William Dean Howells: 27 Novels in One Volume (Illustrated). William Dean Howells

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СКАЧАТЬ impatient about going. I wish we could be off at once."

      A tremor passed over the young girl and she started from her languid posture, and laid the dress in the trunk. "So do I, mother. I would give the world if we could go to-morrow!"

      "Yes, but we can't, you see. I'm afraid we've undertaken a great deal, my dear. It's quite a weight upon my mind, already; and I don't know what it will be. If we were free, now, I should say, go to-morrow, by all means. But we couldn't arrange it with Don Ippolito on our hands."

      Florida waited a moment before she replied. Then she said coldly, "Don Ippolito is not going with us, mother."

      "Not going with us? Why"—

      "He is not going to America. He will not leave Venice; he is to remain a priest," said Florida, doggedly.

      Mrs. Vervain sat down in the chair that stood beside the door. "Not going to America; not leave Venice; remain a priest? Florida, you astonish me! But I am not the least surprised, not the least in the world. I thought Don Ippolito would give out, all along. He is not what I should call fickle, exactly, but he is weak, or timid, rather. He is a good man, but he lacks courage, resolution. I always doubted if he would succeed in America; he is too much of a dreamer. But this, really, goes a little beyond anything. I never expected this. What did he say, Florida? How did he excuse himself?"

      "I hardly know; very little. What was there to say?"

      "To be sure, to be sure. Did you try to reason with him, Florida?"

      "No," answered the girl, drearily.

      "I am glad of that. I think you had said quite enough already. You owed it to yourself not to do so, and he might have misinterpreted it. These foreigners are very different from Americans. No doubt we should have had a time of it, if he had gone with us. It must be for the best. I'm sure it was ordered so. But all that doesn't relieve Don Ippolito from the charge of black ingratitude, and want of consideration for us. He's quite made fools of us."

      "He was not to blame. It was a very great step for him. And if"....

      "I know that. But he ought not to have talked of it. He ought to have known his own mind fully before speaking; that's the only safe way. Well, then, there is nothing to prevent our going to-morrow."

      Florida drew a long breath, and rose to go on with the work of packing.

      "Have you been crying, Florida? Well, of course, you can't help feeling sorry for such a man. There's a great deal of good in Don Ippolito, a great deal. But when you come to my age you won't cry so easily, my dear. It's very trying," said Mrs. Vervain. She sat awhile in silence before she asked: "Will he come here to-morrow morning?"

      Her daughter looked at her with a glance of terrified inquiry.

      "Do have your wits about you, my dear! We can't go away without saying good-by to him, and we can't go away without paying him."

      "Paying him?"

      "Yes, paying him—paying him for your lessons. It's always been very awkward. He hasn't been like other teachers, you know: more like a guest, or friend of the family. He never seemed to want to take the money, and of late, I've been letting it run along, because I hated so to offer it, till now, it's quite a sum. I suppose he needs it, poor fellow. And how to get it to him is the question. He may not come to-morrow, as usual, and I couldn't trust it to the padrone. We might send it to him in a draft from Paris, but I'd rather pay him before we go. Besides, it would be rather rude, going away without seeing him again." Mrs. Vervain thought a moment; then, "I'll tell you," she resumed. "If he doesn't happen to come here to-morrow morning, we can stop on our way to the station and give him the money."

      Florida did not answer.

      "Don't you think that would be a good plan?"

      "I don't know," replied the girl in a dull way.

      "Why, Florida, if you think from anything Don Ippolito said that he would rather not see us again—that it would be painful to him—why, we could ask Mr. Ferris to hand him the money."

      "Oh no, no, no, mother!" cried Florida, hiding her face, "that would be too horribly indelicate!"

      "Well, perhaps it wouldn't be quite good taste," said Mrs. Vervain perturbedly, "but you needn't express yourself so violently, my dear. It's not a matter of life and death. I'm sure I don't know what to do. We must stop at Don Ippolito's house, I suppose. Don't you think so?"

      "Yes," faintly assented the daughter.

      Mrs. Vervain yawned. "Well I can't think anything more about it to-night; I'm too stupid. But that's the way we shall do. Will you help me to bed, my dear? I shall be good for nothing to-morrow."

      She went on talking of Don Ippolito's change of purpose till her head touched the pillow, from which she suddenly lifted it again, and called out to her daughter, who had passed into the next room: "But Mr. Ferris——why didn't he come back with you?"

      "Come back with me?"

      "Why yes, child. I sent him out to call you, just before you came in. This Don Ippolito business put him quite out of my head. Didn't you see him? ... Oh! What's that?"

      "Nothing: I dropped my candle."

      "You're sure you didn't set anything on fire?"

      "No! It went dead out."

      "Light it again, and do look. Now is everything right?"

      "Yes."

      "It's queer he didn't come back to say he couldn't find you. What do you suppose became of him?"

      "I don't know, mother."

      "It's very perplexing. I wish Mr. Ferris were not so odd. It quite borders on affectation. I don't know what to make of it. We must send word to him the very first thing to-morrow morning, that we're going, and ask him to come to see us."

      Florida made no reply. She sat staring at the black space of the doorway into her mother's room. Mrs. Vervain did not speak again. After a while her daughter softly entered her chamber, shading the candle with her hand; and seeing that she slept, softly withdrew, closed the door, and went about the work of packing again. When it was all done, she flung herself upon her bed and hid her face in the pillow.

      * * *

      The next morning was spent in bestowing those interminable last touches which the packing of ladies' baggage demands, and in taking leave with largess (in which Mrs. Vervain shone) of all the people in the house and out of it, who had so much as touched a hat to the Vervains during their sojourn. The whole was not a vast sum; nor did the sundry extortions of the padrone come to much, though the honest man racked his brain to invent injuries to his apartments and furniture. Being unmurmuringly paid, he gave way to his real goodwill for his tenants in many little useful offices. At the end he persisted in sending them to the station in his own gondola and could with difficulty be kept from going with them.

      Mrs. Vervain had early sent a message to Ferris, but word came back a first and a second time that he was not at home, and the forenoon wore away and he had not appeared. A certain indignation sustained her till the gondola pushed out into the canal, and then it yielded to an intolerable regret that she СКАЧАТЬ