appearance, nor
into the recognition of a lover. If it did, I would give you an
eloquent dissertation upon it, so that you would yawn and take snuff,
and wish me carried off by the diavolo to some place where I might
lecture on the infinite without fear of being interrupted, or of
keeping sinners like you unnecessarily long awake. There will be no
hurry then. Poor old diavolo! he must have a dull time of it amongst
all those heretics. Perhaps he has a little variety, for they say he
has written up on his door, "Ici l'on parle francais," since Monsieur
de Voltaire died. But I must go on, or you will never be any wiser
than you are now, which is not saying overmuch.

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