Hugh Crichton's Romance. Coleridge Christabel Rose

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СКАЧАТЬ so hot and tired, I will get it. There is no terrible opera to-night. Maddalena! Maddalena!”

      “Ah! signorina, I know who nearly broke the china bowl.”

      “Why, I did, Maddalena! I threw it down,” said Violante, as she tripped about after the old woman, whose gold hair-pins were quivering with sly triumph. “But it is quite safe – not a crack in it.”

      The coffee was finished; the bright, hot sun went down; and the sisters sat long by the open window in the warm, pleasant twilight. Violante fell into dreamy silence; Rosa also. But there was a great gulf between their meditations, though they were thinking of the same subject and, partly, of the same person.

      “There’s father!” cried Violante, as a step sounded. “Oh, I will run away, and you shall tell him.”

      “No, no, you little coward; he will be sure to ask for you – stay a minute.”

      Violante leant back against the window-sill, her eyes drooping, her breast heaving, and yet her face flushing and dimpling, – the new confidence almost conquering the old fear. Rosa looked far the more frightened of the two. Signor Mattei’s step came up the great staircase quick as a boy’s; he seemed almost to skate across the polished floor, so instantaneously did he bear down on his daughters. In a moment his roll of music was cast aside in one direction, his great white umbrella in another; and, with accents rising every moment into higher indignation, he exclaimed: “Violante, what folly is this that I hear? Is this what all your idleness and obstinacy mean? I’ll not hear a word of it. A lover, indeed! Never let me hear of it again!”

      Violante stood breathless, but Rosa interposed:

      “Has Mr Crichton been talking to you, father?”

      “Ay, and a fine story he brought me. Talking of promises, indeed! How dare she dream of making promises? And you – what have you been doing? Taking care of your sister? No! No! Encouraging her in disobedience and deceit!”

      Now Signor Mattei was wont, on all occasions of domestic disturbance, to relieve his feelings by the most voluble scoldings that the Italian temperament could suggest and the Italian tongue express. Had Violante broken the china bowl she would probably have heard nearly as many reproaches; but no amount of experience ever accustomed her to these outbreaks; and, though practically she had never been ill-treated, she feared her father far more than: he guessed; while Rosa usually answered him back more promptly than respectfully, and, loving him better than Violante did, often ended by having her own way. Now she said:

      “Why are you angry with Violante, father? She has done nothing wrong. Is it her fault if Mr Crichton loves her and has asked her to marry him?”

      “Asked her – asked her! How dared he ask her? Now, most undutiful, most ungrateful child, how long has this conspiracy lasted?”

      “He came to-day,” stammered Violante.

      “To-day? You tell me this folly has begun to-day! You, who have been secretly sighing for this stranger, sighing for him instead of singing! Ah – shame on you! – tell me – tell me —tell me!” in a rapid crescendo, as he seized her wrist and pulled her towards him.

      Violante burst into tears.

      “Father! how can you speak to her so?” cried Rosa. “Let her go – and I will tell you. Mr Crichton never said a word to her till to-day. Why will you not consent to their encasement?”

      “Because I know my duty as a father better. But it is all over. Do you hear, Violante? I have ended it for ever!”

      “Oh, father,” cried Violante, holding out her hands imploringly, “I will not neglect my singing, I will practise all day long; but you would break my heart – oh, dear father, I love him;” and the poor child, with unwonted courage, went up to her father and put her arms round his neck with a look and gesture that, could she have called them up at will, would have settled her stage difficulties for ever.

      “No, Violante!” Signor Mattei said. “You know what my wish has been. You were not free to promise yourself; and to-day I have made my arrangements with Signor Vasari and have promised you to him.”

      “Father, father, I would kill myself first!” cried Violante, dropping on her knees and hiding her face. “Oh, Rosa – Rosa – help me!”

      “Hugh, hush, my child. Stand up and control yourself,” said Rosa, with English dislike to a scene – a kind of self-consciousness shared by neither father nor sister. “Go away – go into our room. I will talk to father first.”

      Violante rushed away with her hands over her face, and then the other two prepared for war.

      Signor Mattei divested himself of his neck-tie, rubbed his hands through his hair, marched up and down the room, and said:

      “Now, Rosa, be reasonable, be dutiful, and hear what I have to say.”

      Rosa sat down by the table, with a red spot on each cheek, and took up her knitting.

      “Yes, father, that is just what I wish. I want to know what has happened.”

      “Am I a cruel father? Do I beat or starve you, or do I work all day for my ungrateful children?”

      “I think you were cruel to Violante, father, when you called her deceitful.”

      “Violante is a little fool. Now, once for all, Rosa, I will have no disputes. This very day I have promised her to Vasari.”

      “Father!” cried Rosa, in high indignation. “It is one thing to forbid her engagement to Mr Crichton, and quite another to insist on her marrying Vasari. I would not stand it.”

      “But you, figlia mia, have the sense to decide for yourself,” said Signor Mattei, with a little flattery inexpressibly provoking to the downright Rosa. “Your sister is a child, and cannot judge. Consider. This young Englishman goes home. The proud ladies of his house would see him mouldering in his grave before they blessed his betrothal.”

      “I don’t believe they would be so ridiculous! And he is quite independent. But I agree with you, father, that it would be a very unfortunate thing if he married her without his friends’ consent, and what we could not agree to. But he speaks confidently of being able to gain it.”

      “He speaks!” echoed Signor Mattei, with scorn. “He speaks! He goes home – he sees his folly. Flattered by the flowers of his own aristocracy will he remember Violante?”

      “I don’t believe he has anything to do with the aristocracy! Of course, father, I see all the risks – they are fearful ones; but the other way is such certain misery,” said Rosa, faltering. “How will she bear it!”

      “Rosa, I am surprised at you. Can you not see the benefits of this marriage?”

      “Yes, I know all that,” said Rosa, sturdily. “I know, if she could make up her mind to it, it would be a very good thing for her and for all of us. But, father, married or single, she will never make an actress, it will kill her; and she hates Vasari.”

      Then Signor Mattei’s patience fairly gave way.

      “Hates him! Don’t tell me of anything so absurd. How many girls, do you think, have hated their suitors and been happy enough! That is no reason.”

      In spite СКАЧАТЬ