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THE DUCHESS EMILIA 
 
BARRETT WENDELL S NOVELS. 
 
 Each in one volume. 12mo, cloth, $1.00; 
 paper, 50 cents. 
 
 RANKELL S REMAINS. 
 
 " Remarkably well done," says NORA PERKY in The Inde 
 pendent. 
 
 " A beautiful and needed lesson," says the Boston Globe. 
 
 " Original, unusual, spirited, and interesting," says the Bos 
 ton Courier. 
 
 " Deep and thoughtful impression," says the Home Journal. 
 
 THE D&GHESS EMILIA. 
 
 " The leading conception is very noble." The Nation. 
 
 " The plot is as weird as one of Hawthorne s wildest, but the 
 picture is wonderfully painted. It is a picture of old papal 
 Rome." The Churchman. 
 
 * # * For sale by all booksellers. Sent by mail, post-paid, 
 on receipt of price t by the publishers. 
 
THE DUCHESS EMILIA 
 
 A ROMANCE 
 
 BY 
 
 BARRETT WENDELL 
 
 The soul that rises with us, our life s star, 
 Hath had elsewhere its setting." 
 
 WORDSWORTH. 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 CHARLES SCRIBNER S SONS 
 1896 
 
Copyright, z8g6 
 BY CHARLES SCRIBNER S SONS 
 
 Copyright, 1885 
 BY JAMES R. OSGOOD AND COMPANY 
 
 All rights reserved 
 
h 
 
 U/J 
 THE DUCHESS EMILIA. 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 T^HE Rome of the Caesars is dead and 
 - gone, dead and gone like that shadowy 
 Rome whose secret name lay hidden in the 
 hearts of her priests. And there is another 
 Rome, a Rome our fathers knew, a Rome 
 we saw ourselves, which shall be seen no 
 more by men. Indeed, it seems now that men 
 will see less of the Rome of the Popes than 
 of the older cities on which she reared her 
 self. For scientific people are at work digging 
 up Forums, and breaking great boulevards 
 through the heart of the houses, where filth 
 and fever, and picturesque things speakable 
 and unspeakable, used to dwell together in 
 peace under the Holy Fathers sway. The 
 
 261255 
 
6 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 stones that were worn by the sandalled feet 
 of consuls and the chariot-wheels of imperial 
 generals are coming to light once more. The 
 streets whose dust blew about the gilded coaches 
 of the Cardinals are vanishing away. The old 
 papal times are a legend to children, such a 
 legend as British rule was to American chil 
 dren when our Republic was new. And men 
 who love to dream, look back to those times 
 already as to a fantastic past, where in clouds 
 of color and glory things of this world and 
 of the next sin and holiness, ecstasy and 
 intrigue, beauty and passion, charity and gran 
 deur rolled inseparably mingled before the 
 eyes alike of those who bowed before the Vice 
 gerent of Christ, and of those who stood erect 
 as he passed. 
 
 The tale I wish to tell is a tale of that van 
 ished Rome. The man whose papers tell the 
 tale to me lived in years not far gone. The 
 mill his father built on the Merrimac still pays 
 dividends. And for aught I know the friends 
 he knew in Rome are still in Rome, rejoicing 
 
The Duchess JZmilia. 
 
 or sorrowing in the rule of hirsute King Hum 
 bert. In plain figures, it is not quite forty years 
 since Richard Beverly went to Italy, yet it is 
 long enough for him to have become a strangely 
 mystic figure of the past, who seems as unreal 
 to-day as does the Rome of which his writing 
 tells. 
 
 He was my kinsman. To be sure, I never 
 saw him. When I was born he was already 
 dead. When I was old enough to hear his 
 name, he was spoken of as an erratic person, 
 whose unspecified but singular behavior had 
 been by no means what should have been looked 
 for from a respectable American. Our people 
 were men of affairs, who thought more about 
 cotton than about poetry. As for romance or 
 mystery, I doubt that you could have taught 
 them what the words mean. 
 
 Perhaps from the fondness for opposition com 
 mon in children, perhaps and I like to think 
 so from some sympathy that would have 
 made me Richard Beverly s friend, had he 
 lived to know me, I grew first to wondering 
 
8 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 what his singular behavior could have been ; 
 then to conjuring up all manner of strange 
 deeds, heroic and mystical, and attributing 
 them to him ; finally to loving the kindly and 
 romantic figure which I called by his name. 
 The delight that some children find in half- 
 believed daj^-dreams of cities and kingdoms 
 which their fancy builds, I found in dreaming 
 of Richard Beverly. I conjured up a Rome 
 for him to dwell in ; I conjured up his figure as 
 the most potent dweller therein. I grew to 
 think of him as mine, and to love him with all 
 the self-applauding intensity of a creator. 
 
 Years afterwards not long ago, in fact 
 I came across the papers that were sent home 
 from Rome when Beverly died. I read them 
 with an interest perhaps exaggerated by the 
 fantastic memories that in my mind clustered 
 about his name. Yet making all allowance for 
 this prejudice, it seemed to me that his last 
 days, unlike as they were to the grand career 
 that I had been used to dream about as his, 
 had a strange beauty of their own. And this 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 9 
 
 beauty, I thought, might win from others for 
 
 his memory such loving admiration as it wins 
 
 :ation far different from 
 
 Idhood I blindly gave to 
 
 bout his name. 
 
 my mind to tell his story. 
 
 n his own words, adding 
 
 s are needed to explain 
 
 feel that I do tardy jus- 
 
 ose that knew him mis- 
 
 veiiy is remembered by 
 
 him at all as a foolish 
 
 to be so thought of no 
 
 he may have been ; but 
 
 harder than mine who 
 
 more than folly gleaming 
 
 lat closed about his life 
 
 pe Gregory s Rome, a 
 
 and as forgotten of the 
 
T3 ICHARD BEVERLY was the only child 
 "^ of parents who married late in life. He 
 came of one of those old New England families 
 that live through generation after generation 
 in country pulpits, until at length the energy 
 that has been gathering in the stock reveals 
 itself, usually in no very ministerial way. 
 Richard s father it was who brought the Bev- 
 erlys out of the Orthodox Church and into the 
 world. A remarkably keen man of business, 
 he was in early life one of those who founded 
 the great mills that have made the commercial 
 fortune of New England ; and in a money 
 way he prospered exceedingly. Richard Bev 
 erly left a handsome estate. 
 
 Along with fortune came to old Mr. Beverly 
 the curse that the long agonies of our pious 
 fathers have handed down to us, to temper the 
 blessings of their sharp wit and their honesty. 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 11 
 
 He would fall into fits of despondency so deep 
 that his friends would grow seriously alarmed. 
 At last he was observed to eye his razor with 
 so fond a glance that it was thought well to 
 put him under control for a while. So, not un 
 willingly, for he was quite aware of his infirm 
 ity, he was bundled off to an asylum, where 
 he soon recovered from the attack. This timely 
 proceeding, which undoubtedly saved him from 
 one fate, resulted in plunging him into another. 
 At the asylum was a lady, no longer in the first 
 bloom of youth, whose excessively romantic be 
 havior had led competent authorities to pro 
 nounce her mind unbalanced ; so she had been 
 temporarily retired from the world. She had 
 known Mr. Beverly of old. His merits, which 
 were mostly of the practical sort, had never 
 appealed to her in general society. But now 
 that the pair were thrown together perforce, 
 she discovered in him many admirable traits. 
 Indeed, I suppose that any susceptible woman 
 is sure to discover them in a man whom she 
 is compelled to see every day. And any sus- 
 
12 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 ceptible woman may be trusted to do what this 
 one did, namely, to fall very honestly in love 
 with the possessor of the traits in question. 
 Whether Mr. Beverly fell in love with her or 
 not has never been quite settled. However 
 this may have been, they were married, to the 
 great scandal of society, soon after they emerged 
 from the singular place which had witnessed 
 their courtship. 
 
 The marriage was a happy one. Mrs. Bev 
 erly turned out to be an excellent house-keeper ; 
 and as duties began to present themselves she 
 found no more time for romance. So, barring 
 a very marked experience of religion a year or 
 two before she died, she was perfectly sane for 
 the rest of her life. Mr. Beverly was not so 
 lucky. He went on and prospered for some 
 years, and gave good dinners, and bought a 
 good deal of celebrated Madeira. Then, one 
 day, overwork or the strength of Puritan sad 
 ness asserting itself in spite of environment, 
 put an end to dinners and Madeira and cotton 
 and clubs. He cut his throat. His was one 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 13 
 
 of the first of the marble monuments that make 
 ghastly the hills of Mount Auburn. 
 
 That Richard Beverly, coming of such par 
 entage, should be a strange fellow was only 
 to be expected. So much was it to be ex 
 pected, indeed, that everybody who knew him 
 was on the watch for oddities ; and with that 
 sage acuteness which people show when their 
 attention is aroused, his friends were prepared 
 to assert that they observed something uncanny 
 even in his baby cries. Yet, after all, so far as 
 I can discover from what tales of his childhood 
 remain after sixty years and more, he was in 
 many respects a normal boy enough. To be 
 sure, he was self-conscious ; but then, he was 
 the solitary pet of a sentimental woman advanc 
 ing in years, and besides, he was very handsome. 
 A portrait of him is still preserved. It is very 
 ill-painted. But all that the painter could do 
 to caricature the boy, who sits in his best green 
 jacket and broad white collar, stiffly leaning his 
 head upon his right hand, could not conceal 
 his marvellous great eyes, and his clean-cut 
 
14 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 features, and his rich dark skin, and his bil 
 lowy black curls. So, just as Mrs. Beverly 
 spoiled him because he was her son, other 
 people must have spoiled him because he was 
 a beauty. 
 
 There is no doubt, too, that he had a curi 
 ously sensitive nature and a sense of honor so 
 fantastic that it sometimes got him into trouble 
 with his less high-strung acquaintance. Once, 
 when a cousin of about his own age began, in 
 a fit of confidence, to tell Richard some child 
 ish secret of unspeakable importance for the 
 moment, Richard begged him to stop. For, 
 the strange child observed, if somebody should 
 happen to ask him whether he knew anything 
 about the matter in question he should have 
 to answer yes. Upon this declaration of prin 
 ciple a fight ensued, in which Richard was 
 worsted ; and the consequent wrath of his 
 mother gave rise to a family feud that was 
 not healed until the assailing cousin came, in 
 a spirit of Christian condonation, to Mrs. Bev 
 erly s funeral. The feud preserved the story. 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 15 
 
 There is another tale of him when he was 
 a little older, which I have from my mother. 
 At dancing-school, where from time out of mind 
 the youth of Boston have made their first ap 
 pearance in the social world, she was something 
 of a belle. One day Richard Beverly came run 
 ning into the room, quite out of breath, and 
 invited her to dance with him. She had hardly 
 accepted when another admirer followed in his 
 footsteps. Whereupon, before she had time to 
 decline the second invitation, Richard grew very 
 red in the face, and stammering a little, amazed 
 her by declaring that he thought she had better 
 dance with the other boy. 
 
 " The fact is," he said, " I heard him say that 
 he was going to ask you ; and I ran in first. I 
 don t think I was quite fair." 
 
 And thereupon, Master Richard made an 
 awkward bow and glided off, much to the dis 
 pleasure of his partner. A few days afterwards, 
 he came running after her in the street and 
 handed her a nosegay. 
 
 " I thought you might like these," he said, 
 
16 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 " and besides, I want to tell you that I really 
 wanted to dance with you, only it did n t seem 
 quite fair. It was n t that I did n t want to," 
 which speech involved a supposition that put 
 him more out of favor than ever. 
 
 A bluff old uncle of mine has told me of 
 another trait of Beverly s. 
 
 u The fellow s mind," he said, " was un 
 wholesome. Why, sir, if you undertook to tell 
 him a decent story, he d stare as if you were 
 talking to a woman." 
 
 My uncle s conception of decent stories, I may 
 add, was of the robust old school. 
 
 Perhaps the most remarkable of Beverly s 
 oddities, however, was of a very different kind. 
 It was an amazing aptitude for the Italian lan 
 guage. To the inexpressible astonishment of the 
 professor who introduced him to that musical 
 tongue, he learned to read it in a few weeks, 
 and to speak and write it in a few months, as 
 well as the professor himself could. It seemed, 
 Beverly said, like remembering something that 
 he had known before. 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 17 
 
 "Per Bacco ! " swore the professor, "his 
 intellect is without limitation." 
 
 The professor, like some other men, had a 
 convenient habit of measuring mental capacity 
 by the ease with which people grasped his 
 ideas. 
 
 There are a few more stories of Beverly s 
 youth, which repeat the traits indicated in those 
 which I have told. At the same time, when 
 nothing happened to excite his morbid propen 
 sities, he seems to have behaved like a healthy 
 boy. He was fond of exercise, and a good 
 athlete according to the simple standards of the 
 time. And he had as hearty a dislike of apron- 
 strings as if there had been nothing odd in his 
 character. He did not lack self-assertion either ; 
 it is remembered that when his querulous par 
 ent insisted that at twelve years old he must be 
 followed about by a servant, he flatly refused to 
 go out of doors unless he might go alone. All 
 the same, I think Mrs. Beverly s excessive care 
 repressed some of the robustness that was really 
 in his nature. 
 
 2 
 
18 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 When Richard was somewhat past twenty, 
 Mrs. Beverly brought her earthly career to an 
 end in the odor of sanctity. Then Richard, left 
 without the care which had bored him while he 
 still had it, fell into a gloomy state of mind. 
 His mourning kept him much to himself; and 
 his fortune was large enough to relieve him of 
 the necessity of doing anything to increase it. 
 American men of inherited wealth are now as 
 plenty as grasshoppers ; but in his day you 
 could have counted them on your fingers ; so 
 it was held a fresh piece of eccentricity that 
 he seemed determined, with rare fixedness of 
 purpose, to do nothing in particular. Now 
 nothing in particular is by no means good food 
 for the mind ; and he was soon so despondent 
 that people began to shake their heads and talk 
 about the paternal razor. 
 
 Bub I think that people were wrong. He 
 always kept a singularly full journal ; yet in the 
 pages which were written about this time I find 
 nothing to indicate any thought of suicide. 
 His trouble seems to have been not a longing 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 19 
 
 to escape from life, but a restless eagerness to 
 do in life some duty which he could not see 
 plainly. 
 
 "I cannot get rid of the idea," he writes, 
 " that I am in the world for some definite rea 
 son. It is a common enough idea, they tell me. 
 I was sent here to do my duty in general, they 
 go on to say ; it consists partly of church-going, 
 and partly of making money as fast as possible, 
 and partly of being either very radical or veiy 
 conservative, as the case may be, on the ques 
 tion of slavery. Bah ! Such commonplaces 
 make me mad. It is none of them or of their 
 kind that I look for. But I feel I have grown 
 to feel day after day and month after month 
 that I am here in this world of sunshine and 
 darkness because I have a work to do, a work 
 as real as a Messiah s. It is a work that no man 
 but I can do ; yet what it is I cannot tell. 
 And the time may be passing ; and the work 
 may be left undone forever. Yet I can find no 
 light, nor any seer." 
 
20 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 Shortly after he wrote these lines in his 
 journal he started on the travels from which he 
 never returned. Cleveland, the painter, who 
 married our cousin, was already in Rome, one 
 of the first of our countrymen to take up his 
 professional abode there. He wrote to Beverly 
 sundry attractive things. And one day Boston 
 awoke to find that Richard Beverly had packed 
 up and gone. 
 
H 
 
 n. 
 
 OW he crossed the Atlantic has little to 
 do with us. Nor shall I pause any more 
 than he paused in misty, green England, whose 
 young queen had lately begun her reign; or in 
 far-stretching France, where respectable citizen- 
 monarchy still upheld the throne of pear-faced 
 Louis-Philippe. His melancholy went with 
 him. Other men looked with joy at the un 
 wonted sights of the Old World ; he seems to 
 have found pleasure out of the question, for 
 he was still tormented by his old perplexity. 
 For what purpose was he come into this world 
 through which he was journeying, he asked 
 himself over and over again. England and 
 France gave no answer ; nor yet the grim 
 Swiss mountains, with their rocks and their 
 glaciers and their gaunt pines. But when at 
 last he climbed the Alps and looked down upon 
 
22 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 the land to which he travelled, a great flood 
 of happiness swept over him, such happiness 
 as the old Hebrews felt when from the moun 
 tain-top they gazed upon the fields that Heaven 
 had promised to their children. 
 
 " Italy s beauty," he writes, " begins with 
 Italy. Indeed, it should seem that some magic 
 dwelt in her name, and cast a veil of splendor 
 over all things that are permitted to bear it. 
 Why, it is worth while to come into the world 
 only to breathe such air as I have breathed 
 to-day. The lazy horses have droned along 
 the road. I would not have them speeded. 
 Had each step taken a century it would not 
 have been too long. The savage Alps are 
 behind me, though the country still heaves 
 with the same blows that drove the Swiss 
 rocks skyward. And perchance, if the magic 
 of Italy did not rest on this landscape, this, 
 too, would be as full of the grandeur of deso 
 lation. But here no rock peeps out save from 
 a bed of verdure soft as a mother s breast. No 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 tree, no shrub, no green thing grows as if 
 growth were labor. The curse of birth-agony 
 seems stricken out of the world. Like the 
 waters that leap down the mill-races, all Nature 
 laughs here, even as she groaned in the North 
 ern land. And she laughs a laugh of happiness, 
 like the laugh of one who has eaten and drunk 
 well, and who sits in the midst of his children, 
 at peace with the world. Strange idiots with 
 huge necks gibbered at us from their crazy 
 barracks as we climbed the Alps. Here dark- 
 eyed girls sit in their cottage doors, and glance 
 roguishly at us as we pass ; and when we look 
 back they bend their heads once more over the 
 spinning-wheel, with flushing cheeks. And we, 
 finding no eye to meet ours, look further ; and 
 lose our thoughts among the vineyards, where 
 vine and tree cling together as lovingly as 
 virgin lovers meeting when the sun goes down. 
 Nay, even misery itself laughs. Sturdy fellows, 
 with vast brown breasts bared from boyhood 
 to sun and wind, hang their heads and thrust 
 out their hands for help. To-day I would give 
 
24 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 alms even to a shivering Swiss. I fling coins 
 to these merry children of the land that shall 
 be mine henceforth. And I bid them laugh out 
 the laugh that I see hidden in their eyes ; and 
 merrily drink to me, their brother who is come 
 home. For Italy is to all men a second father 
 land, nearer than Heaven and not less lovely. 
 And it is a merry land. And life is a merry 
 thing." 
 
 Now all this is romantic, overwrought stuff, 
 if you please ; but surely it is not morbidly 
 suicidal. And this is the sort of thing that 
 Richard Beverly wrote as he made his way 
 towards Rome. In this mood he came to merry 
 Milan, where even under the white-coated Aus- 
 trians all life seemed one long festival. There 
 he duly admired the dark, sleepy-e}^ed women, 
 with their fans and their mantillas ; and the 
 great white cathedral. Then on to Bologna, 
 where he thought the Caracci great ; but stood 
 beneath the Carisenda and watched the clouds 
 pass over the toppling pile, because Dante had 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 25 
 
 stood there and watched before him. Then 
 canie ducal Florence, where he was full of 
 Dante again, as he saw the fair San Giovanni 
 that Dante called his own; and standing by 
 the stone where men say Dante sat of old, 
 looked up at the tower of Giotto. Here, too, 
 the paintings opened to him a new world of 
 beauty. Whence came the colors which the 
 dead masters laid upon their canvases, he won 
 dered for a while in vain. Then, one evening, 
 as he stood at Fiesole and looked down the 
 soft valley of the Arno, the sunset light of 
 Italy came streaming up from the west and 
 told him. 
 
 Then he drove through the steep Etruscan 
 country and looked down on the Trasimene 
 lake ; and saw Perugia perched upon her rocky 
 hill; and Assisi, with her vast piles of holy 
 masonry ; and Terni, with her rushing waters. 
 And late one afternoon he came to Rome. 
 
III. 
 
 T N those days the Cardinals were the greatest 
 *- people in Rome, except, of course, the Holy 
 Father, whose white mules still jingled past 
 churches and palaces and fountains. The Car 
 dinals were something more than high priests. 
 One of them was sure to be, any one of them 
 might be, the ruler of the people who smiled or 
 frowned as they swept along, with stiff lackeys 
 and great umbrellas behind their lumbering car 
 riages. And most of them were familiar figures. 
 There was one, however, who was little more 
 than a name to the Romans ; and perhaps for 
 that very reason his name seemed fraught with 
 more dignity than those of the astute priests 
 whose faces and whose deeds were always meet 
 ing you. The Cardinal Giulio Colonna kept 
 within his own doors, save on those great occa 
 sions of state when all the pillars of the Church 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 27 
 
 were in duty bound publicly to uphold her 
 splendor. With the active life of the time he 
 had little to do ; and when on rare occasions 
 his venerable figure passed before the eyes of 
 common men, it seemed more than any other 
 to embody the apostolic dignity of the Roman 
 Church. Other members of the sacred college 
 sharpened their wits in far-reaching diplomatic 
 contests ; and spent what time they had to 
 spare in endless intrigues, which all their cun 
 ning could not keep hidden, to bring them 
 selves nearer the chair of Saint Peter. Giulio 
 Colonna sat apart. Every day, men said, he 
 passed hours in solitary prayer. His thoughts 
 were more of the other world than of this ; and 
 devout people were not wanting who whispered 
 that holy visions had opened to his living eyes 
 glories that many of his brethren should never 
 see through all the ages. When these devout 
 people caught a glimpse of his face, they saw 
 in the fixed calm of his features, and in the 
 distant look of the eyes that had not grown so 
 old as had his- bent shoulders, something that 
 
28 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 betokened knowledge of things that other men 
 only guessed at. As Dante s grina visage scared 
 the children who thought they saw lurking in 
 its wrinkles the grime of Hell, so the old Car 
 dinal s deep eyes told believers that living men 
 might still have glimpses of Heaven. So he 
 lived and prayed apart from the world. And 
 clever people said that he was very clever ; and 
 that his failing strength, together with his ever 
 growing holiness, was enough to insure him Pope 
 Gregory s seat, if he only survived Pope Greg 
 ory. Some, indeed, ventured to hint as much, 
 when his wily chaplain, Monsignor dei Bardi, 
 was by. Whereat Monsignor, than whom no 
 better man of business or of state wore violet 
 stockings, would generally put his smiling head 
 a little more to one side than usual, and would 
 take a pinch of snuff, and utter through his 
 thin lips some epigram clever enough to make 
 those that hinted wish that they had held their 
 peace. 
 
 Yet, if old stories could be believed, Giulio 
 Colonna s life had not been one of unmixed 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 29 
 
 holiness. Legends grow fast, to be sure, and 
 perhaps the greater part of the story was a 
 legend ; but there was no doubt that in his 
 youth the saintly Cardinal had been a man of 
 war. No more gallant officer, in every sense 
 of the word, had worn spurs and uniform in his 
 early days. And when, soon after his brother s 
 death had placed in his hands what was left 
 of the Colonna fortune, he had taken to the 
 Church, instead of taking to himself a duchess 
 from among the Roman maidens who clustered 
 about his ducal path, there had been a good 
 deal of surprise, and no small amount of head- 
 shaking. Something certainly must have hap 
 pened to change a man of the world into a man 
 of God. Perhaps it was a miracle. But the 
 story that people whispered had nothing miracu 
 lous about it. Indeed, in papal Rome it was 
 commonplace ; but to us of the New World 
 such tales are not commonplace as yet. And 
 I am ardent enough to believe that more gen 
 erations than are now behind us must have 
 passed away before our land is old enough to 
 
30 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 hear without a start such tales as were whis 
 pered of Giulio Colonna. 
 
 When the century was still young, Pius the 
 Seventh came back to Rome, and with him 
 came those Romans whom the storms of the 
 Revolution had scattered for a while. Things 
 were to be, it seemed, as they had been before 
 impious philosophy had turned away from sal 
 vation the thousands of souls who had risen 
 against the Holy Church. But the old sys 
 tem needed more vigorous defence than it 
 had needed in the quiet olden time. Roman 
 nobles banded themselves together to protect 
 the Mother Church who had watched over 
 them and their fathers for a thousand years. 
 And among these loyal gentlemen no one was 
 more loyal or more active than the Duke Pietro 
 Colonna, elder brother of Giulio, and head of 
 the great house to which they belonged. 
 
 Pietro Colonna seems to have been an earnest 
 man, not without mysticism in his devotion to 
 the church from which the fortune of his race 
 had sprung when some far-off great-uncle had 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 31 
 
 been made pope, centuries ago. Like many 
 earnest men, in passionate Italy as well as in 
 our more phlegmatic Northern lands, he gave 
 himself with all his heart to what he believed 
 to be the truth. And having given his whole 
 heart to the cause of the Church, he had nothing 
 but punctilious politeness left for the beautiful 
 duchess to whom he had given his name. Emilia 
 Colonna, by birth remotely akin to him, was a 
 wonder even in Rome, where women grand as 
 goddesses have dwelt since the days when the 
 Sabine beauties came to add their graces to 
 the stout stock that had taken root by the 
 Tiber. The splendor of her face and form 
 has not yet died out of Roman drawing-rooms, 
 where reflections of it still gleam faintly in the 
 words of old men who knew those that knew 
 her. But all this splendor was lost on solemn 
 Duke Pietro, who thought of nothing but the 
 grandeur of the Church, and the wicked plots of 
 the Carbonari, if, indeed, the Liberal plotters 
 of those early days had already taken the name 
 that they bore in times nearer our own. 
 
32 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 A Roman woman claims more than formal 
 homage from her lord. The beautiful Duchess 
 Emilia could not rest content with the courtesy 
 of her patriotic spouse. At least so thought 
 the people of her time, who looked about 
 accordingly to see whose love, of all those who 
 pressed to offer her their love, should be re 
 warded with hers. What truth lay in their 
 conclusions nobody rightly knew ; but all 
 Rome whispered, with no word of contradic 
 tion, that the beautiful duchess found close 
 at hand the devotion that she vainly looked 
 for in her marriage. The gallant Giulio, men 
 said, played with her the part that Paolo played 
 with Francesca in the Rimini that Dante knew. 
 And so Rome lived and loved and plotted, as 
 our century grew older. 
 
 The Liberal poison, whose workings gave the 
 Duke Pietro so much concern, ran deep in 
 Roman life. There were many gallant gentle 
 men to rally with him about the standard of the 
 Church. But there were others who dreamed 
 already of an Italy, dearer to them than any 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 33 
 
 church, or than any of the states that then 
 divided the country. There were men who 
 told one another in whispers what Macchia- 
 velli had written three hundred years before : 
 " In great part, all the wars which foreign 
 hordes have waged against Italy have been 
 caused by these Roman priests ; for the most 
 part, all the barbarians who have surged in 
 upon us have been called hither by them. And 
 even in our own time they do their old work; 
 and that it is which keeps Italy disunited and 
 feeble." 1 There were gentlemen in Rome whose 
 hearts were full of words like these. To speak 
 them out, meant exile or life-long prison ; so 
 they kept them back, and whispered and plotted. 
 Who they were, none but themselves knew, 
 except perhaps, Duke Pietro s spies. But if 
 rumor did not lie, Giulio could have told you. 
 
 1 " Tutte le guerre che furono da barbari fatte in Italia, f u- 
 rono in maggior parte dai Pontefici causate ; e tutti i barbari 
 che quella inondarono, furono il piii delle volte da quelli chi- 
 amati. II qual modo di procedere dura ancora in questi nostri 
 tempi ; il che ha tenuto e tiene T Italia disunita ed inferma." 
 Istorie Florentine, Book I. 
 
34 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 In Duke Pietro s own home, men said, were 
 hatched the plots that he would give his life to 
 suppress. 
 
 One night came a piece of news that thrilled 
 through the city in an hour. Pietro Colomia 
 had been stabbed to death as he was step 
 ping from his carriage at his own door. The 
 Duchess Emilia, who sat above, had uttered 
 no cry. Cold as marble, she had sat in the 
 flickering light looking down at his dead 
 form. Then she had bidden them carry him 
 into his palace ; and, with a face as white 
 as the dead man s, she had mounted to her 
 own apartment. There she had turned about 
 once, bidding the servants send Giulio to her, 
 when he should come ; and with no more 
 words had passed within her doors. The news, 
 as I have said, spread like fire through the 
 city. It reached Giulio no one knew where. 
 He came hurrying to the palace door ; with a 
 tremor in his voice, he asked if the tragic re 
 port were true. When they told him that it 
 was, and that the widowed duchess waited for 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 35 
 
 him above, his eyes seemed to start from his 
 head, and he lifted up his arms and shook 
 his clinched fists in the air. Then he turned 
 and hurried away. He never spoke to Emilia 
 again. Within a month he had given himself 
 to the Church. 
 
 Meanwhile, the story goes, she sat waiting 
 for him who did not come. Finally, late in 
 the night she rang and asked if he had sent 
 her no word. When she heard that he was 
 come and gone, she bade her servants leave 
 her, with a firm voice. But before they had 
 passed her door they heard a fall ; and turn 
 ing about, they found her on the floor sense 
 less. From that she went into a fever, and 
 for days they thought that she would follow 
 the Pietro whose name she kept calling in ac 
 cents of warning and of terror. But she rallied, 
 and lived on in Rome, more beautiful than 
 ever, save that her marble face grew to have 
 the hardness of marble. What her life was 
 the scandals of the time will tell those who 
 choose to know. At last her passions and her 
 
o6 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 sorrows came to an end. She died, and was 
 laid by the Duke Pietro s side in the marble 
 chapel where the Colonnas lie. And Monsig- 
 nor Giulio, already famed for his holiness, came 
 and said a mass for her sinful soul. 
 
 And now the Duchess Emilia had been dead 
 for well on to five and twenty years. The 
 Colonna fortune had not prospered meantime. 
 The old Cardinal, in his great palace, thought 
 little of money matters ; but those who lived 
 about him found that money matters necessarily 
 occupied a good deal of their attention. The 
 household was not large. There was Monsignor 
 dei Bardi, who devoted himself to His Emi 
 nence with a singleness of purpose accountable 
 for only on the supposition that he saw at the 
 ond of his labors a vision of a red hat. There, 
 too, in apartments of their own, were the Coun 
 tess Barbarini, a child of the Cardinal s dead 
 sister, and her daughter, the Contessina Filippa. 
 These the old man had taken to his home when 
 they were left with no fortune at the death 
 of the Count, whose life and money had been 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 37 
 
 dissipated in cards and other frivolities. In 
 return the Countess, whose practical qualities 
 rivalled those of the smiling chaplain, looked 
 after what was left of the Colonna fortune with 
 no mean skill. This Countess had been a beauty 
 in her day ; and the Coritessina Filippa, the 
 only other member of the household, was said to 
 be as beautiful a girl as ever grew into woman 
 hood in a Roman palace. 
 
 Of course, they did not need the whole palace 
 for themselves. So, reserving two great suites 
 and a picture-gallery, renowned both for its 
 merits and for the fact that the foreign sight 
 seers who penetrated almost everywhere never 
 penetrated there, the Countess and Monsignor 
 between them had long ago managed to let the 
 rest of the vast building to a motley array of 
 lodgers, native and foreign, noble and ignoble. 
 Among these lodgers was Cleveland, whose 
 studio was not far off. And when Beverly 
 came to Rome the artist insisted that he too 
 should take quarters in the Colonna palace, 
 where an apartment happened to be vacant. 
 
IV. 
 
 FROM this time on, I shall tell most of 
 Beverly s story in his own words as they 
 were written in his journal. The passages I 
 shall quote are not always consecutive ; the 
 second in this chapter, for example, comes some 
 days after the first ; the third some days after 
 the second. But it was his habit to use so few 
 dates that I have thought it useless to insert 
 any. When I come to a passage which it 
 seems best to omit, I shall indicate the omission 
 by a space and some stars. How much time 
 has elapsed between any two quotations I often 
 know as little as the reader. 
 
 From Beverly s Journal. 
 If I am ever to be happy I ought to be happy 
 here. I live in a Roman palace, of which, so 
 far as my own rooms are concerned, and my 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 39 
 
 apartment is large enough for a prince, I am 
 master. There is nothing to prevent me from 
 giving myself up to the delights of Rome ; 
 and these delights are no common ones. Here, 
 all about me, are the ruins of the ancient world 
 that I have dreamed about ever since I was a 
 child. Here, too, are marble churches and 
 palaces and fountains ; here is the muddy 
 Tiber with its bridges ; here are villas and 
 gardens, and columns from which the saints 
 have toppled down the brazen emperors; here 
 are statues and great paintings, and a thousand 
 other nameless things which carry me at will 
 through the whole length of the Middle Ages 
 to our own days. With a few steps I can 
 wander out of this troublesome modern time 
 into a limitless past, of which nothing is left 
 but the loveliness. It is the sin and the 
 tumult and the passion of human life that die. 
 Enshrined in art the beauty of the old days 
 lives, and it will live forever. Here in Rome 
 you have no excuse for thinking of mean and 
 hateful things. Each palace door, each church 
 
40 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 porch, with its curtain ready to swing aside at 
 a touch, leads you into some old world that 
 has been purified of all that is not good. 
 
 If I want modern life, too, I have only to 
 pass a staircase, and there I am at Cleveland s 
 door. He and Cousin Abby do all they can to 
 welcome me. He even leaves his painting and 
 walks with me about this marvellous town, 
 which has grown as familiar to him as old 
 Boston is to me. He can lead me straight to 
 the things that all men wish to see, just as I 
 could lead him to Copp s Hill, where I used 
 to ponder over the epitaphs and the carved 
 arms of the old Tories who went away from 
 New England when the King was driven out. 
 And Cousin Abby has been very kind. She 
 has saved me the trouble of engaging servants, 
 by lending me some of hers ; and she insists 
 that I shall dine with her every night. 
 
 Yet here in Rome I find stealing over me 
 that old feeling which I had hoped to leave 
 behind me in the cloudy North. What right 
 have I to be here, passing in listless pleasure 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 41 
 
 the hours that have been given me to pass on 
 earth? What meaning has my life? What 
 right have I to live a life that has no meaning, 
 a life that shall leave on the world no trace 
 of its passing? Blessed are the obscure, they 
 say. Blessed may they be, with all my heart. 
 I have no wish to make a name, as they call it. 
 But there is something I have always known 
 that there is something in this world that no 
 one but I can clo. And the time is passing. 
 Thus to idle is to disobey the voice of duty, 
 of conscience. Awake ! Be doing ! it cries to 
 me day and night. I start up, longing for one 
 word of counsel. Whither shall I turn ? There 
 is no answer. 
 
 Here in Rome I feel these things more deeply, 
 I think, than I have ever felt them before. Per 
 haps a strange thing that is happening to me 
 makes them seem more real. I am haunted. 
 Day after day, hour after hour, there sweeps 
 over me the sense that I am in a land that I 
 have known before. Everywhere are vague 
 memories, stretching towards me from a past 
 
42 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 a far-off past of mine that has to do, I know 
 not how, with this Rome through which I walk. 
 These ruins, these churches, these fountains 
 have known me of old. They have known 
 more. They have known some secret that I 
 long to remember, a secret that fled away 
 from me in the past that had vanished before 
 memory began. I have forgotten; but Rome 
 remembers. And the sparkle of her sunshine, 
 and the rich mantling of her shadows, and the 
 misty spray of her fountains, and the rustling 
 of her trees, and the breath of her flowers, 
 and the placid faces of her marble men, all 
 strive to tell me what I should know without 
 the telling ; but they tell it in a strange tongue, 
 and I cannot grasp their meaning. 
 
 I have talked of this to Cleveland and to 
 Cousin Abby. I am just come from them. 
 
 " I am sure, Richard," said Cousin Abby, 
 " that your digestion is out of order. I shall 
 send you up some rhubarb. I always keep rhu 
 barb on hand. It is quite harmless, and " 
 
 "Excuse me, my dear," interrupted Cleve- 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 43 
 
 land, "but I can t help observing that you are 
 talking nonsense. The thing is simple enough, 
 Beverly. It is nothing in the world but your 
 memory of school-books. I felt something very 
 like it when I came here first, only it took me 
 differently. It struck me as irresistibly absurd 
 that places where I could sit and smoke my 
 cigar unless a snuffy priest told me to throw it 
 away, should have the impudence to bear the 
 names that were beaten into me at the Latin 
 School. I am quite an authority on corporal 
 punishment still. I can trace the ideas that 
 olive-wood still suggests in my mind, to a ruler 
 that lay on the desk of a certain usher, whom 
 I have painted in various unpleasant characters 
 during the last few years." 
 
 "I cannot feel that you are right," I said, 
 " I have never learned any mysteries about 
 Rome." 
 
 " I never supposed that you had," said he. 
 " The human mind is so constructed that what 
 is once in it makes the deuce of a bother in 
 getting out again ; and when it has disappeared 
 
44 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 as a memory it turns up again as a mystery. 
 Besides, when you are out of softs " 
 
 " That is just what I said," put in Cousin 
 Abby, " he needs rhubarb." 
 
 " All he needs," said Cleveland, " is to get 
 his nerves in order. He smokes too much." 
 
 I hardly smoke at all ; and told him so. 
 
 " You don t smoke enough, then," said he ; 
 " have a cigar." 
 
 I took one. It was very good. Perhaps he 
 is right. 
 
 How a human face sometimes flashes into a 
 corner of one s mind that seems to have been 
 kept empty on purpose for it. This afternoon 
 I walked out with Cleveland on the Pincian Hill. 
 He wished me to see the view of Saint Peter s. 
 
 " On a good afternoon," he said, "it is some 
 thing fine. You look over the whole city, and 
 see the dome swimming in an ocean of blue 
 glory. Then you get behind some trees, which 
 make a tremendous shadow for a foreground. 
 It is theatrical, of course ; but sane people like 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 45 
 
 the theatrical. Besides, everybody goes to the 
 Pincio of an afternoon." 
 
 So we went to the Pincian Hill. Cousin 
 Abby would not go with us. She rarely goes 
 out. She cannot see, she says, why she should 
 if she does not feel like it ; and she is sure that 
 there is no pleasure for her in looking at any 
 number of people whom she does not know and 
 does not care to. So we left her with some 
 worsted work that seems to satisfy most of 
 the wants of her soul ; and walked together 
 in those marvellous gardens that look down on 
 Rome. 
 
 All the world was there, Cleveland said. I 
 suppose it was. At another time I might have 
 had eyes and thoughts for it. Indeed, at first 
 I thought I should have them to-day. But 
 suddenly in the passing throng I saw a woman, 
 a young girl I suppose I ought to call her; 
 after that I saw nothing else. She had a face 
 and form that seemed to have gathered to 
 themselves all the riches of life and beauty 
 that have been gathering in Rome since the 
 
46 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 world began. As she walked, I felt more 
 than I saw that hers was such a form as the 
 women of old unveiled before Grecian sculptors. 
 As the sunlight fell on her cheek, it kindled 
 there such colors as the masters of painting 
 have treasured up in the canvases that you 
 see only here. It was as if one of those mar 
 ble women of old had awakened into all the 
 warmth and passion of living human beauty. 
 For the flash of her great eyes and the deep 
 breath that came through her red and parted 
 lips told of the rich life-blood that throbbed 
 in her veins. 
 
 I looked at her as I should have looked at a 
 goddess. I knew nothing except that she was 
 before me. Then she turned her eyes toward 
 me, and I forgot to take mine away. Just then 
 Cleveland looked up and bowed. Mechanically 
 I did the same ; and stood with bared head as 
 she passed with her companion, a stately lady, 
 of whom I noticed nothing more. When they 
 had passed, and I had regained myself a little, 
 I asked Cleveland her name. 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 47 
 
 "Haven t you seen them before?" he an- 
 swered, " Why, that is our landlady, the 
 Countess Barbarini, and the Contessina Filippa. 
 She is devilish handsome, isn t she? I should 
 like to paint her." 
 
 And he an artist, whose work we of New 
 England think inspired could find no better 
 words than these, could feel no deeper thing 
 than that this woman among women might serve 
 him in his trade. I said no more. As soon as 
 I could leave him, I came home. As I passed 
 up the stone stairs, they seemed unlike the stairs 
 that I have trodden here before; for they, no 
 doubt, have been pressed by her feet and brushed 
 by the hem of her garments. I dined alone. 
 Since then I have been sitting in my own rooms, 
 in dim candle-light, with no thought save for 
 that wondrous form that has burned itself into 
 my mind. 
 
 Filippa ! Filippa ! I have caught myself whis 
 pering, in no sentimental lover s tone, for she 
 has not kindled in me the silly love that one 
 reads about. But she has taken her place in 
 
48 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 my life, along with the Goddesses of Greece and 
 the Virgins of this marvellous Italy. To see, 
 to have seen, such a form as hers makes it worth 
 while to have been born. 
 
 Filippa! And Cleveland thinks her devilish 
 handsome and would like to paint her ! 
 
 Cleveland is so good to me that I feel ashamed 
 of allowing myself to think and to write down 
 that he cannot see and feel as I do the wonders 
 of Rome and the beauties of life. It is not that 
 I am a finer being than he, I feel sure. It is 
 only that he is full of occupation, while I am an 
 idler. He has no time to play with his dreams. 
 I have no other thing to do. And so I soar up 
 into all sorts of clouds, and feel much offended 
 when Cleveland reminds me that he is walking 
 on solid earth. 
 
 To-day, when I went to his studio, I found 
 with him a sharp-faced American, deep in talk. 
 Cleveland introduced me to the man. 
 
 " Glad to meet you, sir," said he, shaking my 
 hand until I shook all over ; " knew your father 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 49 
 
 well. You ain t engaged in manufacturing your 
 self, are you ? " 
 
 No," said I. 
 
 "Perhaps you are in the art business, like 
 your friend here ? " 
 
 " I am not in any business," I said. 
 
 " Ain t ! " said he, with an air of disapproval, 
 and turned back to Cleveland, with whom he 
 was soon deep in some talk that sounded like a 
 bargain. 
 
 " Well, sir," he said at last, " you know what 
 such things are worth, and I don t. What I 
 want is something that people will allow to be 
 valuable, and I m willing to pay. No, I don t 
 want to see the concern. I can t tell one picture 
 from another ; but if folks that know what s 
 what say that this one s the thing, go ahead." 
 And with a nod to me he withdrew. 
 
 If I were an artist, such a fellow, I am sure, 
 would upset me for a day. I was silly enough 
 to feel annoyed that Cleveland took up his 
 brushes and calmly went to work as soon as the 
 
 door was closed. 
 
 4 
 
50 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 " What do you suppose that aesthetic person 
 is doing?" he asked, after a while. 
 
 " I have no idea," I answered. 
 
 t; Something in agreeable contrast to himself," 
 said Cleveland. " He is buying the Colonna 
 Titian. It delights me, do you know, to think 
 that a creature like that should have happened 
 to be the means of getting me into a Roman 
 gallery that hardly anybody in Rome has seen, 
 particularly when I have been living for a 
 couple of years in the same house with it. The 
 old Cardinal, you know, is very jealous of his 
 pictures ; and that Florentine priest of his is 
 clever enough to know that things you can t 
 see are more talked about than things you can. 
 So until this patron of art came along with the 
 idea of giving some Yankee museum a first-rate 
 picture, I cooled my heels at His Eminence s 
 door in vain. But as soon as they found that 
 I really meant business they were all smiles. I 
 am -going to take you there in a day or two. 
 I am saving it for a bonne bouche. After the 
 Colonna gallery, where you have everything to 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 51 
 
 yourself, all the others, where everybody runs 
 against your elbows, are intolerable. There 
 you have the real thing." 
 
 And as he painted, I sat and thought how 
 strange a world this is, where the vulgar osten 
 tation of an untaught fellow can serve to open 
 for me the doors of that marvellous Roman 
 girl, who passed before my eyes on the Pincian 
 Hill. 
 
V. 
 
 From Beverly s Journal. 
 
 T HAVE seen the Colonna gallery, the one 
 -* great collection in Rome that is kept secure 
 from the crowd. Surely no spot is better worth 
 guarding. If there be sacred things in art, if 
 there be a holiness about works into which men 
 have poured all the beauty of their lives, that 
 holiness is here. And just as I am offended to 
 see careless travellers tramp through churches 
 where they would disdain to kneel, so I shrink 
 from passing with a careless company the works 
 that the masters have left us. In the Colonna 
 gallery each picture seems to have grown in its 
 place as naturally as the churches of Rome, or 
 the vines that wander over Roman ruins have 
 grown up above the elder city. Each one is in 
 itself a new glimpse into another world, a 
 world of happiness and of agony vast beyond 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 53 
 
 words. I did not think of judging these mar 
 vellous things. I simply looked and marvelled. 
 And in the end I was as one who has seen a vi 
 sion ; who knows that he has been swept through 
 endless space peopled with beings grander and 
 sterner than men, and who wakes to find that 
 memory cannot bear the burden, that it can 
 keep for him only the fading knowledge that 
 he has for a moment known things too holy to 
 be profaned by common human thought. 
 
 Yet one picture I cannot forget, perhaps 
 because it is to be carried away from this shrine 
 where it has been treasured for three hundred 
 years. It is the Titian which Cleveland is buy 
 ing. It shows a woman seated on a great rock. 
 At her feet grow flowers. Behind her is a glo 
 rious landscape where fantastic mountains rise 
 up in a mist of blue as pure as a sunny ocean. 
 Above her head is foliage which seems to rustle 
 in a gentle wind. And the woman s grand form 
 throbs and swells in every part with the full 
 life-blood of old Italy. But she looks at none 
 of the loveliness that is about her. With tear- 
 
54 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 swollen eyes and trembling lips she gazes up 
 towards a Heaven that her sight cannot reach. 
 The agony of sin that may never be undone, 
 even though it be forgiven, is upon her. And 
 it should seein that the very richness of the life 
 which brought her to that sin makes the agony 
 greater, even as it strives to deaden it, to whis 
 per back her thoughts to earth. For her fingers 
 grasp a skull. It is Magdalene. 
 
 I looked at this picture in silence. For the 
 moment I hardly saw its lines, or the marvellous 
 colors that Titian wooed from the skies of Ven 
 ice. My heart was full of the meaning that was 
 beneath them, a meaning too deep for words. 1 
 thought of the vastness of sin in this world that 
 without it would be a paradise ; of the vastness 
 of the mercy that brings men even through sin to 
 peace ; of the vastness of the agony with which 
 that peace must be won. In this world few are 
 happy enough to pass through life unstained. 
 Men live thoughtlessly ; and one day they awake 
 to find memory seared with thoughts that may 
 not be washed out. Then, in the moments of 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 55 
 
 solitude that come to us more and more as life 
 goes on, we shrink from the self with whom 
 more and more we must live, the self with whom 
 at length we must pass out alone into the solitude 
 of death. Blessed, verily, are the pure in heart. 
 
 Cleveland was beside me. He spoke at last. 
 
 44 Wonderful, is n t it ? " he said. 
 
 44 Wonderful ! " I answered. 
 
 44 A few things like that will go a good way 
 to civilize the Yankees," he went on. " Did you 
 ever see such color ? We can t do anything like 
 it nowadays. I comfort myself with wondering 
 how much of it is art and how much is chemis 
 try. After all, nothing but time can give tone to 
 painting. I have left some colors at the bottom 
 of a picture or two for which I have great hopes 
 in the twenty-second century." 
 
 I said nothing more. Cleveland s words had 
 called me back to myself. They had called me 
 back at the same time to the strange thoughts 
 which had filled my mind when I first crossed 
 this threshold. The feeling that I had known 
 of old the things which I saw had swept over 
 
56 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 me more strongly than ever. Cleveland has 
 told me often that he is the only stranger who 
 is permitted to come here. In moments of sober 
 thought I know that he speaks the truth ; but 
 sober thought will not always come. As I 
 looked at the great Titian, and as I gazed up 
 at the ceiling where pagan gods sit on rolling 
 clouds and smile at one another across the 
 yawning cracks that have opened in the plaster, 
 there came to me the overwhelming thought 
 that I had seen all these things before, that I 
 had known them well. How I had known 
 them and when I could not tell. But with the 
 feeling that I had known them there came a 
 great sense of horror, of agony such as Mag 
 dalene felt as she sat and gazed heavenward. 
 Such a feeling I never knew before. I trem 
 bled. I seized Cleveland s arm. 
 
 " Take me away," I said. 
 
 " There is a fine Domenichino that we have 
 not seen yet," said he ; " it won t do to waste a 
 chance like this." 
 
 "Take me away," I said. "I have seen 
 
TJie Duchess Emilia. 57 
 
 enough." And I almost forced him to lead 
 me away. 
 
 As we passed out a great carriage drove into 
 the court-yard of the palace. 
 
 " By Jove ! " said Cleveland, " here is His 
 Eminence. We are in luck. You might have 
 stayed here ten years and never have seen him. 
 Stand aside and look at him. Ten to one, he 
 will be the next pope." 
 
 So we stood at the head of the great stair 
 case and watched two figures slowly ascending 
 toward us. One was a tall priest with sharp 
 eyes, and clean-cut features set in a smile such 
 as hides the thought that may be behind it. 
 He walked with a firm step. On his arm 
 leaned the other, a bent old churchman who 
 moved with the infirmity of age. His head 
 was bowed down, as if the toil of climbing the 
 broad stairway was almost beyond his power. 
 Yet with all his weakness there was about him 
 such an air of dignity as I had never seen be 
 fore. I watched him come up toward us with 
 a feeling like awe. 
 
58 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 " He is a grand old fellow, is n t he ? " whis 
 pered Cleveland. " He is tougher than he 
 looks. He is younger, too. It s not years 
 that have aged him, so much as fasting and 
 prayer and all that sort of thing. He has put 
 himself through enough of that, they say, to 
 kill an ordinary man twice over. But he 
 hopes to be pope, you know, and hope is the 
 elixir of life." 
 
 By this time they were close to us. Cleve 
 land bowed low, and I followed his example. 
 The old Cardinal bent his head in return, and 
 lifted his hand with a gesture of blessing. As 
 he did so he turned his face toward us, and I 
 saw it for the first time. For the first time it 
 must have been, yet as I looked upon that face, 
 pale and thin, and trembling with age, and 
 marked in every line with a gentleness and 
 a holiness such as I had not dreamed that 
 human features could possess, it seemed to me 
 that in some far-off time I had known him, too, 
 even as I had known his grand dwelling. The 
 shudder, the horror that I had felt in the 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 59 
 
 presence of the Magdalene came upon me again. 
 I gazed at the old man with what must have 
 seemed brutal rudeness. I could not move my 
 eyes from his face. 
 
 As I gazed at him, he turned his eyes toward 
 me. Then he stopped for a moment and gazed 
 at me with a look that was almost like a recog 
 nition. It seemed to me that he too felt some 
 thing of the mystery that was upon me. His 
 face grew strangely earnest. His eyes seemed 
 to pierce me through and through. For a mo 
 ment I thought that he was about to speak. 
 But this was only for a moment. He raised 
 his hand once more in blessing. 
 
 "Pax vobiscum," he muttered in a low 
 voice. Then, leaning more heavily on the 
 arm of his companion, he passed on, and we 
 stood and watched his tottering steps and his 
 bent shoulders. 
 
 I cannot sleep. I have lain awake, it seemed 
 for hours. Now I have risen. I have tried to 
 read by the flickering candle-light that makes 
 
60 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 these great rooms seem too mysterious to be 
 dwelt in by men. The words meant nothing. 
 I flung my book aside. My mind is full of 
 strange thoughts, of the knowledge that I am 
 here on earth for some purpose which I cannot 
 see, the knowledge that has haunted me so long. 
 But now at last, as I strain my brain to catch 
 a glimpse of the things that are hidden from 
 me, I begin to see something more than the 
 smoky clouds that writhe about in that uncanny 
 world which men see when their eyes are closed. 
 I see the great Magdalene gleaming through the 
 cloudy mist in all the passionate glory that Titian 
 has wrapped about her. I see, too, the thin old 
 Cardinal, gazing at me with eyes that tell of 
 things that as yet I do not know. I stretch out 
 my arms. I hurry toward these forms. And 
 the smoky clouds writhe and curl, and I know 
 not whither I go nor what I am. But still I 
 am drawn on toward what I was bom to do. 
 And before me I see waiting in the future, 
 beckoning me on, these shapes that in life I have 
 never seen before to-day. What is there that 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 61 
 
 binds them to me, that binds me to them ? 
 Whither do they lead me on? I cannot tell. 
 But I cannot sleep. I cannot forget. I cannot 
 think. 
 
 To-day, when I was weary with the sleepless 
 night through which I had watched, came word 
 that the Cardinal Colonna would deign to see 
 me. The message surprised me. They say 
 that he keeps himself hidden from the world, 
 that few may pass his threshold even of those 
 whose names should give them a right to do so. 
 Yet, after all, my surprise was not so great as 
 I should have looked for. As I made my way 
 toward him, it seemed as if I was going through 
 places where I had been before ; as if the stream 
 of my life was carrying me with it whither it 
 was used to flow. 
 
 I found him in a great room, hung with faded 
 tapestry. He sat in a large chair, carved with 
 strange figures. Satyrs grinned on the arms ; 
 and his long, thin fingers played about their 
 shaggy heads, as he looked upon me with the 
 
62 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 same deep eyes that had burned themselves into 
 my memory when I saw him first. When I 
 came to him he was not alone. The tall priest 
 was there, whom I had seen with him before. 
 His name, they tell me, is Mousignor dei 
 Bardi ; he is a Florentine as wily as his old 
 countrymen of whom Macchiavelli writes. He 
 stepped toward me with the fixed smile that 
 never leaves his hard face, and led me forward 
 to present me to His Eminence. Another man 
 was taking his leave, a wiry, dapper little 
 creature, with a bald head and much vivacity 
 of manner. This, said Mon signer, was the 
 Prince Palchi, a rich gentleman of Rome. As 
 I came in he pressed his lips upon the sapphire 
 ring of the Cardinal, and passed out, ignoring 
 me as I might have ignored a child. Then, 
 when he was gone, His Eminence turned to 
 me. 
 
 "You are welcome to Rome," he said. He 
 spoke in French, and the words came hard ; 
 his manner had the stiffness that comes when 
 men speak a language in which they cannot 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 68 
 
 think. But in spite of this his presence lost 
 no jot of its dignity. In our little New Eng 
 land we laugh at the greatness of the Old 
 World as a fiction of the past. We laugh at 
 it until we grow to think it a jest. When we 
 are brought face to face with it we are over 
 whelmed with our presumption, like the scoffer 
 in the old story who found himself at last 
 embarking in the boat of Charon. 
 
 I stood in confusion for a moment. Then I 
 stepped forward to kiss his holy ring as I had 
 seen the Roman do. To such a man as this no 
 homage could be too reverent. But he drew 
 back his hand with a sort of shrinking. 
 
 44 You need not pay me the honor that you 
 have seen the Prince Palchi pay me," he said. 
 "That is due to my office, not to me. And 
 you, they tell me, are of another faith." 
 
 I muttered some words that told him that I 
 am a Unitarian. I suppose I am ; yet when 
 I compare the faint thing we call religion with 
 the grand church which declares itself true 
 everlastingly, everywhere, for all men, I am 
 
64 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 not proud to own it. We are half-hearted 
 Christians, we of New England. 
 
 " That shall not stand between us," he said. 
 " I have sent for you because I wish to know 
 you as you are." 
 
 I could say nothing. Why he should wish to 
 know me I could not tell ; yet it seemed right 
 that he should. For in moments when I do not 
 pause to think, I find myself fancying that there 
 has been a dreamy old time when he has already 
 known me, and when I have known him better 
 than I know myself. I stood still. 
 
 Meanwhile, the Florentine priest stood by. 
 I felt that he was looking at me, though I 
 hardly turned my eyes toward him. I felt 
 that he was studying me, and that behind that 
 thin smile of his he was trying to make out 
 what manner of creature his master had a fancy 
 to know. He could not see the bond that drew 
 us together. Of that I felt sure ; for there are 
 things that can never be seen by men who use 
 the mind alone. Truly craftiness flings a veil 
 across the eyes of the crafty; and men who 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 65 
 
 would see what surrounds them in this great 
 mystery of life must give themselves up to the 
 seeing, nor ever ask themselves the wherefore 
 of what they see. Yet though the priest stood 
 without the secret he wished to penetrate, his 
 presence troubled me. It troubled the old 
 Cardinal, too. He turned to the priest and 
 bade him leave us. Whereat Monsignor, never 
 changing his smile, bowed and withdrew. But 
 though he changed no muscle, it seemed to me 
 that I could feel the spite with which he left 
 us to an interview of which he could not guess 
 the purpose. And as he passed out I heard 
 the click of his snuff-box. 
 
 Then we were left alone, looking at one 
 another ; and the Cardinal Colonna was as full 
 of nameless trouble as was I. For as he bade 
 me sit in a stiff chair that stood near, his voice 
 trembled with an emotion like that which quiv 
 ered through me. Then he sat silent for a 
 while ; at last he spoke very slowly. 
 
 " They tell me that you have never been in 
 Rome before," he said. "Is it true?" 
 5 
 
66 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 I answered him in Italian, I cannot tell 
 why. We had spoken before in French ; but 
 now the French words would not come to my 
 lips. 
 
 " You speak our language," he exclaimed, 
 with quick nervousness ; " then you must have 
 been here before." 
 
 I told him how lovingly I had learned his 
 tongue in my own home ; how it had come 
 to me like something which I had known of 
 old, just as Rome comes now. 
 
 " Strange," he muttered, half to himself. 
 " In your infancy, in your childhood, perhaps, 
 you were brought here. Memory has deep 
 hiding-places." 
 
 I told him that until a few months ago I had 
 never left New England ; that my parents before 
 me had never left it. 
 
 " Strange, very strange," he said again. 
 And then he asked me many questions about 
 myself, which showed me that in some way he 
 had learned what little there is to know of my 
 history. He had learned how I was born in 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 67 
 
 that far-off Boston which seems to me now like 
 a shadowy town in some unreal world; how 
 I grew np there, an only child ; how my 
 parents were dead ; how, at the bidding of my 
 kinsfolk, I was come here for the first time ; 
 how I was filled with the charm of Italy ; how 
 Rome seemed to me haunted with memories. 
 As he asked me if each of these things were 
 true, I answered him that they were, with 
 more and more marvel how he could know 
 them. 
 
 "And these memories that haunt you here," 
 he asked at last, " what are they like? Joyous 
 or sorrowful?" 
 
 Then I told him, in such words as would 
 come to me, how these strange feelings came 
 surging upon me like dark mists, the shape of 
 which I could not know ; how they blinded 
 my mind, and filled me more and more with 
 trembling, I knew not at what; how each thing 
 that seemed to me a thing that I had known 
 of old made the mists roll more thickly, made 
 the nameless terror greater ; how through it 
 
68 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 all I felt myself carried toward the work that 
 I have been made to do, the work, the duty, 
 of which as yet I have no glimpse. Sometimes 
 it has seemed to me that my life-work was to 
 be a great one, admired of men ; now, as it 
 draws nearer, it brings with it shapeless terrors 
 from which I fain would shrink. But ever my 
 life-current presses me onward amid these scenes 
 whose hidden meaning seems ever vaster. 
 
 As I spoke, the mystery of Rome gathered 
 about me more thickly than of old. I was 
 like one in a dream. I saw the old Cardi 
 nal as if he were afar off in his great chair ; 
 and the shaggy satyrs of wood grinned like 
 devils, and tossed their horned heads, and 
 would have rushed upon me, but that he held 
 them back with his thin white fingers. Then 
 I saw his face, full of strange excitement, look 
 ing now at me, and now at something which 
 lay on a table by his side in a fretted frame of 
 gold. And none but the grinning satyrs knew 
 the meaning of what was passing. 
 
 Then I heard him ask me with slow words 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 69 
 
 where these strange fancies oppressed me most, 
 what part of Rome seemed most charged with 
 mystic meaning. And I told him how his great 
 palace meant most to me of all I had seen ; and 
 I muttered words about the great Magdalene 
 into whose heart my spirit had entered. 
 
 "And I," he said, in a voice so tremulous 
 that the words would hardly come. " am I, 
 too, a thing that you have known?" 
 
 I could not tell. What I said I know not. 
 All was confusion. It was as if I had slept. 
 
 When I awoke he was speaking words of 
 comfort. The clouds of mystery were floating 
 away from me. And he was grand and calm 
 once more, as I had seen him first on the great 
 stairway of his palace. 
 
 " Truly," he was saying, " your life is a 
 mystery, a mystery full of sadness ; but the 
 time may come when the sadness shall be all 
 past, when the mystery shall be all clear. 
 Watch and wait. Come to me when you will. 
 To speak out such things as are in your mind 
 does men good. Do not fear to speak them to 
 
70 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 me, for I have known joy and sorrow and agony, 
 and life has taught me to feel for others whose 
 burdens are heavier than mine if so be it 
 such others there are that sympathy which 
 should make their burdens lighter. Speak to 
 me when you will. I will always listen. 
 And perhaps this friendship which begins so 
 strangely shall end for you and me in a joy 
 that neither of us knows to-day. God grant 
 that such may be His will." 
 
 His words were like a message of peace. I 
 found myself kneeling at his feet, pressing my 
 lips upon the blue-veined hand that let me 
 grasp it now. Then I turned up my eyes 
 toward his. He was looking down at me, still 
 amazed. And it seemed to me that even as 
 we looked upon one another then we had looked 
 before ; and though to look at one another now 
 brought peace to both, the thought of the looks 
 that we had cast upon one another in the name 
 less past brought back the shudder that had 
 swept over me when I stood before the Magda 
 lene. My eyes looked into his ; and he looked 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 71 
 
 down, first at me and then at something which 
 he held in his hand. It seemed like a miniature. 
 As he gazed at it the look of trouble came 
 creeping over his face again ; and he drew back 
 his hand as if he shrank from my touch. 
 
 Then, with a great effort, he laid the minia 
 ture on the table beside him, with its face down 
 so that none could see it; and his fingers 
 grasped instead a golden cross that hung about 
 his neck ; and the look of calmness came back 
 to his face. 
 
 " God be with you, my child," he said. 
 u Come to me when you will. Such comfort 
 as I can give, you shall have." 
 
 Then I left him alone in his carven chair. 
 But the shaggy satyrs grinned no more, but 
 gnashed their teeth in spite. 
 
VI. 
 
 From Beverly s Journal. 
 
 the first time since I was a child, my 
 life is neither a pleasure nor a burden ; 
 it is a fact, like the Tiber which I watched 
 to-day swirling under the Bridge of San An- 
 gelo ; like the Tiber, it is flowing onward 
 whither it knows not, but it is flowing as it 
 was made to flow. I am content. 
 
 I go to the Cardinal Colonna almost daily. 
 What draws me thither I know as little as 
 ever. I know only that in his presence I find 
 a semblance of the peace I yearn for. Yet 
 what I find there is not like the peace of the 
 blessed, that great contentment which comes 
 to happy souls when their work is done. It 
 is like the peace of one who has shuddered for 
 years in the fear that death may take him 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 73 
 
 unawares, and who finds himself at last face to 
 face with a fate that may not be shunned, and 
 breathes freely because the terrors of uncer 
 tainty are past ; yet all the time the death that 
 he sees before him is ever a vaster mystery. 
 
 Perhaps this feeling is foolish. I have tried 
 to speak of it to Cleveland ; but he laughed at 
 me, and I said no more. Yet in his laughter 
 he explained one thing that had seemed wonder 
 ful. How the Cardinal Colonna had come to 
 know the history of my life I could not guess. 
 Cleveland laughed again when I said so. Mon- 
 signor dei Bardi, he told me, who is deep in 
 bargaining with him about the great Magda 
 lene, had asked him many questions about 
 me. Doubtless, Monsignor had reported his 
 answers to the Cardinal before His Eminence 
 summoned me. 
 
 " Though why the devil His Eminence should 
 trouble himself about you," said Cleveland, " is 
 more than I can see. He never showed any 
 interest in us." 
 
 "And I m sure," said Cousin Abby, "we 
 
74 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 never wanted him to. The less you have to 
 do with Romish priests the better." 
 
 Cousin Abby is a stanch Protestant ; she 
 goes to all the services at the British Legation, 
 where decent English folk appear in black coats 
 and monstrous bonnets. 
 
 They are kind to me, these kinsfolk of mine. 
 I am grateful, I think, for their kindness ; bnt 
 in spite of myself they trouble me with their 
 constant talk of little things. The meanness 
 of life rises before me with every word they 
 speak. And when I speak frankly to them 
 they stare at me as if I were a madman. Per 
 haps while they stare they remember the old 
 story of my parents. With them I find it best 
 to keep my thoughts to myself. And thoughts 
 kept back surge and swell in my mind longing 
 to burst out, until I am in a great trouble ; 
 then, if I speak, ni}^ words are incoherent. So 
 things go on, from bad to worse. 
 
 With the Romans whom I have come to know 
 all is different. The movement of their life is 
 like the current of a great stream whose source 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 75 
 
 is hidden deep in a past forgotten by man, a 
 stream which is flowing on toward some unseen 
 future whither it is bearing all the world. And 
 the life that I have known in New England, the 
 life that my kinsfolk have brought with them 
 to Rome, is like some tiny whirlpool, full of 
 broken sticks and mean things, ever circling 
 round and round in some petty corner of a shore 
 that has caught it and keeps it apart from the 
 stream. 
 
 Though I have seen the Cardinal Colonna so 
 often I have never spoken of the mystery that 
 was upon us when first we met face to face. 
 Nor has he spoken of it to me. We talk of 
 common things, now of the old glory of Rome 
 and the beauty that still thrives in Roman sun 
 shine, now of the cold New England that has 
 passed out of my life like a troubled dream, 
 now of art and letters and men, never of our 
 selves. Indeed, that solemn moment when he 
 and I looked into one another s eyes and saw 
 there we knew not what seems to me now like 
 a dream, too. But it is like a dream from which 
 
76 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 I am not quite awakened, a dream into which, 
 I know not how or when, I may fall again. 
 
 I am beginning to feel that I have friends 
 here in Rome. The Cardinal Colonna has made 
 me known to the kinsfolk with whom he lives. 
 They have treated me with kindness. They bid 
 me come and go among them like one of them 
 selves. 
 
 Thin Monsignor dei Bardi looked doubtfully 
 upon me at first. He would peer at me with 
 his small eyes, as he handled his snuff-box, 
 wondering whether I had some hidden object 
 in making my way among these people. But 
 now, I think, he sees in me no more than a 
 harmless caprice of His Eminence ; and he glides 
 about as if I were not in the world. He has 
 smiles for all men, clever words for those who 
 wish them, supple bows for those who are 
 greater than he. Truly he is in the world if 
 ever man was. I smile now as I try to think 
 of him in the Heaven they preach about, where 
 business and smirking are unknown. 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 77 
 
 There is another man among these Romans 
 who treats me with small courtesy. It. is the 
 bald little Prince Palehi, who was with His 
 Eminence when I first came to him. The 
 Prince, they tell me, is the richest of modern 
 Romans. His father, who sprang no one knows 
 whence, made a great fortune in the troubled 
 times that came to all Europe after the Revolu 
 tion in France. When he died he was a great 
 banker ; and left his bank and his money and 
 his palaces and gardens to his dapper son. So, 
 favored by fortune, the small prince lives among 
 men whose names run back to the days of the 
 Caesars; there he makes formal bows, and shows 
 his white teeth in forced smiles, and plays with 
 his jewelled rings and charms, and prattles the 
 gossip of the hour, and has little thought for 
 men like me without a pedigree. But to the 
 great people of Rome he is cap in hand, and 
 when they deign to listen to what he says, 
 he looks vastly contented. 
 
 The one whom I see listen most is the Count 
 ess Barbarini. She stands at the head of the 
 
78 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 house before the world, for the Cardinal Colonna 
 never leaves his own rooms, where none may 
 come unless he bids them. She is such a figure 
 as my fancy makes those women who ruled the 
 Popes in the olden time. Olimpia Pamfili-Doria 
 might have been like her, with her yellow laces, 
 and her big eyes, and her disdainful lip, and her 
 plump hand with tapering fingers. She is kind 
 to the people about her, but she treats them all 
 as if they were made of meaner cla} r . Indeed, 
 I might have thought her disdainful of all things 
 except herself, had I not seen her once in the 
 ante-chamber of the Cardinal Colonna, glancing 
 at some accounts which a white-haired servant 
 had laid before her. As I passed through the 
 room, I heard her exclaim, 
 
 " What is this ? Fish ! " 
 
 " For the table of His Eminence," said the cring 
 ing servant. " The Holy Apostles themselves 
 could not have bought it for a lower price." 
 
 "Nino!" cried the Countess, "if ever you 
 expend such a princely fortune on fish again, 
 not all the Holy Apostles themselves, if they 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 79 
 
 came hat in hand, should prevent me from turn 
 ing you from my doors." 
 
 So, after all, there are things in life which 
 the stately Countess deigns to notice. 
 
 Among the men I see in her presence there 
 is one to whom I feel already as if he were 
 an old friend. This is the Count Luigi Orsini, 
 a godson of the Cardinal Colonna s. He is a 
 favorite with His Eminence, and comes and 
 goes here as if this were his home. His race 
 is among the oldest of Rome. He is an officer 
 in the Pope s guard. Sometimes he comes in 
 a uniform as grand as ever a school-boy painted 
 with his first box of colors. He is full of youth 
 ful life ; but the training of the world he lives 
 in keeps him calm in manner. And perhaps I 
 might have thought him as cool as Monsignor 
 himself, were it not for the warm grasp of his 
 hand, and for the fire with which he spoke to 
 me one day some verses of a Roman poet whose 
 name I had never heard. Monsignor dei Bardi 
 chanced to be by. As he listened to the verses 
 his smile was not pleasant. 
 
80 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 " Your poetry is very charming, Count," he 
 said at last, at the end of a stanza ; " but if I 
 were you I think I should prefer my uniform. 
 The two do not seem to me compatible." 
 
 "I am an Italian!" exclaimed the Count 
 Luigi, with all the warmth which the verses 
 had kindled. " No Italian can hear those words 
 without a thrill." 
 
 " They do not excite my enthusiasm," said 
 Monsignor drily. And when I had declined 
 his proffered snuff-box, and he had taken a 
 pinch in his discolored fingers, he moved away, 
 gently shaking the brown dust from his hand. 
 
 " That black fellow is a serpent," whispered 
 the Count, as Monsignor passed out of hearing ; 
 " he has no blood in his veins." The Count s 
 blood was burning red in his dark cheeks. 
 
 And Filippa I wonder why I have left her 
 till the last. I used to think that women had 
 no charm for me. At home, I am sure, they 
 had none. There they are good and pure, 
 better, perhaps, by the stern standards our an 
 cestors fixed than she whom I love to think of 
 
The Duchess Umilia. 81 
 
 here. Yet sometimes I like to fancy her among 
 them, with the grand fulness of her human life 
 gleaming beside their fading Northern beauty. 
 By her side they would seem like feeble copies 
 of what they were meant to be, as a Roman 
 statue looks when it is stood beside a Grecian 
 goddess. Her manner is simple, simpler than 
 the manner of lesser women. Yet as she was 
 when I saw her first on the Pincian Hill, when 
 floods of sunshine filled the air, and the great 
 dome of Saint Peter s was bathed in a mist of 
 golden blue, and faint music came with the 
 w r ind that rustled through the trees and the 
 flowers, so she is here in the dark palace of her 
 fathers. 
 
 In wild moments I have dared to think of 
 her as mine, to dream of clasping her in my 
 arms, or rather of sinking down before her 
 and flinging my arms about her knees while 
 she looks down, grand as ever, but with no 
 forbidding gaze. But when I try to think of 
 her with me, in the simple life that men and 
 women live together in my country, I laugh 
 6 
 
82 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 aloud. The Grecian goddess was no house- wife. 
 Yet is she the less to be adored for that ? 
 
 Do I love her, I wonder ? As I write the 
 words I laugh again at myself, but it is with 
 no happy laugh ; for with the laughter comes 
 the old thought that will not be laid to rest. 
 Even here, where all things seem full of peace, 
 I feel that I am ever moving on, as the rolling 
 earth moves on through the space where there 
 is nothing to check its moving, toward my 
 duty that lies hidden. When that thought 
 comes I know that to my life, whirling onward 
 toward I know not what, I may never link 
 another, even though that other were a thou 
 sand-fold less precious than hers of whom I 
 love to dream. Yes, I should count it a bless 
 ing that she has never smiled on me, save 
 with the courtesy which she shows to all who 
 are about her. For whither I go I must go 
 alone. 
 
 To-night the past seems far away, the future 
 near ; the past seems dark, the future bright. 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 83 
 
 I am like one who is awaking from a sleep that 
 has brought no rest. In God s name, let me 
 doze no more ! 
 
 I am just come from the rooms of the Count 
 ess Barbarini, whither I was bidden along with 
 the Romans who have come there of right all 
 their lives long. There I was silent, for I felt 
 little inclination to mingle with the company 
 about me. I stood aside, watching the cour 
 teous men and the stately women, calm until 
 they spoke, then speaking with volcanic fire. 
 Among them I saw Filippa. From her my 
 eyes cannot long depart when she is within 
 my sight. So I stood and watched her face 
 as she sat near by, not knowing that she was 
 watched. By her side was small Palchi, whose 
 bald head, with its fringe of crisp and perfumed 
 curls, gleamed in the light of the tapers like the 
 jewelled rings which I could see as he moved 
 his hand. He was talking to her with anima 
 tion, smiling and bowing and gesticulating as 
 vigorously as the innkeepers with whom my 
 vetturino squabbled on the road to Rome. But 
 
84 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 she listened with an air in which I saw at last 
 some shade of her mother s disdainful look, 
 and played with her fan, and looked about as 
 carelessly as if she sat alone. 
 
 By and by her eyes met mine ; arid it seemed 
 to me that I saw in them a look of pleasure, as 
 if she were glad to know that I was by. But 
 her eyes did not rest on me, but wandered on 
 toward others. And I stood, wondering for the 
 first time whether the thoughts of her which 
 more and more fill my mind had shown them 
 selves unknown to me. Women, they say, look 
 deep. If she has seen my heart, she has seen 
 things that as yet I have not dared tell in words 
 even to myself. 
 
 Presently she looked toward me again. Then, 
 more than before, I saw that her look was 
 friendly. So I passed to her side and spoke 
 I know not what formal words. 
 
 When I came she held me out her hand, and 
 I, for the first time, bowed over it and kissed 
 it, as I had seen the Romans do. Then, as I 
 rose up again and looked into her face, I saw 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 85 
 
 that she was looking at me with no displeasure ; 
 but she looked at me no longer than a maiden 
 should. I felt a throbbing in all my veins. 
 Standing by her side I knew only that I was 
 there. I spoke stiffly, for no thought would 
 come to my mind save that I must not speak 
 what I felt. And Palchi, who never left his 
 seat, tried to turn her from me, with fine compli 
 ments; but she turned away from him instead, 
 hardly deigning to answer the talk which he 
 rolled off as glibly as if it were a lesson that 
 he had just learned. Yet she listened with a 
 smile to the nothings that I stammered, and 
 answered them as simply as they were spoken. 
 And it seemed to me that just as I was happy 
 with a troubled joy at her side, so she was 
 happy at mine ; that if Palchi had risen and 
 gone she would have been as glad as I. 
 
 But Palchi would not go. And presently 
 came her stately mother, who spoke to me so 
 that I could stay by Filippa no longer. I 
 turned to speak my farewell. As she answered 
 me she let fall some flowers which had been in 
 
86 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 her hand ; and kneeling to pick them up, I 
 took one and kept it hidden. Whether she 
 knew what I had done, I cannot tell ; but in 
 her look as she bade me farewell there was no 
 displeasure. 
 
 So, after I had spoken with the Countess 
 Barbarini and with others who were about her, 
 I came away. And here I sit writing of 
 Filippa, thinking of her, forgetting the self 
 that has haunted me so long. The thought 
 of self comes, as old habits will, in spite of all 
 we can do ; but when it comes to-night I look 
 at the flower which she has held in her hand. 
 I kiss it, speaking her name. Then I think of 
 nothing but of her. 
 
 So my life glides on in Rome, now with my 
 own kinsfolk, now with the old Cardinal Colonna 
 and his. All things seem to smile, even the 
 Roman girl who more and more fills my thoughts. 
 In truth, Filippa is so full of gentle courtesy that 
 I begin to dream of a time not far off when I 
 shall dare, after the manner of her country, to 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 87 
 
 speak of what I feel to those who may grant me 
 the right to speak of it to her. Yet even in her 
 presence, where I am filled with such love as 
 makes me forget all other things, there comes to 
 me little peace. The old feeling that I strive 
 to trample down rises above all, and bids me 
 gaze onwards toward the duty that I cannot 
 discern nor yet forget. There is within me 
 a voice which whispers that this passion to 
 which I yield myself up is a devil s snare. In 
 wiser moments I reason with myself, thinking 
 how men who love are alwa}^s tortured with 
 disquiet until their love is blest ; and I laugh 
 at my folly as others would laugh. But my 
 laugh sounds hollow. 
 
 When I come to the old Cardinal Colonna 
 all is changed. In his presence I find a peace 
 that I never find elsewhere. Yet even that is 
 only such peace as a soldier finds when he lays 
 him down with his arms upon him, never know 
 ing when the order may come nor whither it 
 may bid him go. From the Cardinal I am just 
 come ; and I feel still some remnant of the 
 
88 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 peace which his presence sheds about him. 
 But now again the form of Filippa rises before 
 my eyes; and there is a part of me that will 
 think of nothing else, just as there is another 
 part which bids me turn my eyes another way. 
 
 As I write these lines the clouds that I dread 
 are gathering before my eyes once more, the 
 clouds wherein sits Magdalene, groaning in 
 all the misery of her guilt. I seem to know 
 that it is to her side that I should press on, 
 nor rest beside this siren girl of old Rome. 
 But now, again, I look upon the flower that 
 I found at her feet, and I kiss it, murmuring 
 her name ; and in that murmur all other 
 thoughts are drowned. 
 
vn. 
 
 From Beverly s Journal. 
 
 I AM in a great trouble. I have let myself 
 wander from the path that I should tread. 
 I have striven to silence the voice that called 
 me back. Even now I would fain be weak : I 
 would fain tell myself that I have been betrayed, 
 that the girl upon whom I have let my thoughts 
 dwell has played with the honest love which 
 she saw hidden in my eyes, that it was to spite 
 dapper Palchi that she smiled upon me first, 
 that then it pleased her fancy to see so strange 
 a creature as I lying at her feet. But now at 
 last I am gaining strength enough to blame my 
 folly and no deed of hers, for the trouble I 
 suffer. 
 
 To-day I was making my way to the Cardinal 
 Colonna, thinking as I went of the peace that I 
 
90 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 have found in his presence. I came to the ante 
 chamber through which those who go to him 
 must pass. There I found an open door ; and 
 looking through it, I saw sitting in an inner 
 room the Countess Barbarini. She was busy, 
 as I had seen her before, with household matters, 
 of which she talked to her old servant. Near 
 by sat Filippa, whose presence brought back to 
 me thoughts of love. So I stopped for a while 
 where I could not be seen, and looked at her, 
 marvelling, as I have always marvelled when 
 she passed before my eyes, at the beauty which 
 is hers. 
 
 For a while I fancied that she sat alone, think 
 ing I knew not what girlish thoughts. And it 
 seemed to me that I had never seen her face so 
 full of life and of passion, that I had never seen 
 such meaning in her eyes. I wondered at what 
 her fancy looked. In my foolish heart, I dared 
 to guess that it was I ; and I longed to pass 
 within the room and to stand where she could 
 see me. But presently I saw her lips move as 
 if she spoke in a whisper to one who was near 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 91 
 
 but hidden from me. I felt my heart beat fast 
 as there came to me the thought that there 
 might be another to whom she looked and spoke 
 thus, as never save in my fancy had she looked 
 or spoken to me. I moved myself a little, to 
 see if perchance there was any one by her side. 
 And when I came where I could see who was 
 there, it was with a great effort that I kept my 
 self from crying out in rage. 
 
 For beside her sat one who is suffered to 
 come and go here as if he were her brother, 
 though no tie of kindred binds them. It was 
 the Count Luigi. While the Countess Barba- 
 rini s back was turned, and she was busy with 
 matters that filled her mind, he was whispering 
 to Filippa. None but she could hear his words ; 
 but though I could not hear them I could guess 
 their meaning. For no man speaks with such a 
 face, and no woman hears with such blushes, any 
 words but words of love. Then, if I could have 
 wished for more to tell me that what I guessed 
 was true, I saw him take her hand in his. And 
 she, glancing at her mother to make sure that 
 
92 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 her eyes were elsewhere, suffered him to take it 
 and to press it to his lips. 
 
 When I saw that, I could look no more. 
 I stood aside where none could see me from 
 within. I leaned against the wall, full of pas 
 sion such as those feel who have murder in their 
 hearts. Within myself I cried out that she had 
 tricked me, that she had played with the love 
 that had taken possession of my being. Then, 
 with no pause for thought, I took from my 
 bosom a little packet in which I had wrapped 
 the flower which when she first smiled on me I 
 had taken at her feet. I looked at it once, full 
 of rage. Then I flung it down and trampled 
 on it, doing dishonor to her who smiled as she 
 played me false. 
 
 But then came other thoughts. Was not this 
 sight that I thought I had seen only another 
 strange fancy, like the cloudy dreams of fate 
 that I had striven to forget ? Was it in truth 
 the girl that I had dared to love and the man 
 that I had grown to deem my friend, whom I 
 had seen within, clasping one another s hands? 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 I rubbed my eyes ; and gathering up my cour 
 age, stepped again to a spot whence I could see 
 them. 
 
 All was as it had been before. The stately 
 Countess still sat talking of money to her ser 
 vant. Behind her still sat the lovers, with no 
 eyes now save for one another, their hands still 
 clasped together, their lips still moving with 
 whispers that I could not hear, their cheeks still 
 flushing with the happiness that I might never 
 know. 
 
 Then, shrinking back, I trampled once again 
 on the withered flower that I had loved to kiss. 
 And so I turned away from them, who cast no 
 look on me ; and with unsteady step I made 
 my way to the room where the Cardinal Co- 
 lonna is used to sit. He had bidden me come 
 when I would, and not trouble myself with any 
 announcement of my coming. So, as had grown 
 my custom, I passed within the door-way, and 
 looked for the gentle figure that should sit 
 ready to breathe upon me such comfort as 
 I yearned for. But his great carven chair 
 
94 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 was empty, and the footstool that stood beside 
 it was overturned as if he had arisen in haste. 
 And it seemed to me, when I found that he was 
 not where I had looked to find him, as if all the 
 world were bound to spite me. Like a peevish 
 child I was about to cry out. But of a sudden 
 I saw where he was gone ; and I was awed into 
 silence. 
 
 For across the great room there stood a carven 
 cross, on which was the form of Christ in the 
 great agony that he suffered for the sins of men. 
 And before it, on a wooden form such as I have 
 seen in the common churches, knelt the old Car 
 dinal. His eyes were fixed upon the image ; his 
 face was turned away from me. But I could 
 see his thin white hands clasped tight together, 
 and I could hear the low voice in which he 
 breathed forth a passionate prayer. 
 
 I stood and watched him with such feelings 
 as have come to me when I have entered a 
 great church, where in the dim light I have 
 found myself of a sudden standing before the 
 priests of God, breathing the incense and list- 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 95 
 
 ening to the mystic words of the mass. The pet 
 tiness of the things that had worried my heart 
 made me ashamed. The thought of the woman 
 whose earthly beauty had dazzled my eyes until 
 they could see no other thing, seemed as nothing 
 in the presence of this man, who, more than 
 any other that I have known, deserves the name 
 of holy. For as the years have borne him on 
 nearer and nearer to the end of the pilgrimage 
 of his life, he has kept himself more and more 
 apart from the things that men love. His mind 
 is fixed on Heaven. In the midst of this Old 
 World which my countrymen would teach me to 
 think full of evil, he has moved ever onwards 
 toward that oldest world which Rome, with all 
 her weakness and her wavering, has ever kept 
 in sight, even as Peter kept his Lord. And 
 now I found him here, face to face with the 
 Master to whom he has given his loyal life. 
 
 For a while it was enough to stand and watch 
 him. At last there came to me a great desire 
 to kneel at his side, and there pour forth a con 
 fession of the weakness that had let me turn 
 
96 The Dtichess Emilia. 
 
 from the path I was made to tread. I longed to 
 speak a prayer that I might forget the love that 
 for a moment had filled my heart, a prayer of 
 blessing upon that other love which shall make 
 Filippa s life happy, whatever fate may come to 
 me. I longed to pray that, like the man who 
 knelt before me, I might have strength to press 
 onward to my work which some day I shall 
 clearly see; to pray, too, that the day when 
 my life-work shall no longer be a mystery 
 be not long in coming. So I stirred myself; 
 and with soft step, lest the sound of my pres 
 ence should disturb him, I moved toward his 
 side. 
 
 The great chair where he was used to sit was 
 in my way; and at its feet there lay on the 
 marble floor something that sparkled. When 
 I came close to it I saw that it was the little 
 frame of gold that he had held on the day when 
 I first came here to his presence. It lay there 
 as if it had fallen when he had risen up. What 
 image that frame held I had never seen. I had 
 done better to pass it by without a look ; for as 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 97 
 
 my eye first caught sight of it, I felt creeping 
 through me such horror as came to me when 
 I looked upon the Magdalene who could not 
 cast away her sin, such horror as I felt 
 when first I knelt at the old Cardinal s feet. 
 Yet, though I seemed to know that what I 
 wished to see was an evil thing, it charmed me, 
 as sin charmed our fathers in the garden of 
 Paradise. I stretched forth my hand and took 
 the frame, and looked upon what was within 
 it. Then I stood still and trembled. 
 
 For there in the golden frame was the painted 
 figure of a woman, dressed in the garb that women 
 wore when the old Cardinal was young. Her 
 dark eyes looked upon me with a look that I had 
 known before. At first I could not tell where 
 I had known it. But then, of a sudden, I knew 
 that her face was mine, that mine was hers, 
 that the eyes that looked upon me from the 
 painted face were the eyes that had looked upon 
 me from my mirror ever since memory began. 
 
 Then more than ever I knew I could not 
 tell how the vileness of my life, breathing out 
 
 7 
 
98 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 its time with no good deeds, droning useless 
 through the earth where it was made to work. 
 The great eyes of the portrait bade me be 
 doing. But what ? what? I could not tell. 
 I cannot tell. Within myself I cried out, " Be 
 merciful, Lord, to me a sinner!" Bat I made 
 no sound. And as I stood trembling, there 
 came to my ears the words of the old Cardinal s 
 prayer : 
 
 " Save me, O Lord. Take my thoughts from 
 the things of this world to Thy holy will. Give 
 me strength to cast off the evil memories of the 
 past that I have striven to trample down within 
 me ; to look to Thee, to Thee alone, in the infi 
 nite goodness and mercy that Thou hast prom 
 ised them who give themselves to Thee." 
 
 Then I knew that this was no place for me to 
 sta) r . And very quietly I turned away and left 
 the old man in the midst of his prayer. But all 
 the time I held the portrait in my hand. I have 
 it with me now. As I look upon it and see 
 again my own face, I am filled ever with a 
 deeper horror. What meaning lies within it I 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 99 
 
 cannot tell. But it has a meaning which shall 
 not long lie hidden. The painted eyes look 
 upon me with a warning that the work for 
 which I was born is at hand. In God s name, 
 let it come quickly ! 
 
VIII. 
 
 FOR some time after this entry there are few 
 coherent words in Beverly s faded old 
 journal. Indeed, I thought for a while that 
 there was nothing to show what happened to 
 him in that Roman world so near us in time, 
 so far away in all things else until he began 
 to write again with such calmness as it was his 
 lot to know. One day, however, I found among 
 some papers of my father s a packet of letters 
 from Cleveland. One or two of them throw 
 light on Beverly s story ; and it seems to me 
 that I cannot do better than give here the pas 
 sages that have told me all I know of what 
 happened now. 
 
 " A queer thing has happened to Beverly," 
 writes Cleveland, " after the fashion that queer 
 things have of happening to queer people. I 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 101 
 
 sometimes think that our ideas of the common 
 place are only the quintessence of our own pe 
 culiar sort of queerness. A Roman studio is my 
 bread-mill, for example ; and you probably find 
 it hard to imagine a life that is not busied with 
 making cotton and money up on the Merrimac. 
 Bat I must come back to Beverly, or they will 
 be making you pay double postage. 
 
 " I told you how he had been taken up by the 
 Cardinal Colonna, who has never been known to 
 do anything civil to a foreigner before. We 
 have lived here in his palace for a couple of 
 years, and it is as much as ever that we have 
 seen him drive out in his coach. In fact, all the 
 Romans are ridiculously exclusive. I do not 
 imagine that they exclude us from a particularly 
 amusing society. 
 
 " Why the Cardinal should have taken a fancy 
 to Beverly I could not quite see. But as I had 
 happened to be in a way of letting his chaplain 
 know that Beverly had a comfortable fortune, 
 I thought it possible that they had a notion of 
 making a match for him with a handsome young 
 
102 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 woman, who is a niece of the Cardinal s, and has 
 no dowry to speak of. This seemed improbable, 
 though ; Romans have great ideas of family, and 
 do not appreciate that we have such a thing as 
 social distinction without titles. Seriously, I 
 don t believe that they understand the differ 
 ence between me and a common native copyist. 
 
 " Beverly s queer adventure explains the 
 whole matter. A few days ago he came to me 
 with a disturbed countenance, and demanded a 
 private interview. So we sat in conclave in my 
 studio ; and there, with much mystery, he pro 
 duced a miniature which, as nearly as I can 
 make out his rather incoherent story, he seems 
 to have stolen from the Cardinal Colonna. Of 
 course I shall make him return it. 
 
 " The miniature was the portrait of a woman, 
 painted thirty or forty years ago. When Bev 
 erly showed it to me I saw nothing remarkable 
 about it except a curiously familiar look. I 
 could hardly have seen the original, yet the face 
 struck me as one that I knew perfectly well. I 
 asked him who it was. He said that he did not 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 103 
 
 know. Whereupon I remarked that it was very 
 well painted. 
 
 " Whom is it like ? he said, interrupting me. 
 
 " 4 1 don t know, said I. 
 
 u Look ! look ! he exclaimed rather wildly. 
 So I looked ; and all of a sudden I saw that the 
 face was curiously like his own. 
 
 " The likeness was not in feature nor in 
 color; it was in expression, in what I call 
 type. You know I have always had a theory 
 that if you got together a dozen people of any 
 race you please, from Italians to Esquimaux, 
 taking care that no two of them looked alike, 
 and then carefully studied each face, you would 
 have classified humanity. Everybody you meet 
 will look like one of the lot. In other words, 
 the chance that one man will look like another 
 is about one in twelve. Of course in this 
 hybrid nineteenth century most people will look 
 like two or three others. Nothing is rarer than 
 a pure type. Now, the one thing that has 
 chiefly impressed me in Beverly is that his face 
 is as purely typical in its own way as Napoleon s 
 
104 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 was in another. And this woman, whose 
 picture he had found, was a remarkably pure 
 example of the same type as Beverly s. As far 
 as I could judge from the portrait, they were 
 no more alike in feature than you with your 
 Roman nose and I with my pug. All the same 
 the likeness was really startling. It is not sur 
 prising that Beverly, who has not paid much 
 attention to this sort of thing, thought the 
 resemblance uncanny. 
 
 "Indeed, I could not make him understand 
 my view of the matter, though in order to 
 explain it I sketched two or three types in a 
 way that seemed to me rather good. He in 
 sisted that there was some hidden mystery 
 about the likeness, and that the Cardinal 
 Colonna knew what the mystery was and 
 would not tell. The Cardinal, it seems, has 
 had a way of looking at this picture when 
 Beverly was about, and has acted as if he 
 attached a good deal of value to it. 
 
 " Here, I thought, was a clue. I examined 
 the miniature with care. The frame was sur- 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 105 
 
 mounted with a ducal coronet. The Colonna 
 arms were worked into it. ID a moment it 
 flashed across me that this was the portrait of the 
 beautiful Duchess Emilia, the wife of the Cardi 
 nal s brother. They say that the Cardinal was 
 once her lover. The story is rather interesting." 
 
 And here Cleveland goes on to tell the story 
 of the Duchess Emilia, much as I have told it 
 already. 
 
 " The whole matter is clear enough now," he 
 concludes. " The old Cardinal, whose wits are 
 pretty well worn out with praying and waiting 
 for the chair of Saint Peter, has been carried 
 away with the likeness between the dead Duchess 
 and Beverly. Probably he has a misty sort of 
 idea that Beverly is her son and possibly his. 
 I explained this to Beverly. He said nothing ; 
 but shook his head incredulously, and seemed 
 dreadfully shocked at the naughtiness of his 
 double. He is not in a healthy state of mind." 
 
 The rest of this letter has nothing to do 
 with Beverly. Another letter, however, gives 
 
106 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 a glimpse of him and of what was going on 
 about him. I do not know exactly when it 
 was written. It is dated simply " Wednesday," 
 after a fashion affected by Cleveland, who 
 avoided formulas which suggested the commer 
 cial traditions of his family. On the whole, I 
 think that it was probably written some little 
 time after the next entries which I am going 
 to quote from Beverly s journal ; but in a nar 
 rative so fragmentary as this chronological order 
 is of little importance. I think that Cleveland s 
 second letter may best be put here. 
 
 " I am sorry to say," he writes, " that we 
 have had a misunderstanding with Beverly. I 
 hardly know who is to blame. Abby began it, 
 I suppose ; but really he had no business to 
 take offence. For the rest, it does not amount 
 to much. By the time this reaches you there 
 will doubtless have been a grand reconciliation. 
 
 " Abby, you know, is a tremendous Protes 
 tant, a good deal more of one than she used 
 to be at home. For here she sees hardly any- 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 107 
 
 body except travelling English people, who are 
 inclined to believe that the Pope is Anti-Christ, 
 and that all priests have cloven hoofs. They 
 are fond of being presented at the Vatican all 
 the same, perhaps from a natural desire to 
 get a notion of the lurid surroundings from 
 which their apostolic faith is sure to deliver 
 them in the next world. So Abby hates a 
 priest, with a beautifully simple hatred. 
 
 " When Beverly took to going to the Cardinal 
 Colonna s she was much alarmed for his spirit 
 ual welfare. She had no doubt that they were 
 trying to pervert him, as she expressed it. I 
 did not think her idea very plausible, and told 
 her so. Beverly is not worth the trouble of a 
 full-blown cardinal. His fortune might deserve 
 the attention of a third-rate monsignor, but cer 
 tainly not of a more exalted personage. But 
 Abby is remarkably feminine. She does not 
 often have an idea of her own ; and when she 
 gets hold of one, I think it improbable that the 
 devil himself could shake it. Reasoning is to 
 her what a shower is to a duck. She is inclined 
 
108 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 to believe that the Cardinal Colonna had the 
 mysterious picture painted for the special pur 
 pose of luring Beverly into the Romish fold. 
 
 "A few days ago they had it out in spite of 
 me. Beverty came to dine with us. He had 
 been at the Cardinal Colonna s during the day, 
 and happened to mention it. Whereupon Abby 
 began to dilate upon the errors of Romanism 
 and the trickery of priests. Finally, she de 
 clared her opinion that he was in great danger. 
 He flushed, and professed not to understand her. 
 She proceeded to state that in her opinion the 
 Cardinal Colonna was laying snares for his soul. 
 
 " You are quite wrong, said Beverly. The 
 Cardinal Colonna has never spoken to me of 
 religion. 
 
 " c He will not speak to you, said Abby. He 
 is too crafty. He will act upon you without 
 your knowing it. 
 
 " If so, said Beverly shortly, so be it. 
 
 " Richard, said Abby, with much solemnity, 
 your danger is even greater than I thought, 
 1 must protest against your entering the Cardi- 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 109 
 
 rial s doors again. Heaven knows what may 
 come of it. 
 
 u Then, said Beverly, 4 we will leave it to 
 Heaven. I must beg you to say no more. 
 
 " But Abby would not be silenced. She went 
 on to produce some tracts with which she had 
 been furnished by an Anglican parson. And 
 before I knew it, Beverly had arisen and stalked 
 out of the room in a dudgeon, followed by 
 Abby s not very conciliatory assurance that she 
 should pray for him. 
 
 u This was bad enough. He has not been 
 near us since. Still, I was not mixed up in it. 
 The next day, however, as luck would have it, 
 came another difficulty, which embroiled me. 
 You know that I have been negotiating with 
 the Colonnas for a Titian. A man named 
 Slocum, from Providence, wants to buy it. 
 You know him, I think, in a business way. 
 Well, after no end of trouble I had arranged 
 a bargain which seemed satisfactory ; but when 
 it came to making the final arrangements there 
 turned out to be a difficulty. Slocum wanted 
 
110 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 to pay in the damaged kind of currency that 
 most Italians are contented to put up with. 
 The Countess Barbarini, a vicious old harri 
 dan if ever there was one, insisted that the 
 price should be paid in gold. Things came to 
 a standstill again ; and bargaining enough began 
 to delight the souls of all the dead Yankees. 
 Beverly happened to hear of the affair. He 
 was in my studio one afternoon when Slocum 
 called. As soon as Slocum was gone Beverly 
 declared that he would buy the picture himself 
 rather than have it desecrated by such chaffering. 
 It is a fine Magdalene, a remarkable piece of color 
 ing which has taken Beverly s eye. He requested 
 me to tell the Countess that he would pay her 
 price. Of course I was in duty bound to warn 
 Slocum. And Slocum thereupon offered to pay 
 a lot more. He did n t propose, he remarked, 
 4 to let nobody get ahead of him. Evidently 
 he would pay as much as anybody else would 
 offer. There was no sense in using Beverly as 
 a cat s-paw. So I arranged matters for Slocum 
 and wrote to Beverly that he had been outbid. 
 
The Duchess Emilia. Ill 
 
 " He sent me back a single line : 4 It is best 
 as it is, I suppose. That was all. He has not 
 come near me since. You would fancy that I 
 had done him an injury. 
 
 " Slocum s behavior about the Titian is di 
 verting. He has paid a round sum for it 
 without a murmur. Now he is making arrange 
 ments to send it home by a third-rate sailing 
 ship from Civita Vecchia, because that will save 
 freight. It would cost him fifty or seventy-five 
 dollars more to send it safe by a regular line. 
 
 " By the way, it is certain that the Colonnas 
 had no idea of capturing Beverly for their 
 handsome niece. She has just been formally 
 betrothed to the Prince Palchi, a sort of 
 Roman Rothschild. He has a fortune big 
 enough for three ; his grandfather was a peas 
 ant. He wants blood ; the Colonnas want 
 money. It is a capital match." 
 
 And then Cleveland wanders off to other 
 matters. Of Beverly he says no more. Nor 
 does Beverly s journal speak of him for some 
 
112 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 time to come. The breach which was opened 
 by the well-meant meddling of Mrs. Cleveland 
 and the perfectly business-like behavior of her 
 husband seems never quite to have closed. I 
 suspect that the Clevelands were more to blame 
 than the artist s letter would indicate. To have 
 their kinsman walk over their heads into a soci 
 ety from which they were excluded was certainly 
 annoying. Probably they showed their annoy 
 ance without meaning to. But it is not worth 
 while for me to waste time in speculations. 
 
 One word, however, I may add to this chapter. 
 Mr. Slocum s Magdalene never reached America. 
 The ship in which he sent it from Civita Vec- 
 chia sprung a leak in mid-ocean. There she 
 was met by a steamer, which saved her crew 
 and left her to her fate. So the great Titian 
 lies at the bottom of the Atlantic. 
 
 Now I must come back to Beverly, whose 
 journal begins to grow coherent once more. 
 
IX. 
 
 From Beverly s Journal. 
 
 T7MILIA COLONNA ! until Cleveland 
 - spoke the name I had never heard it. 
 Yet it echoed through my mind, raising up 
 answering thoughts, as a trumpet-blast, they 
 say, rouses the fading memories of an age-worn 
 soldier. These thoughts are all confused ; but 
 I can see enough to know that they are no 
 thoughts of peace. And strive how I may I 
 cannot lay them to the rest whence they have 
 sprung into being. It is a mere guess of Cleve 
 land s which tells me that the face of this por 
 trait that lies before me, the face that I have 
 known as mine, is the face of the sinful woman 
 who lived and died here before I came into the 
 world, for she died, they tell me, in the very 
 year in which I was born. It cannot be, men 
 would say, that in the life through which I have 
 
 8 
 
114 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 moved hither from the quiet places where first 
 I looked on the light, her being can have had to 
 do with mine. Yet day by day and hour by 
 hour I am growing to know that the message 
 of the portrait is a message from her, from 
 Emilia Colonna. 
 
 Her name sends through me a thrill deeper 
 than the thrill that came from her face alone, 
 when her name was still a secret. It arouses 
 again the thoughts that came to me when I 
 stood before the great Titian. Her life was 
 Magdalene s, with all its agony, and with no 
 sainthood to bless its end. I seem to see her 
 deep in the toils of sin, casting heavenward, 
 from her Roman palace, eyes that cannot 
 pierce the ceilings whence the painted gods 
 of the pagans grin clown upon her with smiles 
 that the old Christians taught were the smiles 
 of Hell. I seem to see, too, the old Cardinal 
 in the midst of his prayer. Between them 
 there is an empty place. I press forward to 
 take it; and the rolling clouds gather about 
 me again, and I am in a great mist, moving 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 115 
 
 I know not whither. In God s name, let the 
 light come ! 
 
 They have been haggling over the great 
 Titian as if it were some trumpery trinket in 
 a Roman shop, the grinning Florentine, and 
 the hard-faced Countess, and the sharp-voiced 
 Yankee. I have bidden Cleveland take it from 
 them. It shall be mine. To look at it gives 
 me no delight ; but when I look at it, thoughts 
 come to me on which it is right that my mind 
 should dwell. For me, for me alone, the old 
 Venetian drew it unawares, three hundred years 
 ago, and left it behind him, never dreaming of 
 its mission. It shall not be dishonored by the 
 barter of these hagglers. 
 
 The great Titian is gone. It is best as it is, 
 I suppose. That marvellous form will pass out 
 of my life : if time will let it fade out of my 
 memory too, I shall be the happier if not the 
 better. Yet I am sick at heart when I think of 
 the Magdalene, in all her old-world glory, spread 
 
116 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 out before the eyes of the busy, trading world 
 that I have left behind me. It is as if my heart 
 were opened to be stared at by the multitude. 
 It is as if all the secrets of my life, the riddles 
 that I myself cannot read, the dead Duchess 
 and the old Cardinal, their nameless agonies and 
 mine, were flung before the people for a show : 
 such a show the old Romans revelled in when 
 the wicked emperors ruled them. 
 
 There is no strength in me. I was cured, I 
 thought, of the love I had felt for Filippa. I 
 had fought out the fight within myself. I was 
 content to leave her as I had found her, to look 
 upon her from afar off, to see her choose a fitting 
 mate from among the men who lived about her. 
 When I thought of the words of love that in 
 my presence she had whispered to the Count 
 Luigi, I felt my jealous sorrow no more. " It is 
 best as it is," I said. In my heart I blessed the 
 happiness which I dreamed was theirs. 
 
 For it was all a dream, all save that she 
 may not be mine, that my fate bids me harden 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 117 
 
 my heart against all thoughts that are not of 
 the duty that shall be revealed to me when the 
 time shall come. She will never be his any 
 more than she shall be mine. She is betrothed, 
 betrothed to bald Palchi. 
 
 They make a grand ceremony of betrothal, 
 these Romans. I knew nothing of what was 
 doing until to-day, when once more I was mak 
 ing my way to the old Cardinal. I have said 
 no word to him of how I found him at his 
 prayer, of how I took the picture that strives 
 to show me how his life and mine are knit 
 together. But I have seen him many times ; 
 and each time that I have come to his presence 
 I have felt more and more how foul a lie is that 
 which would whisper that he, who sheds about 
 him the blessing of holiness, wrought the sin 
 that makes the dead Emilia groan. Yet all 
 the same I have known that he could tell me 
 the secret that lies hidden in her painted eyes. 
 Each time that I have come to him, I have 
 come to beg that he would speak. Each time, 
 when I have found him in all his holiness, I 
 
118 TJie Duchess Emilia. 
 
 have shrunk from calling up any thought of 
 evil things. In his presence I have been con 
 tent to breathe the air of peace. Each time I 
 have come from him with the words which 
 I have had to say unspoken. Then each time I 
 have called myself coward, and bidden myself 
 gather courage to ask him the meaning of all. 
 
 To-day when his doors were opened to me, 
 I heard an unwonted stir within ; and found 
 before me Monsignor dei Bardi, who seemed 
 to be awaiting some guest. When he saw me 
 he stepped forward, and told me with civil 
 words that to-day I could not be admitted. 
 A ceremony was about to take place, the 
 ceremony of betrothal ; none but the kinsfolk 
 of the couple were to be present. 
 
 I could not trust my ears ; I muttered some 
 half-foolish questions. Monsignor repeated what 
 he had said : 
 
 u I regret that I must ask you to withdraw. 
 It has been stipulated that none but their rela 
 tives shall witness the betrothal of the Prince 
 Palchi and the Contessina Filippa Barbarini." 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 119 
 
 Stupidly, hardly knowing what I did, I turned 
 away ; and turning, found myself face to face 
 with the dapper prince. He was coming in full 
 dress, with three or four sparkling orders on his 
 breast, to play his part in the ceremony. I 
 bowed, and spoke words of formal congratula 
 tion. Not one of them was true. In an instant 
 I was ashamed that I had spoken them. 
 
 " I am sensible of the honor of your felicita 
 tions," said the little prince, bowing until his 
 bald head was half-way down to his varnished 
 boots ; "I am indeed the most fortunate of 
 men." 
 
 And with that he passed within the doors, 
 which closed behind him. 
 
 When I was left alone, I wanted air. I must 
 breathe. I must gather my thoughts together. 
 For the moment all things save Filippa had fled 
 from my mind. I stumbled down the great 
 stairway, hardly knowing where I trod. A 
 man hastening upward was in my way. We 
 stopped face to face. It was the Count Luigi. 
 He was very pale. I looked at him for an 
 
120 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 instant in silence. His suffering, I thought, is 
 more than mine. From him a life of glorious 
 happiness is being snatched away. I have noth 
 ing to complain of save that my dreams are only 
 dreams. I have slept, and thought myself a 
 good spirit breathing blessings upon men ; I 
 wake to find that I am none. That is all. His 
 is the real misery. 
 
 He looked at me as I looked at him. In his 
 face I saw all the suffering that he felt. In 
 mine I trust he saw the sympathy that filled my 
 heart. I held him out my hand. 
 
 " They have told me what is passing," I said. 
 " God be with you, friend." 
 
 He stood for a moment without a word. Then, 
 of a sudden, he flung his arms about me and 
 kissed my cheek. 
 
 " God bless you for your gentle word," he 
 half sobbed. " You are worthy to be called a 
 friend. You do not belong in this foul Old 
 World of ours. You come from a land where 
 men are men and not slaves, where life is life 
 and not a prison." 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 121 
 
 Then, with another embrace, he was gone ; 
 and I was left alone. I heard the great doors 
 close behind him. As I passed through the 
 court-yard and out through the narrow street, 
 I made my way among blazoned coaches and 
 trampling horses that had borne their masters to 
 the grand ceremony. And I wandered aimless 
 through the Roman streets, while in the palace 
 that I had left behind me Filippa was pledging 
 her faith to the dapper prince. 
 
 It must not be. It shall not be. Her life 
 shall not be flung away upon such a man as her 
 hard-faced mother has bidden her smile on. 
 Her gallant lover shall not be cast aside. I will 
 go to the Cardinal Giulio. He sits alone, his 
 eyes fixed on Heaven, forgetting the world 
 about him in his thoughts of the world to come. 
 He knows not, in his holiness, what is done 
 within his own doors. I will show him. A word 
 from him shall cast down the evil edifice that 
 they are rearing ; for with all his holiness he is 
 still the head of their house, and in that house 
 
122 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 his word is law. I will go to him. He will speak 
 the word that shall free her. And then, on my 
 way through life, I shall have done one small 
 good deed ; I shall not have waited idly for the 
 work that is preparing. 
 
 I have seen him, alone again in the great room 
 which his presence had seemed to sanctify. I 
 am come away full of disquiet. I have built me 
 a house of dreams ; a breath has cast it down. 
 
 He was alone, I say ; and welcomed me with 
 as kind a smile as ever. 
 
 " It is good of you to come," he said ; " you 
 always bring me happiness." And he held out 
 his blue- veined hand, on which, as had grown 
 my custom, I pressed my lips. Then for a little 
 while I was abashed and said nothing ; but sat 
 still as I had sat with him before, full of confi 
 dence that he was good and faithful, sure that he 
 felt a like confidence in me. A woman might 
 sit so with her lover. 
 
 Finally I gathered up my courage, and asked 
 him if he knew what was done yesterday. 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 123 
 
 " Surely," he said, " yesterday was a happy 
 day in the history of my family. An alliance 
 was made that will do us much honor." 
 
 I looked at him amazed. His face was calm ; 
 it wore a look of content, a smile ; but the smile 
 was not like those that I was used to see on his 
 lips. There was something in it that called up 
 before me the smile of the tricky Florentine ; 
 nay, that even seemed to know the secret of the 
 rnirth with which the carven satyrs writhed on 
 his great chair. 
 
 " Indeed," he went on, u the alliance was of 
 my making. It was no easy work. In such 
 matters complications come which one who has 
 led a simple life like yours can hardly imagine. 
 To have reached this happy conclusion gives 
 me great satisfaction. There are few worldly 
 things left to trouble me now." 
 
 Had I been wrong ? I wondered. Had my 
 fancy conjured up a tragedy when really all 
 things went well ? 
 
 " Does she love him, then ? " I asked, so ab 
 ruptly that I started at the rudeness of my voice. 
 
124 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 " Surely not now," said the old Cardinal, with 
 a look of surprise. " What should a young girl, 
 well brought up, know of love ? " 
 
 44 And you have let her promise herself with 
 out love ! " I cried, full of amazement that he, 
 who had seemed to me all goodness, looked 
 with no frown upon this evil. 
 
 "We have bidden her do what seemed best 
 to those who were most fitted to judge of her 
 welfare," he answered, with a dignity that had 
 in it some shade of reproof; for what I said 
 seemed to him, I think, meddlesome. " She has 
 obeyed with dutiful readiness." 
 
 With that he spoke some other words, of 
 commonplace matters, to show me, I suppose, 
 that we had said enough of this. But a spirit 
 was aroused within me that would not be si 
 lenced. I broke out with many words, asking 
 him what good could come of a match like this ; 
 what manner of life would be theirs, who were 
 bound together by formal words and by no 
 closer bond. 
 
 He looked at me with displeasure. His face 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 125 
 
 grew severe ; it flushed as if with anger ; for 
 the first time I saw it lose the paleness of age. 
 Such life would be theirs, he said with growing 
 sternness, as had been the life of their fathers 
 before them, as had been the life of their people 
 for generations. Marriage must be, that the race 
 of men may be perpetuated on the earth ; and so 
 God through the Church has sanctified it. But 
 marriage should be kept free from carnal lust ; 
 human creatures who grow to love one another 
 too much lose sight of the higher things toward 
 which they ought always to look. And so a 
 marriage like this, made by thoughtful friends 
 who know what is best, is a purer thing, and a 
 holier, than the sanctified amour which I seemed 
 to think the true one. Such plans as his bind 
 bodies alone together, and leave husband and 
 wife soul-free to fulfil the aspirations that arise 
 within them. Such thoughts as mine desecrate 
 the sacrament. 
 
 As he spoke, my hand had wandered about 
 my breast, and had fallen upon the miniature 
 of Emilia Colonna, which I carried there. I 
 
126 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 drew it forth, urged by an impulse of which 
 I had small consciousness. When his voice 
 ceased, his eye was fixed upon me, full of the 
 displeasure that had led him to rebuke me with 
 all the authority of the Church ; and he drew a 
 deep breath, like one who has spoken things 
 that may not be answered. 
 
 I made no answer ; but laid the portrait be 
 fore him, asking him whose face it showed. 
 
 The flush left his face as he bent down his 
 head and looked at what I showed him. I 
 thought that he would have fainted, for he 
 trembled so that I could see his hands quiver, 
 as they tried to grasp the arms of his chair and 
 hold themselves firm. But he set his lips, and 
 kept his voice calm. 
 
 "It is Emilia, my brother s wife," he said. 
 " How came it to you ? " 
 
 " What manner of life was hers?" I asked 
 him solemnly. 
 
 He stretched out his hand, and took the pic 
 ture, and held it close to his dull eyes. 
 
 "I prayed Heaven that I might see her face 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 127 
 
 no more," he said, as if he knew not that I was 
 by. " When I arose from my prayer her face 
 was gone ; and I troubled myself not to know 
 how it was gone, for my prayer was granted. 
 And now it comes again, to drag me back to 
 the evil days of old, with its witch s eyes, 
 with its devil s smile. I will look on it no 
 more. No man shall look on it again." 
 
 With that he stretched out his arm as if to 
 lay the face of the portrait upon the table by 
 his side, but stopped half-way, and brought 
 it back before his eyes ; and I could see that 
 his thin ringers clutched it so tightly that the 
 fretted frame cut them deep. Then, of a sud 
 den, he raised it and kissed it as he might have 
 kissed the lips it mimicked. But when he felt 
 its touch he started as if from a poisoned sting ; 
 and with a great effort he flung it from him, 
 and it fell and was shattered to pieces on the 
 marble floor. Then he leaned back in his 
 great chair, and closed his eyes ; and his pale 
 face was like the face of a dead man whose 
 last moments knew no peace. 
 
128 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 What made me speak, I know not; but I 
 spoke again, startled to hear my own voice. 
 
 "What manner of life was hers?" I heard 
 myself say once more, " hers, whose marriage 
 was such as you would make Filippa s ? What 
 blessing, what purity of spirit came to her from 
 the union that your Church had blest? Would 
 you have Filippa live as in the olden time 
 Emilia Colonna lived ? " 
 
 The old Cardinal had started up. Resting 
 his hands upon the arms of his great chair, he 
 had raised himself to his feet. He stood before 
 me, holding himself firm upon the limbs that in 
 common times could hardly bear his weight. He 
 raised himself up until he stood erect, and in his 
 sweeping robes looked taller than common men. 
 
 "Stop!" he cried, lifting his hand with a 
 gesture of command. "No man speaks her 
 name to me ! I have cherished you because in 
 you I found a memory of what she was, purged 
 of the old sins that clung to her life and mine. 
 It was a new sin, a devil s snare. Leave 
 me ! Come to me no more ! " 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 129 
 
 I stood abashed. I knew not what I should 
 do. 
 
 " Leave me ! " he cried again ; and he moved 
 his hand with a passionate gesture, as if he 
 would sweep me away like some evil thing. 
 
 Then I stammered words that should depre 
 cate his anger. But interrupting, he bade me 
 leave him, more firmly than before. So, full 
 of trouble, I turned away. And as I went I 
 heard his slow steps tottering toward the great 
 crucifix where I had seen him at his prayer. 
 
 And this, men would tell me, should be the 
 end of all. My life has touched the life of 
 another, greater by far than I. My eyes have 
 been dazzled with his greatness ; he has seemed 
 to me all pure and good. He has deigned to 
 let me approach him for a while ; and I, grown 
 overbold, have presumed too much. Then he 
 has cast me out with no gentle words, showing 
 himself other than I thought him. He has 
 spoken the language of this Old World, whose 
 corruptions we of the New cast off when our 
 
 9 
 
130 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 fathers crossed the stormy seas to plant them 
 selves in the forests that knew no evil. I have 
 dreamed a dream, men would tell me. I should 
 rub my eyes and awake. 
 
 I would that I could do their bidding ; but it 
 may not be. The bonds that bind me to Giulio 
 Colonna may not be broken thus. What they 
 are I cannot tell. Whither his life and mine 
 shall be carried together I cannot see. But the 
 old knowledge that came to me when I saw 
 him first is no whit less clear than before. The 
 work for which I was born, the work toward 
 which I have travelled even as the wise men 
 of old travelled toward the star of which they 
 knew not the meaning, is a work that has to do 
 with him in his dark palace, and with the dead 
 Duchess, whose eyes gaze at me still in memory 
 as they gazed yesterday from the image that 
 lies shivered at his feet. 
 
 Yes, we are bound together, I know not how ; 
 we are bound as lovers might be bound, by a 
 common fate which lies beyond our ken. The 
 time shall come, in some other world if not in 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 131 
 
 this, when Giulio Colonna and I shall cling 
 together, shall move together through the eter 
 nities, working out the destinies for which we 
 were born. But it shall not be as it has seemed 
 to me before. He shall not be my leader. Nay, 
 I shall rather be his, for we are fallen on evil 
 times, and of their evil I know as much as he ; 
 and the impulse that comes to me now bids me 
 forget his angry words, and hold out my hand, 
 and lead him forth from sinful Rome, full of 
 the whoredoms of the ages, to the light of God, 
 which gleams through the clouds that writhe 
 about me as I struggle on alone. 
 
 Let the light come ! Let it come quickly I 
 
X. 
 
 From Beverly s Journal. 
 
 HO-NIGHT, when I was alone, there came 
 a hasty knock at my door. I went to 
 answer it. Before me stood a man wrapped 
 in a cloak. I could not see his face ; I lifted 
 my candle above my head and peered at him 
 in the darkness. 
 
 " It is you," he said ; " I am glad." I knew 
 his voice. He was the Count Luigi Orsini. He 
 glided in with a stealthy step, and closed the 
 door very quietly. Then he turned to me again, 
 flinging back his dark cloak. 
 
 " I am glad that you are here alone," he said. 
 " You alone spoke words of comfort to me on 
 that day when they were tearing out my heart. 
 To you alone I must say farewell." 
 
 For a moment I thought that lie meant to 
 take his life, to snatch if he could in another 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 133 
 
 world the peace his kinsfolk have stolen from 
 him in this. I knew not what to say. I stood 
 looking at him full of uneasiness. But he met 
 my gaze with a fearless eye, with a smile of 
 courage, not of despair. 
 
 " You are an American," he said ; " I can 
 trust you. You come from a land where men 
 are free, where life has broken its shackles. 
 You are grown so used to freedom that you 
 do not know its worth. We know it here. 
 Freedom has not dwelt in Italy for a thousand 
 years. All the men of your great continent 
 are brothers ; they are called by a common 
 name, which thrills them when they hear it 
 spoken. Here there are no Italians ; we may 
 not speak that word. We are Romans or Flor 
 entines or Neapolitans ; we must bow down 
 before one or another of the little princes and 
 priests who are tearing the entrails of Italy. 
 That is a noble destiny to be born to ! " 
 
 He stopped speaking. All his meaning, I 
 think, could not have come to me ; for the 
 charm that Italy had cast upon me rose strong 
 
134 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 in my mind ; and I began to speak of the 
 beauty of his country, to tell him how it had 
 found an empty place in my heart and filled 
 it. 
 
 44 Yes," he said, " Italy has lovers. She has 
 always had them. Such beauty as hers cannot 
 fail of love. But her lovers are like the lovers 
 of a harlot. They breathe their passion only for 
 their pleasure; and when their love is sated, 
 they fling her money, and leave her to her fate. 
 Well ! it is over with me now. I have cast 
 away the mask. I leave Rome to-night. If I 
 stayed it would be in a prison." 
 
 Even then I did not understand him ; and 
 asked him what was his crime, fearing that in 
 his passion he had done some evil thing. 
 
 44 I have dared to be an Italian as you are 
 an American," he said. And then he told his 
 story as we sat together in my room, where the 
 dim candle-light made the walls look vaster than 
 structures reared by human hands. 
 
 The men in Rome are not few who feel as he 
 has spoken to-night. If they speak aloud they 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 135 
 
 are flung into prison ; there they die in silence. 
 So they meet by stealth, and plan in secret for a 
 time when Italy shall at last be Italy, a time 
 which they hope is at hand. For months his 
 life has been one that no man can lead with 
 safety, though each who leads it hopes that he 
 may escape the suspicion which must stop his 
 work for the cause he loves. Soon or late, each 
 man s time comes at last. The Count Luigi s 
 time was come to-night. Monsignor del Bardi 
 had sent for him. 
 
 " That black serpent glides everywhere," said 
 the Count ; u when I saw his scowling face I 
 knew what was coming. He hopes, you know, 
 that the Cardinal Colonna will be made pope. 
 You have seen how he makes the old man play 
 the dying saint, as Sixtus and Leo the Twelfth 
 played it before him. When Capellari 1 sickens, 
 Monsignor will give the viaticum to the Cardi 
 nal Giulio. Then he will bring him back by a 
 miracle to a feeble life that shall tickle the 
 ambition of the conclave. If the Cardinal Giulio 
 
 1 Gregory XVI. 
 
136 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 is made pope, Monsignor will come to him and 
 say, c Do by me as I have done by you. Then 
 he will be made cardinal; and who knows what 
 may come after that? All his sty life is spent 
 in wriggling toward the red hat that he is try 
 ing to put in the Cardinal Giulio s gift. And 
 I, he finds, a near friend of His Eminence, 
 almost a member of his household, am play 
 ing at games that are forbidden." 
 
 Then he went on to tell how Monsignor had 
 stormed and threatened, trying to make him 
 tell the secrets of his friends. If he would 
 speak out, the priest promised, he should have 
 safety and honors ; for the Pope knows how 
 to reward his friends, let them be faithless as 
 devils to all other ties. He is the Vicegerent 
 of God ; to serve him is to serve Heaven, to 
 play his foes false is to confound the children 
 of Hell. And those who do his pleasure on 
 this earth, let it lead them where it may, are 
 sure of seats among the saints. So Monsig 
 nor stood in his black robes, and stamped his 
 buckled shoes, and grumbled forth the distant 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 137 
 
 thunders of the Church that might be launched 
 upon the heads of those who would not do his 
 bidding, and promised rewards in this world 
 and in the next to those who would bend their 
 will to his. And the Count Luigi stood before 
 him and listened, making no answer. 
 
 For at first he was tempted to break out with 
 answering reproaches, to speak as he had spoken 
 to me of the miseries of Italy, of the sins of the 
 priestcraft that has ground her in the dust for a 
 thousand years. But in a moment came wiser 
 counsels, and he held his peace. Nothing could 
 come from a war of words save the clashing of 
 the prison doors that should shut him out from 
 the world as they had shut out his friends be 
 fore him. So he stood listening to threats and 
 to promises. And the priest thought from his 
 silence that he was ready to speak ; and seizing 
 a pen bade him say out the words that should 
 save him and dash to pieces the plans his friends 
 cherished with their lives. 
 
 Then danger gave the Count counsels that he 
 had not deemed himself wise enough to hold, 
 
138 The Uachess Emilia. 
 
 In the subtle world where he has lived he has 
 learned the secret of trickery ; he can speak 
 with a smooth face words that tell nothing of 
 the thoughts that lie behind them. To-night 
 this skill stood him in good stead. With well- 
 counterfeited terror and contrition he told 
 Monsignor a long tale of secrets that he knew 
 and of secrets that were hidden from him ; and 
 he told his tale so well that the priest believed 
 he spoke the truth. Then he spoke to the 
 tricky churchman of the dangers that would 
 beset him if his faithlessness were known before 
 he had time to seek safety ; and he pledged the 
 priest to act slowly and secretly ; and at last 
 had leave to go. So he went, having said no 
 word that could harm his friends, and having 
 gained time. 
 
 He hurried to his friends, and warned them 
 that the time was over when they could stay 
 in peace at Rome. For months their plans had 
 been making to slip away, and in secret places 
 not far off to plan a great onset on the powers 
 that tear asunder Italy. In an hour all was 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 139 
 
 settled. Even now, while I write these lines, 
 they are spurring away from Rome. Whither 
 they are going I know as little as any ; but I 
 know that in good time they shall come again, 
 bearing with them, in spite of priests and priest 
 craft, the Italian fatherland that the poets and 
 the seers have longed for. 
 
 Then, when there were few moments left, he 
 bethought him of me, and of how I alone of all 
 who knew him had shown him that I cared for 
 what he felt when Filippa pledged her faith to 
 Palchi. Full of confidence that I, a free Ameri 
 can, should care too for the love of country 
 that exiled him from his home, that I should 
 not betray him, he was come to press my 
 hand once more, to whisper one more word of 
 gratitude for the word of kindness that I had 
 spoken. 
 
 I could not understand all this. The simple 
 words he spoke so frankly were not so vital 
 that it was worth his while to come and speak 
 them here ; for if he were found in the Colonna 
 palace he would be dragged away to prison. 
 
140 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 Still, though I wondered greatly, this seemed 
 no time to speak of my wonder. So I took his 
 hands and pressed them, and bade him God 
 speed. And then I thought he would go. 
 
 But he stood still, hesitating for a moment. 
 Then, of a sudden, he took a ring from his fin 
 ger and placed it in my hand. 
 
 " It is for her," he said, " for Filippa. I must 
 go without a word. I cannot go and leave no 
 token. No one will suspect you, who pass in 
 and out of the Cardinal Giulio s home. Give 
 her this when chance allows } r ou. Whisper as 
 you give it that I love her still ; that I will come 
 again ; that her name shall be on my lips through 
 every waking hour ; that her face shall be in all 
 my dreams. Tell her how I pray that mine 
 may sometimes be in hers." 
 
 I held the ring. I had almost said that I 
 would be the messenger of his love. But of a 
 sudden, before I had spoken any word, there 
 came to me the knowledge of what this mission 
 meant. She was pledged to another; the 
 love of which I could bear the message was no 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 141 
 
 holy love. I bit my lip that would have spoken. 
 I gave him back his ring, saying that I could 
 not do as he would have me, when she to whom 
 he sent his greeting could never be his wife. 
 
 He looked at me as if he did not understand. 
 
 " Her lips have promised her to Palchi," he 
 said ; " her heart is mine. You know it as well 
 as I." 
 
 Then I told him that the heart might not go 
 without sin where the lips had promised that it 
 should not ; and that I would be the go-between 
 of no unrighteous love. Interrupting me, he 
 burst out in a storm of passion, swearing that 
 I was no true friend. And when he saw that I 
 could not be moved, he stamped his foot, and 
 uttered wild curses, and turned and fled away 
 and left me. 
 
 So all these things that I have let myself love 
 are false. The beauty of this Italy whose heart 
 is here by the yellow Tiber the beauty that 
 filled me with a great happiness when first it 
 glowed before me at the foot of the cold Alps 
 is a devil s beauty. It covers things hideous, 
 
142 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 unspeakable. The joy it brings is like the joy 
 that lurks in the wine-cup. It is charged with 
 evil; and when we have drunk our fill, there 
 comes a great loathing of what we have done. 
 To-night I would shake the dust of Rome from 
 my feet, and fly to some land where I may 
 breathe pure air. But it may not be. The 
 voice within me whose warnings I may not set 
 aside tells me that here, in the midst of guile, 
 I must linger on until I know at last why I am 
 come hither, whither my footsteps must take 
 their way. So I linger still, sick at heart, wait 
 ing for the light that shall guide me on. 
 
 And now I shall break away from Beverly 
 for a while, and tell a part of the story in my 
 own words again. 
 
XI. 
 
 TN the midst of Rome there stands an old 
 church, not large and not so fine as most 
 of those that have famous names. But the low 
 round arches, and the dim mosaics that peer 
 down with big eyes from the Tribune in the 
 midst of which Christ blesses the people, show 
 that it belongs to the oldest of Christian days. 
 Legend says that it was built to keep alive the 
 memory of a Roman virgin who suffered martyr 
 dom on the spot where it stands. Emilia, the 
 legend runs, was the daughter of a great noble 
 man who hated the Christians as bitterly as did 
 the emperor himself. Her father bade her marry 
 an officer of the court, famous for the cruelty 
 with which he hunted down those of the new 
 faith ; and preparations were making for a grand 
 wedding. But a Christian slave who was in 
 attendance on the maiden converted her to the 
 
144 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 truth. So when the wedding-day came she 
 would be the bride of none but Christ. In a 
 rage her father struck her down ; and folding 
 her hands, and muttering a last prayer for him, 
 she died. In later times, when the Christians 
 had risen above persecution and ruled the city, 
 the holy martyr Emilia appeared in a vision to 
 a priest ; and showing him the spot where the 
 house had stood in which she had met her death, 
 she bade him build a church there. So the 
 church was built ; and then, by another miracle, 
 they found somewhere in the Catacombs the 
 body of Santa Emilia, which they placed with 
 solemn rejoicing upon the high altar of the 
 church. And thither for a thousand years men 
 have come to worship. 
 
 In this church the Colon n as were buried, at 
 first simply enough, in tombs that no man could 
 envy save for their quietness. But by and by 
 a rich member of the house, stirred by the mag 
 nificence with which some rival families decked 
 their burial-places, built beside the little church 
 a grand chapel blazing with strange marbles 
 
Tlie Duchess Emilia. 145 
 
 that had been dug up among the ruins of pagan 
 Rome. In this chapel the Colonnas lie now, 
 and among them the Duchess Emilia. 
 
 Elsewhere than in Rome, this old church 
 sweet with the incense of centuries, and splen 
 did, too, since the door that leads to the princely 
 chapel has been opened in its gray wall would 
 be a famous spot. But in Rome, over-rich with 
 treasures of art and of tradition, it stands un 
 noticed. Indeed, when I went to Rome, years 
 after Beverly was dead and forgotten, I had 
 much work to find it. The local guides and the 
 grand porter of my hotel had never heard its 
 name. u It is possible that there is such a 
 place," they would say ; " but who cares to go 
 there ? " All the same I sought it out, and 
 found there many a quiet thought of past time. 
 Such thoughts have come to me in the dead old 
 towns of New England, whose wooden mansions 
 will have rotted away for centuries before a 
 stone falls from the mosaics of Santa Emilia. 
 The world has passed it by. None but the 
 Colonnas remember it, if indeed there are still 
 
 10 
 
146 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 Colonnas in Rome. For I put no questions to 
 the snuffy custode who unlocked for me the iron 
 gate of their chapel ; I only passed within it, 
 and stood among the marbles whose splendor 
 seemed strangely out of keeping with the so 
 lemnity of death. We of New England think 
 of the dead in quiet church-yards, where gray 
 stone slabs, half overgrown with moss, stand 
 amid the long grass. There rude rhymes sing 
 their dirges in quaintly simple tones that lose 
 themselves in the low harmonies of the wind 
 which plays through the slow-moving branches 
 of elms and pines. In Rome the spirit of the 
 old pagans is not dead. As they strove to make 
 bright the homes of their departed with dancing 
 sprites and meny colors, so the Romans even in 
 our own time deck their graves with such splen 
 dors as they love in life. 
 
 In the Colonna chapel there is a monument 
 made by some follower of Canova, and on it 
 is the name of the Duchess Emilia. I stood 
 before it, thinking of the time not far off in 
 years, yet so far in all things else when 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 147 
 
 Richard Beverly had found his way there too. 
 For there Beverly came, by mere chance ; and 
 there at last was revealed to him what he be 
 lieved with all his heart to be the secret of his 
 life. 
 
 It was not long after the time of which he 
 wrote in the last lines I have copied from his 
 journal. Cut off by what seemed a cruel fate 
 rather than any fault of his from all the friends 
 who were near him, from the Clevelands, 
 from the old Cardinal Colonna, from the Count 
 Luigi, from Filippa, whom he still calls Filippa 
 in his writing, he wandered about the city, 
 seeking distraction from himself. His journal 
 contains many notes, such as all travellers make, 
 of sights that have been written of a thousand 
 times and will be written of as long as Rome 
 lasts. At length, he found himself one day 
 before the little church of Santa Emilia, and 
 entered to see what might be within. There he 
 found just such an old custode as met me there 
 years afterwards, perhaps the same, for the 
 man I saw looked old enough to have been there 
 
148 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 since the days of the blessed Emilia herself. 
 And this old creature told him, in a cracked 
 voice that he noted in his journal, the simple 
 story of the saint ; and showed him the shrine 
 that holds her bones. So he stood before the 
 shrine, studded with jewels which look very 
 like bits of polished glass, and thought of what 
 her life had been who lies on earth, as she sits 
 in Heaven, in glory. Nothing could be simpler 
 or slighter. A young girl, faithful to the God 
 whom she had learned to worship, would not 
 swerve from what she thought He bade her do. 
 Pure He had made her ; pure she would give 
 herself back to Him. So she died, and might 
 have been forgotten, but that the Roman Chris 
 tians have never suffered simple purity to die. 
 What good has come within their ken they have 
 gathered up and treasured. They have decked 
 it, perhaps, in such feeble poetry as is made 
 only in monkish minds ; they have shrined its 
 relics in cases that make sane men smile. But 
 all the same they have treasured it. The church 
 that has bred all the subtleties of Roman priest- 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 149 
 
 craft is the church that has kept alive the 
 memory of the saints and the martyrs who gave 
 themselves with all their hearts to what they 
 deemed was the truth. 
 
 Some such thoughts came to Beverly, as he 
 stood before the shrine of the Roman girl who 
 has outlived the great world that did her to 
 death. But he was not suffered to think of 
 her long. The old cmtode, hungry for another 
 fee, dragged him off to the chapel, more 
 beautiful, the custode said, than Paradise itself, 
 which was the glory of this old church ; 
 and unlocked the iron gate, which creaked on 
 its hinges, and forced him to enter. What he 
 found there he shall tell in his own words. 
 
 From Beverly s Journal. 
 As I stepped within the chapel there came 
 to me more strongly than ever the feeling that 
 I was moving through a world where I had 
 been before. And this old feeling came in a 
 form which I had not yet known. Before, it 
 had been as if I was come back from afar off 
 
150 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 to spots full of evil memories too vague and dis 
 tant for me to know what they were. Here at 
 last it was as if I was come face to face with 
 the evil thing that has chased me through my 
 life. I half thought that some shadowy form 
 would stalk before me, and whisper in my ear 
 words that should bear their meaning to my 
 heart. But nothing came ; and I smiled at 
 my folly as I looked about me at the marble 
 splendors which the cracked-voiced verger 
 pointed out. 
 
 Where I was I did not know ; I had not 
 stopped to ask. Whose tombs I looked at I 
 hardly cared. I would have turned back and 
 left the spot, trusting that the evil thoughts 
 which came to me there were only the delusions 
 of a troubled mind. In truth, it seems to me 
 that I did turn back, bidding my old guide 
 show me no more. But of that I know little ; 
 for, as I turned, my eyes fell upon a thing that 
 in my earthly life I had never seen before. 
 And then, for a long time, I saw and knew 
 nothing of what was done about me. But I 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 151 
 
 saw and knew instead the things for which I 
 had strained my mind so long. 
 
 For there before me on a sculptured tomb 
 was the name that had echoed through my 
 brain when Cleveland spoke it, the name that 
 the old Cardinal had bidden me never speak 
 to him, Emilia Colonna. I saw no other word 
 save the date when she died. It was my birth- 
 year. That I had known. But as I looked 
 upon the letters I read more, which had never 
 been told me. It was on the very day when 
 I was born in far-off New England that Emilia 
 Colonna came to her end in Rome. Her life 
 went out of the world as mine came into it. 
 A simple fact enough, men might say ; but to 
 me it had a meaning that unlocked the riddle 
 of my life. Not all at once did the truth 
 come to me, but all at once I knew that it 
 was coming ; and I stood leaning against the 
 sculptured marble, my eyes fixed upon the 
 formal words, as the truth that I had sought 
 came shining through the murky clouds of mys 
 tery that have writhed about me so long. It 
 
152 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 shone through at last, as the sun shines through 
 a mountain mist, first faint and dim, then 
 more and more distinct, at last in all the clear 
 ness of heaven. But the truth that came to 
 me had little of heaven in it. 
 
 For at first there swept over me memories 
 of her sinful life whose bones la}^ within the 
 marble tomb. I thought of her loveless mar 
 riage, of her unhallowed love. I thought of 
 how Duke Pietro, whose tomb was by hers, had 
 fallen murdered before her tearless eyes ; of 
 how, while he lay dead, she had sat in her pal 
 ace waiting for the lover who had dishonored 
 the dead man s name. I thought of how from 
 that day on no touch of penitence had come to 
 her proud spirit ; of how she had sunk deep in 
 all the sins of the flesh, smiling, with the lips 
 I had known for mine in the painted face she 
 left behind her, on every lover who pressed 
 his suit. And then at last she had died in the 
 midst of her sin ; and they had brought her 
 hither and laid her beside her honest lord, to 
 sleep in peace. 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 153 
 
 Here she had been, in her marble bed, since 
 the day when I first drew breath in this world. 
 That was strange, that I, whose simple life 
 was not begun until her stormy life was ended, 
 should be standing by her tomb, telling over 
 the tale of her sins as a monk might tell the 
 beads of his rosary. Nay, I was telling them 
 as if they had been part of my own life, the 
 life that was not yet in being when those sins 
 were done. For with each thought of what 
 her sins had been there came to me a fresh 
 pang. I shrunk from them, as I would have 
 shrunk if I had done them in my own flesh. 
 Yet from them I could not shrink away, even 
 as I could never shrink away from myself. 
 
 What all meant I could not tell ; but I saw 
 that the truth was at hand. I fell upon my 
 knees, crying out to Heaven in my own tongue 
 that I might be kept in the dark no longer. 
 Vile as I was, let me see the light, and I would 
 struggle toward it with all the might that was 
 in me. 
 
 Then my eyes were cleared once more. It 
 
154 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 was as if some hand had swept away the veil 
 of mystery which had hidden from me the place 
 in which I stood ; for in my misery I had ceased 
 to see, to hear, to feel. And when I knew that 
 my eyes could see once more, I found them fixed 
 upon the words which told me that here before 
 me lay the dead woman, who died on the day 
 when I was born. 
 
 With that came to me the memory of an old 
 tule that my nurse told me when I was a little 
 child. It was in the midst of a stormy night 
 that I came into the world. When I was born 
 I was still and lifeless, and they said that 
 there was no earthly life for me, that I was 
 dead in the womb. But of a sudden, as the 
 clocks were tolling the hour of midnight, I 
 quivered and uttered a great cry, louder and 
 wilder than the cries of other children. And 
 I drew breath with a struggle, as if I would 
 fain lie still but could not ; and cried again 
 with a voice of fear that made the women 
 start. Then I lived ; and living I was come 
 back here at last. 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 155 
 
 For from hence I was come. The mystery 
 was clear to me now. The life that has filled 
 my waking hours with agony was come from 
 hence. The spirit that brought life to the baby 
 form that might have lain at peace among my 
 fathers was no blessed sprite from Heaven. But 
 in the stormy midnight the soul that had been 
 Emilia s was whirled about the rolling earth ; 
 and coming to my far-off fatherland it found a 
 wretched home in the madman s body that is 
 mine. Saved for a time by what blessed power 
 no man can tell from the fires of Hell, it lingers 
 on in this earth with one more chance to expiate 
 its sin. 
 
 All the mystery that I have found in Rome 
 was cleared. All the agony that I have suffered 
 was real and true, a thousand-fold more than I 
 had dreamed. I knelt, and prayed with all my 
 heart for light and for mercy. And as I raised 
 my living hands to God, it seemed to me that 
 the dead hands which had been mine raised 
 themselves too within the tomb. Then presently 
 I knew no more. 
 
156 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 When my life came back to me, I was lying 
 in the sacristy of the old church ; and they were 
 bathing my temples with cool water. Before 
 long I raised myself up, stronger and calmer 
 than I had been in the time gone by. And I 
 gave them money, and came my way hither to 
 my chamber in the old palace. 
 
 Here I wait to-night, full of agony deeper 
 than I knew of old, for now the sins for which 
 I suffer are as clear to me as they are to the 
 Heaven by whose justice the suffering has fol 
 lowed them. But I am full of hope, too, that 
 the mercy which has saved me to this time will 
 not forsake me now ; that it will lead me on 
 through agonies of expiation as great as souls 
 can bear, until at last the sin is washed away. 
 Then shall come rest, rest such as God alone 
 can grant. 
 
xn. 
 
 OO this was the secret which Beverly had 
 ^ been seeking so long. It seems a mad 
 thought; no doubt it was. My friends will 
 look at me askance and whisper predictions of 
 a time when I shall be locked up at Somerville 
 if I venture to breathe that there are moments 
 when I see in it something besides madness. 
 But, mad or not, this thought, which to Beverly 
 was the deepest he ever knew, struck a note 
 that brought into harmony all the restless 
 discords of his life. And in that harmony, fan 
 tastic as it is, I have grown to find a beauty 
 that is not quite of this world. So it seemed to 
 Beverly when his last hour came. So, when 
 the end was come, it seemed to the old Cardinal 
 Colonna. And we three are all that have pon 
 dered on the story until it has become part of 
 our lives. 
 
158 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 From the time when Beverly saw the church 
 of Santa Emilia, his life moved swiftly and surely 
 to its end. Day after day he lived on, waiting 
 for the revelation of his duty. Day after day 
 he went from the quiet rooms where now he 
 lived all alone to the little church ; and there, 
 flinging a piece of silver to the old custode, he 
 passed into the chapel of the Colonnas, and 
 knelt by the tomb that held Emilia Colonna s 
 bones, and prayed. Again and again he told 
 over in his mind the story of her sins. More 
 and more he grew to feel that those sins were 
 upon his soul, that all the misery which he had 
 suffered, he had not known why, was mercy 
 by the side of what those sins deserved. And 
 though the suffering that he felt now was keener 
 than the vague pangs he had felt before, it 
 troubled him less, for now he knew what it 
 meant and why it came. 
 
 "There is one thought," he writes, "which 
 gives me comfort. In all the life that I have 
 lived since I have been the being that I am 
 to-day, I have done with all my heart what I 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 159 
 
 thought was right. I have idled, perhaps ; I 
 have not looked about me. But when tempta 
 tions have come, I have struggled against them ; 
 when a duty has lain before me, I have striven 
 to do it. So with God s help I will persist." 
 
 One day, when he came near the church, he 
 found the streets astir ; and asking of some one 
 in the crowd why they had gathered, was told 
 that this was the festival of Santa Emilia. There 
 was a grand service in the little church ; there 
 was to be a procession through the streets of 
 the parish ; and so many dark-eyed Romans 
 were come together to see the solemnities that 
 he found it no easy matter to make his way to 
 a spot whence the rough brick wall of the church 
 was in sight. The rest of what happened this 
 day he shall tell for himself: 
 
 From Beverly s Journal. 
 
 So great was the crowd gathered at the church 
 
 door that I gave up all thought of entering, and 
 
 stood among them waiting to see what might 
 
 come. Through the open doors, whence came 
 
160 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 the sound of organ music, I could catch a glimpse 
 of the altar, sparkling with great candles and 
 with colored lamps, which shone amid clouds of 
 incense-smoke as stars shine through evening 
 mists. Before long the organ music ceased, and 
 there was a little lull, so that I could hear tl;e 
 people talking of the sight that was coming. 
 Then, of a sudden, when I was not prepared for 
 it, came a burst of song from the church, as if 
 the whole company within were one great choir. 
 The crowd about the doors parted ; some fell on 
 their knees ; and the procession came forth sing 
 ing a glorious hymn. First in the hymn came 
 a song of solemn triumph, and in this all the 
 voices joined. Then came a passage which the 
 choir boys sang cheerily, as if their hearts were 
 glad ; the music was sweet and simple, and 
 flowed as if it were not studied, but came of 
 itself to the singers. Then came again the great 
 chorus of triumph. So the procession passed 
 out of the church, with a cross at its head, and 
 made its way through the crowded streets. 
 There were priests in robes of many kinds, 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 161 
 
 and there were boys who sang as if all their lives 
 were one long song, and others who swung 
 censers, from which the smoke curled up and 
 filled the air with fragrance ; and there were 
 great crosses and banners, and finally a reli 
 quary in which lay some of the bones that they 
 say were hers in whose honor all these things 
 were done. So, with joyous song, this holy 
 company made their way among the people. 
 And the people watched them happily, thinking 
 of the girl whose pure life ended here in pain 
 and sorrow near two thousand years ago. She 
 was true to her God. Undefiled He made her ; 
 undefiled she gave herself to Him. That faith 
 ful deed is deemed worthy to keep her memory 
 alive through the ages ; from year to year they 
 sing her praises in such grand hymns as I have 
 heard to-day. So through all time the people 
 remember her who gave little thought to her 
 self, and they bless her memory, praying that 
 she may bring her purity before the throne of 
 God, to beg His mercy for them ; for one good 
 life, they say, is more grateful to Heaven than 
 11 
 
162 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 a thousand evil ones are hateful, such is the 
 mercy of God. 
 
 When the joyous procession was past, the 
 crowd was less dense. So I made my way 
 toward the church, and at last passed up the 
 steps and within the doors. There the light 
 was dim ; so I stood still for a while that my 
 eyes might grow used to it ; and as the people 
 were pressing about me I stepped aside and stood 
 by the wall close to the door. Near me was a 
 woman whose face was veiled. When she saw 
 me she drew her veil closer, as if she thought 
 that I would look at her rudely. What she was 
 like I could not tell; she might be young or 
 old, fair or ugly, for her dress was very plain 
 and her veil hid her face. She gave only one 
 glance to me. Then she looked about her, as 
 if she waited for some one who did not come. 
 
 As the crowd surged about the doorway, 
 there approached her a fellow in the dress of 
 the people. He looked like any other. Until 
 he was close to her she did not remark him ; 
 but when he was at her side he spoke in a 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 163 
 
 whisper some word which made her start. I 
 could see her clasp his hand and hold it fast as 
 she whispered back. It was he for whom she 
 had been waiting here, for whom she had turned 
 this feast of purity into a masque of love. And 
 her love, I thought, could be no true one, else 
 why should it hide itself behind veils and dis 
 guises? For, whoever she was, she was no 
 woman of the people, and the man she met 
 could not be the peasant that he seemed. His 
 face was turned from me. I could see only his 
 thick black hair, and his bearded cheek, and 
 the passion which burst through all his efforts 
 to control it, as he spoke to her who was come 
 to meet him. 
 
 It was strange. There was about this man 
 and this woman something that I had known 
 before, not in the mysterious way in which I 
 have known the Roman things that in my present 
 life met my eyes for the first time, but firmly, 
 really, as I had known Cleveland, and the old 
 Cardinal Colonna, and Filippa. 
 
 Then of a sudden the man turned his face ; 
 
164 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 and in spite of his beard and of his strange dress 
 I knew him for the Count Luigi. And then I 
 knew that the woman he spoke with was Filippa 
 herself. Yes, here in the shadow of the tomb 
 of Emilia Colonna, in the midst of the music that 
 sang the praises of the virgin saint, before my 
 eyes who drag out the miserable life of expia 
 tion that I call mine they were come to whis 
 per secret vows, to begin afresh such work as 
 wrought the agony that T suffer day and night. 
 I could not keep myself back. I laid my hand 
 upon their clasped hands ; and as they looked 
 at me in anger and in wonder I parted them 
 and stood between them. 
 
 " Count Luigi," I said, in a voice so low that 
 no one of the crowd about us knew that I spoke, 
 " this is no good deed. Contessina, come with 
 me." 
 
 In any other spot he would have struck me 
 down, and she too would have stabbed me with 
 her hands as she did now with the marvellous 
 eyes that flashed between the folds of her 
 veil. But here and now the danger was too 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 165 
 
 great. Even here he turned upon me ; and 
 putting his lips close to my ear poured out a 
 torrent of evil words, calling down upon me all 
 the miseries that his fancy could conjure up, as 
 if my misery were not already beyond thought 
 of men. 
 
 " Go," I said to him, "or I will call your 
 name and give you up." 
 
 " Go," said Filippa then. " This madman 
 shall do me no harm; and a word from him 
 may destroy you. Go, for my sake." 
 
 " Lowest of scoundrels ! " hissed Luigi in my 
 ear, " you shall curse this day." 
 
 " With God s help," I said, " I will make you 
 bless it." 
 
 Then I took Filippa s arm and drew it within 
 my own, and forced her to move with me into 
 the crowd that was about us. There the Count 
 Luigi could not follow. So he went his way, I 
 know not whither, to safety. 
 
 Filippa s hand grasped my arm as if she 
 would crush it. She looked at me as her 
 ringers tightened. 
 
166 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 " I wish it were your black heart," she whis 
 pered ; " then I could squeeze it to death." 
 
 " Contessina," I said very gently, " I wish 
 you nothing but good. Come with me a little 
 way." 
 
 " Where would you have me go ? " she asked. 
 " Do you think that I will follow you through 
 eternity ? " 
 
 "God forbid!" said I, and I felt myself 
 tremble as I thought what her words might 
 mean ; it was to save her from that very fate 
 that I dared to do what I did now. " I shall 
 lead you only a little way. Then you shall go 
 in peace." 
 
 I led her, quivering with anger and with fear 
 lest some should know her, or I should do some 
 strange thing, through the festal crowd until 
 we came to the gate of the Colonna chapel. 
 The gate was closed, but when I laid my hand 
 upon it I found that it yielded to the pressure. 
 By chance, the lock was not fast. 
 
 " It is here that I am leading you," I said ; 
 " here I can speak to you best." And I led 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 167 
 
 her within ; and we stood together among the 
 glowing marbles of old Rome, before Emilia 
 Colonna s tomb. 
 
 As I looked toward the tomb I saw with 
 wonder that one was there before us, but so 
 lost in thought that he did not heed our coming. 
 Alone before the sculptured tomb, gazing upon 
 the lines that told who lay within it, stood 
 a black-robed priest. His rusty dress seemed 
 to show his poverty ; but in spite of his garb 
 and of his loneliness I knew him for one whom 
 I had never thought to see save in the grandeur 
 of the state that was truly his. For it was the 
 Cardinal Giulio Colonna, come in secret on the 
 feast of her who had been dearest to him of 
 human things, to watch before the tomb that 
 held within it her bones, to pray perhaps that 
 the soul which had been hers might find mercy 
 in the sight of God, to whose service he had 
 given his life. 
 
 As I looked on him there came to me feelings 
 that were new and old at once. I thought how 
 in the far-off time, when his step had been firm 
 
168 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 and his eye full of the fire of youth, he had 
 whispered the passion of his heart to Emilia 
 Colonna ; how he had clasped her hands in his, 
 and pressed her to his bosom with warm kisses. 
 And as I thought of that love, treacherous in 
 the sight of God and men, yet loyal in itself, 
 constant, in spite of fastings and of prayers, 
 through the long years that stretched on be 
 tween the days when it was young and the 
 time when he too should lay himself to rest 
 among these Roman marbles, I felt my heart 
 swell with answering love, strong and deep as 
 a woman might give her lover. For a moment 
 this was all that I felt ; I would have stepped for 
 ward and spoken it out, had not the girl I had 
 brought thither called me back to what I am. 
 
 " Why have you brought me here ? " she 
 asked, in no steady voice, for the solemnity of 
 the place had touched her with fear. 
 
 I pointed to the tomb of Emilia Colonna. 
 
 " To save you," I said, "from such a fate as 
 hers. To save your spirit from the agony of 
 a sin that may never be undone. To help you, 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 169 
 
 with God s help, so to live your earthly life that 
 when the end shall come you may rest in His 
 peace. Remember her. Remember me, too. 
 Perhaps the time may come when your prayers 
 shall help to win me mercy." 
 
 With that I motioned her away ; and with 
 wondering eyes she went, moved deeply by the 
 strangeness of what I said. So I was left alone 
 with Giulio Colonna, who knew not yet that 
 any one was near him. 
 
 He stood still, his eyes fixed on the marble 
 tomb of Emilia, his lips moving as if in prayer. 
 Was his thought, I wondered, there in the 
 chapel of his fathers? Or did it wander into 
 the future, where his old life must soon merge 
 in the mysteries that lie beyond the grave ? Or 
 did he think of her from whom he had parted 
 in the olden time, and wonder where the life that 
 had been hers dragged out the agony that jus 
 tice should have meted it for all the eternities? 
 Or perchance did his thoughts wander back 
 to that olden time, when in blissful sin those 
 charms were his which now lay mouldering? 
 
170 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 What love had been his for the woman whom 
 human law and law divine had bidden him look 
 at with no loving eyes ! What love had been 
 hers for him, in all the beauty of the youth that 
 he had given her, in spite of earth and Heaven ! 
 Even now it seemed that, purged of earthiness, 
 I felt that love still. The agonies that had 
 been mine were not mine alone. Parted from 
 me by half a world and by all the mystery of 
 the being that I call mine, Giulio Colonna had 
 felt them too, had shared them, not knowing 
 that they were shared. The thought made them 
 lighter. In sorrow there is ever a sad joy in 
 knowing that others know the sorrow that 
 bows us down. 
 
 " Giulio ! " I found myself murmuring of him 
 whom in this life I have known only as the 
 prince of a church that is not mine. Yes, to 
 me as I stood there he was Giulio still, the 
 dark-eyed boy who loved me in old Rome. 
 
 " Giulio ! " I murmured again. 
 
 He heard me. He started, as if my voice had 
 come from the tomb. Quickly, as if he were 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 171 
 
 still young, his hand made the sign of the cross. 
 He turned about, his face full of amazement. 
 He thought, I believe, to see before him some 
 being of another world. 
 
 u In God s name, who speaks to me ? " lie 
 cried aloud. 
 
 But when he saw me he knew me only for 
 the man whom he had driven from his presence. 
 His face grew stern with displeasure; he strove 
 to speak with a firm voice, to stand with a firm 
 footing. 
 
 " You have no right here, rude fellow," he 
 said; but as he spoke his voice faltered, and 
 he trembled and would have fallen. 
 
 Then I reached out my arms and held him 
 up, and looked at the old face that knew not 
 that I had known it when it was not old. And 
 in his weakness, half-wondering, half-angry, he 
 could not but lean upon me. So for a moment 
 I clasped him in my arms. 
 
 Then, when I might have spoken out the 
 secret of which my heart was full, there came to 
 my ears the swelling sound of the hymn that 
 
172 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 the people were singing in honor of the virgin 
 saint. And I remembered in whose temple we 
 stood ; and with that memory came the thought 
 of what manner of life had been hers who bore 
 in later time the virgin Emilia s name. I shrank 
 away from the man who had soiled her life 
 when still it was pure. Yet I could not fling 
 him from me. So, very gently I laid him down 
 upon the marble steps of the altar that stood 
 in the chapel. And he sat trembling, looking 
 at me in wonder. 
 
 So I left him, alone in the chapel of his 
 fathers. And as I passed out into the church, 
 I found the people rejoicing once more ; and 
 through the entrance doors came to meet me 
 the crosses and the banners and the smoking 
 censers of the company that had sung through 
 the streets of Rome hosannas to the virgin 
 saint. 
 
XIII. 
 
 From Beverly s Journal. 
 
 "\ T 7 HEN the Cardinal Colonna bade me come 
 * * to him again I could not choose but go ; 
 for perhaps through him, in some way that I 
 could not foresee, might come the revelation of 
 my duty, whose doing shall win me a right to 
 rest. So I followed the servant who summoned 
 me, thinking to go straight to the Cardinal 
 Colonna s presence. But when I came to the 
 chamber through which I must pass to the room 
 where I was used to find him they told me that 
 I must wait. His Eminence was not alone, and 
 must not be disturbed until those who were 
 with him had finished their business. 
 
 So I was left to myself, my mind full of the 
 days when Emilia Colonna lived in these very 
 places, when her eyes gazed upon these painted 
 ceilings, and these carven chairs, and these dim 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 tapestries. Here, perhaps, when her heart was 
 hot with love, she had waited for the lover who 
 sat within to-day. Here, perhaps, she had given 
 back his kisses and his love. Here had that 
 dishonor been wrought which with every breath 
 I expiate in my living life. Full of such 
 thoughts I stood alone. 
 
 How long I waited I cannot tell. A hand 
 was laid upon my shoulder, and aroused me to 
 myself. I turned about and knew that it was 
 Filippa, who had glided in unheard. Her face 
 was full of such wrath as might have flashed 
 from the faces of the old goddesses of the 
 pagans. Never had I so seen the full splendor 
 of her face and her form. She moved toward 
 me noiselessly, but it was with no petty cunning 
 that she governed her motion; her stealthy 
 step had the grandeur of a lion s as she came 
 close to me, and spoke in low tones fiercer than 
 loud threats. 
 
 She knew why I was come, she said. It was 
 to tell her kinsfolk tales of where I had found 
 her. Well, I might speak them out if I would. 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 175 
 
 She would swear that they were lies, and that I 
 told them because I had insolently dared whisper 
 words of love to her, and she had scorned me. 
 
 " Which will be believed? " she asked, 
 44 you, a stranger from God knows where, or I, 
 a Roman lady ? Speak if you will." 
 
 So she stood for a moment, in all the splendor 
 of her beauty. But that beauty, which when 
 I saw it first filled me with such delight as the 
 Grecian artist felt when at his prayer the mar 
 ble was turned to flesh, filled me now with 
 loathing. For it seemed the incarnate beauty 
 of this Old World, that for ages has led men on 
 to such nameless fates as that which I suffer. 
 I shrank away from her, with some movement 
 as if I would thrust her aside. What was she 
 to me? I had warned her of what might come. 
 She had scorned my warning. Let her glide on 
 to her fate. 
 
 But of a sudden, when she saw that I was 
 not moved, her whole face changed ; her lip 
 trembled ; her eyes filled with tears. She 
 snatched my hand, and held it fast. In God s 
 
176 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 name, she begged me, forgive her for speaking 
 as in her folly she had spoken. In God s name, 
 have pity. A word from me might set them on 
 Luigi s track, might drag him to the prison that 
 meant a living death. Be silent, she prayed 
 me, for his sake, not for hers. 
 
 " For I love him," she sobbed, " I love him 
 with all my soul." 
 
 I looked on her in wonder. My heart soft 
 ened ; for I saw that even as her threats were 
 falsehood, her tears and her love were truth. 
 I laid my hand upon her dark hair, for she 
 had bent down before me as she clasped my 
 hand. 
 
 "My poor child," I said, "if you love him, 
 why do you give yourself to the other ? " 
 
 She looked up piteously. How could she 
 help it? she asked. A girl must do as her 
 kinsfolk bid. But all the kin in all the earth 
 cannot bind the heart. 
 
 Then, before I could answer her, there was a 
 sound of people coming ; and in an instant she 
 had left me, and vanished like a dream. 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 177 
 
 In another moment there came from the room 
 where the Cardinal Colonna sat, a company of 
 priests, talking in low tones among themselves 
 of what matters I could not tell. But more 
 than once I heard them speak the name of the 
 Cardinal Giulio Colonna, and the name of the 
 Pope. With them was the Florentine Dei 
 Bardi, his thin visage full of eagerness as he 
 spoke to one with a great golden cross, who 
 seemed the chief of the party. With no look 
 at me, who stood aside, they passed by. And 
 as I looked at them I thought how strangely 
 different was this busy company of churchly 
 statesmen from the boyish singers who in the 
 garb of the same Church had chanted through 
 Rome the praises of the martyred saint ; how 
 different, too, from the saint who had given her 
 all for Christ when Christ and His Church were 
 poor. 
 
 When these figures had passed, I was free to 
 enter the room of the Cardinal Colonna. So I 
 passed within, and found him alone. 
 
 He sat in the great carven chair where I 
 12 
 
178 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 had seen him in the days of our friendship. He 
 rested his head on his hand. And it seemed 
 to me that I had never seen living man look 
 so old and feeble. When he turned his face 
 toward me, the eyes, which I had been used to 
 see full of a life that belied the weakness of 
 his form, were dull as the yellow skin of his 
 shrunken face. And they were sunken deep 
 in their sockets, and dark lines were about 
 them such as they say are about the eyes of 
 the dead. 
 
 There was no look of welcome in his face. 
 He moved one hand and bade me sit. Then for 
 a while he looked at me with a strange sternness, 
 passionless yet firm, such as some judge might 
 have when he spoke at last a sentence, with a 
 broken heart. 
 
 " I have sent for you to-day," he said, " be 
 cause there is no other way. Since you crossed 
 my path I have known no rest. I have prayed 
 for it. I have spoken my secrets in the ear of 
 the Church ; but the sacrament itself has not 
 brought me peace The olden time with all its 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 179 
 
 sins is about me still. It is you who have 
 brought it back, even in the very chapel where 
 my bones shall lie. What you are, man or devil, 
 I cannot tell ; but I have grown to know that 
 until I speak out to you the secrets that you 
 have called back into life, they will haunt me 
 still. So I shall speak them out. Then at last 
 I may give my mind to those things which alone 
 must fill it now." 
 
 Then he looked with his dull eyes, not at 
 me nor at anything that was about him. But 
 the holiness that men were used to see in his 
 face was gone. As he looked to-day, Magda 
 lene might have looked when her eyes were 
 not yet raised to Heaven. 
 
 I spoke no word; but listened as with slow 
 accents he forced himself to tell me the tale 
 of Emilia Colonna. In the old days, he said, 
 when he was a thoughtless boy, his solemn 
 brother had brought home the bride whom all 
 men saw with envy. Then at first he himself 
 had been full of pride that she bore his name, 
 and had thought no evil as he grew to think 
 
180 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 of her more and more. But at last one day 
 they wandered together in a Roman garden, 
 which from times long past has been the pleas 
 ure ground of his race. There they spoke of 
 Italy, the Italy that Dante dreamed of, the 
 Italy that Macchiavelli of Florence longed for 
 in the far-off days when men saw no hope of 
 its coming. And sitting together on a great 
 stone bench, among the flowers, they looked 
 into one another s eyes, and their lips met, and 
 they knew that they loved. Then while slow- 
 witted Pietro was busy in the service of the 
 Church, the lovers used to meet, and to love, 
 and to talk of their love and of Italy. So they 
 had wandered together among the flowers of 
 the garden where first they had loved; and 
 life to them had been full of sunshine and of 
 beauty, and the world free from misery. 
 
 The story was the story which had filled my 
 mind as it had filled his. Each word awoke to 
 living life old memories that even as they lay 
 half dead within me had caused me such agony 
 as I had deemed that man could hardly bear. 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 181 
 
 Bat I bade myself remember that if this tale 
 brought peace to him, it was best that I should 
 listen, and bear his burdens along with mine: 
 such suffering, perchance, was part of the duty 
 I was born to do. So at last he came close to 
 the time when Pietro Colonna met his end ; and 
 I began to feel that soon I might go and bear 
 away the load of misery from which Giulio had 
 striven to free his soul. But of a sudden I 
 found that he was telling things that I had not 
 known before. 
 
 For he told how the lovers of Italy, to whom 
 he had given all his confidence, found that they 
 were pressed too hard by the watchfulness of 
 Pietro. In secret conclave they doomed him 
 to die. Then Giulio s heart revolted. There 
 was little time ; and even then Emilia waited 
 for him in a spot where they were used to meet. 
 Thither he came ; and when he saw her he 
 clasped her fast in his arms, and pressed his lips 
 to hers once more, for the last time. Then he 
 told her how the end of their joys was come. 
 They must part ; and he must go to his death. 
 
182 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 With flashing eyes she started up, swearing that 
 it was a lie, that he loved her no more ; and chose 
 a pretext to cast her off. But very solemnly 
 he answered that the end was come indeed ; and 
 he charged her to warn Pietro, and begged her 
 to pray for his wretched self. Then he left her, 
 sitting with her head flung back, pale as death ; 
 and her firm-shut lips spoke no word of farewell. 
 From that he went and made ready for the 
 death to which his treachery doomed him, for 
 the friends whom he had betrayed would suffer 
 no traitor to live. But though he went to his 
 death, he felt that a load was off his soul. So 
 he came to his lodging, and there found waiting 
 for him a note from Emilia. "I love you, 
 Giulio," she wrote ; " I will not speak. You 
 and I shall belong to one another in the sight 
 of men." When he read those lines his heart 
 stood still. With all his speed he hurried to 
 the palace of Pietro. There he found that Pie 
 tro was already dead ; and Emilia waited above, 
 to clasp him in her treacherous arms even while 
 Pietro lay warm in his blood. 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 183 
 
 " Then at last," he said, " I knew what our 
 sin had been ; and full of horror, I vowed that 
 all the rest of my life should be one long pen 
 ance, which, perchance, might win us the mercy 
 of God. So I gave myself to God, whom I have 
 striven to serve from that day forth. May He 
 have mercy on my soul ! " 
 
 With that he bowed his head and covered his 
 face with his hands. And I stood still, full of 
 such loathing of myself as I had not dreamed 
 of before. For the sin which I bear upon my 
 soul I knew at last in all its nakedness. I had 
 thought it such sin as men do in the weakness 
 of the flesh. Now I knew that to that sin which 
 had seemed enough was added such dishonor 
 as I had not deemed in my living life that men 
 could work. In my misery I groaned aloud. 
 And when I groaned, he lifted up his head once 
 more ; and I saw that his face grew stern. 
 
 Leave him, he bade me. Let him never see 
 my face again. I had tortured him until he 
 had spoken. In God s name, let me trouble him 
 no more. 
 
184 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 So I turned to go ; and he, gathering his 
 strength, sat watching me, as with trembling 
 steps I passed from his presence. 
 
 There are tales of men, chased like me by 
 the spectres of old crime, who have come after 
 long years to the judges and bidden them speak 
 a sentence. They were happier than I ; for 
 human law-givers would laugh at my tale. I 
 would fain raise against myself the hand of jus 
 tice, and hiding from my eyes before their time 
 the sunshine of the world, seek rest in my grave. 
 But then I think of what I was and of what I 
 am. Who knows into what form the sinful 
 spirit that is mine might go if it were loosed from 
 this ? There are tales at which scholars smile, 
 of wicked souls who prowl on the earth in the 
 bodies of foul beasts. 
 
 No. What I am I must be, until in the mercy 
 of God the end of what I am shall come. In 
 old Rome Emilia sinned. She sinned with the 
 world about her, a world that knew not honor 
 or truth. The light of her life was love. She 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 185 
 
 loved with all her earthly heart ; and all things 
 were bent before her loye. So she did what her 
 love counselled, even to the foulest of dishonor ; 
 and to the very end she knew no repentance. 
 Then, in our New England, where the hearts of 
 men are as pure as the clear air they breathe, I 
 was born and was taught the lessons of my peo 
 ple ; and I grew to hate falsehood and dishonor, 
 and to hold myself above the herd of sinners. 
 But in quiet hours I was always sad with a sad 
 ness of which I could not guess the meaning. 
 Now I know it, as none could know it who was 
 not reared in all the purity of the home that I 
 shall see no more. And I must not shrink ; but 
 living on, must ever be with my sin-stained self, 
 until perhaps a time may come when deeds of 
 mine may win the mercy of God, 
 
 Yes. The life that is must atone for the sins 
 done in the life that is past. So on this earth 
 must it ever be, until at length to all human life 
 shall come rest like that from which, at the voice 
 of God, it first awakened. 
 
186 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 Here, I think, I may add a few lines from 
 another letter of Cleveland s to my father. 
 
 " Beverly," he writes, " we hardly see. He 
 cannot forgive Abby for caring about his soul, 
 or me for taking care of my business reputation. 
 After all, you know, we painters have to think 
 about our clients. Beverly glides back and 
 forth on the stairways here, as grim as you 
 please. It is as much as ever that he will bow 
 to me. Such unreasonable conduct in anybody 
 else would make me real mad, as the boys used 
 to say. But of course it would be absurd to 
 treat Beverly as if he were like ordinary human 
 beings. Besides, do you know, I cannot help 
 feeling rather anxious about him. There is a 
 queer look in his eyes. If I had any sort of 
 authority in the matter, I should be inclined to 
 engage somebody to watch him. He needs 
 watching, I fear, as much as his father did. 
 What a hideous thing this insanity is. 
 
 " By the way, is there any truth in these 
 rumors about the Franklin Mills ? The last 
 dividend was smaller than I expected." 
 
XIV. 
 
 From Beverly s Journal. 
 
 AS I came down the staircase of the Colonna 
 palace, bound I know not whither, I saw 
 just within the entrance door the black figure 
 of Dei Bardi. He was speaking hurriedly to a 
 servant, whom he held close by the wall so that 
 they could not be seen from without ; and he 
 pointed with a hand that shook with excitement 
 toward something from which they were sep 
 arated by the wall. Then I saw the servant 
 nod his head, as if he understood the charge 
 that was given him ; but in spite of Mon- 
 signor s excitement the fellow passed out of 
 the door with no hurried step. It seemed, 
 indeed, as if he studied to appear unconcerned. 
 It seemed as if the priest so studied too ; for 
 when the man was gone he gathered himself 
 together and stood still for a moment. Then, 
 
188 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 with his head bent down like one in deep 
 thought, he slowly stepped out of the door too, 
 and turned in the direction in which the ser 
 vant had not gone. But I saw his eyes peering 
 out from under the broad brim of his hat, to 
 make sure that something before him was really 
 what he deemed it. 
 
 So when I passed out of the door in his foot 
 steps I looked the same way, curious to know 
 what had so moved him. Before me stood a man 
 of the people, leaning lazily against the palace 
 wall. If I had not seen that Dei Bardi thought 
 him no common sight I should have passed him 
 without a look ; but now that my attention 
 was aroused, I looked at him closely, and knew 
 him for the man I had seen in the church of 
 Santa Emilia, the Count Luigi. 
 
 He was come here, perhaps, in the wild hope 
 that he might catch a glimpse of Filippa s face, 
 that he might see a loving look in the eyes 
 that would know him in spite of his mean 
 dress. Not thinking of his danger, he waited, 
 while his enemies were gone on either side to 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 189 
 
 fetch the officers who should seize him. A few 
 moments more, and he would be carried off to 
 the prison whence the foes of the Pope do not 
 emerge. 
 
 I could lose no time, and I could not bid 
 him fly, for wherever he went he would meet 
 the enemies that were gathering about him. 
 So, with no thought save for his safety, I called 
 his name in a low voice and beckoned him to 
 come within the palace door. When he heard 
 me call him he looked up ; and a great curse 
 sprang to his lips as he saw that I knew him. 
 
 "Take care," he said between his teeth, as 
 he came toward me. "You call yourself my 
 friend, and you track me like a dog who follows 
 his master unbidden, and licks his hand when 
 the enemy is upon him. Such dogs are struck 
 down." 
 
 I made no answer to his threat, but in hur 
 ried words told him his danger. Then, for I 
 thought of no other way to save him, I placed 
 in his hand the key of my rooms, and bade 
 him hurry thither and there hide himself until 
 
190 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 such time as he might find to come forth un 
 noticed. 
 
 As he heard me speak he looked at me with 
 wonder. Did I know, he asked me, that what 
 I proposed meant a prison for me too ? For he 
 who shields the enemies of the Pope makes 
 himself of their number. 
 
 I answered him that I cared nothing for that. 
 Let him hasten, or he would be too late. 
 
 " Do you know," he asked, " what I should 
 say if you were one of my people? I should 
 say that this was a trap ; that you loved Filippa 
 yourself and would take this way to clear me 
 from your path. And I would kill you here ; 
 and wait for Dei Bardi if he ever came." 
 
 His words made me angry. Do as he would, 
 I bade him ; I could do no more. And I turned 
 away, ready to pass into the narrow street. But 
 just as I turned he seized my hand, and drew 
 me back. 
 
 " I will trust you," he said ; "you have been 
 reared in a land of freedom and of truth." 
 
 With that he left me, and glided swiftly up 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 191 
 
 the great stairway. And I went out into the 
 street. For in Rome I have learned to dis 
 semble ; I have breathed in the lesson with 
 the Roman air; perhaps there has risen to life 
 within me some memory of the old wiles that 
 Emilia Colonna cast about her. And even 
 though what Luigi said was true, and I had 
 indeed been reared in a land where frankness 
 and truth are the habit of men, the thought 
 that rose uppermost in my mind was that I 
 must act as if I had not known that Luigi was 
 by, lest Monsignor, who perhaps had seen me 
 on the stairway behind him, might be roused 
 to wonder why I had turned back. 
 
 So forth I went into the Roman sunshine. 
 And as I passed the corner of a street close by, 
 I saw the black-robed priest, no longer deep 
 in pretended thought, hurrying toward me with 
 officers at so swift a pace that his black cloak 
 swelled behind him in the wind. When he 
 came in sight of the palace and saw that Luigi 
 was no longer there, I heard him utter a great 
 oath of anger. Then he quickened his pace, 
 
192 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 beckoning the officers to follow. And I went 
 another way, and wandered for a while about 
 the Roman streets. 
 
 Then by and by, when I thought that time 
 enough had passed for no one to look askance 
 at me, I came back and passed up the stone 
 stairway. There nothing met me save the 
 shadows of the olden time that fall upon my 
 soul when I pass the spot where the olden time 
 worked out its doom. So I came to my own 
 door, where I knocked gently ; and the Count 
 Luigi opened it. 
 
 When he saw me his face was lighted with a 
 look of welcome greeting. He drew me within 
 the door ; and when the door was closed behind 
 me, he flung his arms about me as he had flung 
 them when we met on the stairway, on the day 
 when Filippa pledged her faith to Palchi. Ho 
 pressed me close to his heart, pouring forth a 
 flood of grateful words. He had wronged me. 
 He had let himself believe that I would betra}^ 
 him, that I did not hold him dear. And now 
 I had proven that I was the faithful friend 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 193 
 
 he had been used to deem me ; I had saved his 
 life from his enemies. He would roll at my 
 feet, craving pardon for the thought that had 
 wronged me. He would tear out the part of 
 his heart that had swerved from trust in me. 
 So he spoke, with all the passion of his people. 
 
 When the first tempest of his speech was over, 
 I asked him why he was come back to Rome, 
 where every door-way might be a trap. 
 
 He thrust his hand into his breast and drew 
 forth a dagger. 
 
 "I will tell you," he said. " It was to drive 
 this into Palchi s heart. He shall not live to 
 call Filippa his wife." 
 
 I looked at him startled. I had not dreamed 
 that the passion of his love had swept him on 
 so far. And he, with growing anger, told me 
 how the time was running short, how in few 
 days the hour would come when Palchi should 
 claim his bride. He had tried to bear the 
 thought that this hour was at hand, to trust 
 fate that in future time he might come to his 
 love and laugh with her in secret at her dapper 
 13 
 
194 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 husband ; but when he thought how Palchi was 
 to call her his, to clasp her, even loveless, in his 
 thin arms, all Luigi s heart rose up in protest. 
 He swore an oath that Palchi should die. Be 
 fore Heaven, he swore to me again, he would 
 keep his oath. I had saved him that he might 
 keep it. To-day he had known that Palchi 
 was to pass within the Colonna palace, on some 
 errand with the Cardinal Giulio. At the palace 
 door he had stood waiting ; and when the 
 prince stepped forth it would have been to 
 meet an unshriven death. Unkind fate had 
 thrown Dei Bardi in his way ; then Heaven 
 had sent me to save him, that Palchi might die. 
 For die he should ; there was still time. 
 
 I shrank from him, filled as he was with sin 
 ful thoughts. What good, I asked him, could 
 come of such a deed ? More than ever it would 
 part him from Filippa. 
 
 " Yes," he said, "they will put me to death. 
 But I shall sleep quiet in my grave ; for the 
 man that has stolen my love will be as cold 
 as I." 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 195 
 
 Let him beware, I cried, full of the agony that 
 lay hidden in the grave of Emilia. Those who 
 die in sin may not sleep in peaceful graves. 
 
 Then he laughed aloud. I was always prating 
 of sin, he said. Life was sin to me. Love was 
 sin. Then, as he spoke, his cheek began to 
 burn and his eye to flash with, fresh fire. 
 
 Did I know, he asked me, what my prating 
 of sin had led to ? It had led to this ; and he 
 held up the dagger again before my eyes. 
 
 What he meant I could not tell. I bade him 
 speak plain. 
 
 In Emilia s church, he told me, he had come 
 to meet Filippa, who had slipped away in secret 
 from her people. Thence he had planned that 
 they should fly together to the secret places 
 where his friends lay hidden. There, with 
 hearts full of love for one another and for Italy, 
 they would have laughed when they thought of 
 the baffled folk in Rome : of grim Dei Bardi, 
 biting his nails in vexation ; of the stern Count 
 ess, filling her palace with impotent curses ; of 
 trim Palchi, strutting and showing his teeth, 
 
196 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 the laughing-stock of the town ; of pious Car 
 dinal Giulio, praying that all men might be 
 saved. Then I had come between them, and 
 unknowing had checked their flight. Now it 
 was too late. He could not make his plans 
 again. There was nothing left but this : again 
 he held the knife in his hand. 
 
 I looked at him, sick at heart. I made no 
 answer. Was this, I thought, my mission in 
 the wretched life that I may not cut short? 
 Must I spread about me, in the form that is 
 mine, evil and misery and guilt, even as in the 
 olden lime Emilia Colonna spread them about 
 her path ? Longing to do good, to win my right 
 to the salvation that I have dared to hope for in 
 the time that is to come, must I unwittingly 
 spurn from me and cast down into sin deep as 
 that from which I struggle to be free, the souls 
 of the men that are about me ? It were better, 
 I thought, that I should rest among the damned. 
 
 What look was in my face I know not ; but it 
 must have been a strange one. For as the Count 
 Luigi gazed upon me I saw him grow pale. He 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 197 
 
 seized my arm. In Heaven s name, he asked 
 me, what was in my mind? 
 
 I shook my head. I could not speak. I was 
 full of that nameless agony which falls upon me 
 at those times of my life when a little more of 
 what is to come is revealed to me at last. The 
 writhing clouds that make past and present 
 seem like one long evil dream from which there 
 is no waking were gathered before my eyes. It 
 seemed to me that the walls which were about 
 me, that the startled man who stood before me, 
 were made of such vapors as curl thick through 
 summer skies. A breath of wind might change 
 their quivering forms to a shapeless mist, dark 
 and murky and fearful. 
 
 Then I heard the Count Luigi cry out again 
 in passion. Was I faithless after all ? Would 
 I betray him because I was pleased to say that 
 what he did was sinful ? By Heaven, I should 
 be the first to feel the sin ! 
 
 What happened then I know not ; for the 
 winds of confusion broke in upon the vapors 
 that writhed about me, and all was darkness, 
 
198 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 in which I struggled I knew not whither. But 
 when at last the light gleamed upon me once 
 more, and I knew myself, and where I was and 
 what I did, I was standing erect on the spot 
 where I had stood before. And in my hand 
 was the dagger which the Count Luigi had 
 held ; and the Count Luigi, pale and trembling, 
 lay at my feet, as if he had been flung down ; 
 and I was speaking and he listening, as if my 
 words were the words of a prophet. 
 
 Then I stretched out my hand and raised 
 him, and I bade him be of good cheer and trust 
 me, for all should be well with him. 
 
 For the writhing clouds were gone, and I 
 saw the light of God s day ; and by it I knew 
 that though the deeds by which I may win my 
 right to rest were still afar off, there was a deed 
 that I might do even now which should save 
 from sin these friends who suffered before my 
 eyes the first agonies of lives that without me 
 might end in agony like mine. 
 
 Be of good cheer, I bade him again. Trust 
 in me ; and I would make Filippa his before 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 199 
 
 the eyes of God and men ; and Palchi should 
 live, to strut in Rome until he found another 
 bride to dower with his millions; and on 
 Filippa s soul and Luigi s there should be no 
 stain of sin to darken the love that should fill 
 their lives until Heaven called them to the rest 
 of its eternities. 
 
 Then the Count Luigi slowly rose up, and 
 with trembling voice told me that he knew not 
 my meaning, but that he could not help trust 
 ing one that spoke as I spoke, for my words 
 were no words of earth. And bending down, 
 he kissed my hand. 
 
 With that I bade him go hide himself in an 
 inner chamber until I should call him forth ; 
 and thither he went. Then, left alone, I 
 gathered up my strength and prepared to do 
 the work that should save him, praying in my 
 heart that in good time the light might come 
 which should show to me the work that shall 
 win the salvation which is rest for the soul 
 that I call mine. 
 
XV. 
 
 From Beverly^s Journal. 
 
 T)EFORE I set out I looked within the room 
 -^ where Luigi was gone, on whose service I 
 was bound. Tired out, he had fallen asleep, 
 and slept peacefully as a child. So might 
 Giulio have slept in the olden time, when his 
 life was still free from sin, smiling as he 
 dreamed of the woman, the thought of whom 
 was joy. I looked at Luigi, keeping very still 
 for fear that I might arouse him. I found my 
 self unawares speaking words of blessing, such 
 as old folk speak. For though I seem near to 
 Luigi in years, my soul-life runs back in the 
 past ; and with it runs memory, until I feel 
 older than any gray-beard. Then I left him 
 gently resting, and made my way to Giulio 
 Colonna s door. 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 201 
 
 They would have kept me out, but I gave 
 them gold, whereat they grinned and bowed 
 as they might have bowed before an angel. So 
 I passed in, and coming to the room where 
 Giulio Colonna sits, I entered as I had been 
 used to enter in the days of our friendship, 
 unannounced. 
 
 The Cardinal Giulio sat alone as I had seen 
 him sit before ; but his look was different from 
 any that I had known as his. Deep in thought 
 I had seen him ; full of concern and trouble, 
 too; at other times calm and smiling; but 
 never until now full of busy life. His back 
 was turned to me, as he sat in his carven chair, 
 leaning forward over his table. I could hear 
 the sharp scratching of his pen, for he was 
 writing swiftly, like the bustling merchants 
 whom I used to watch at home in their dreary 
 counting-houses. In his bearing there was no 
 trace of age or of reverence. Of old he had 
 been a man apart from the world ; now he 
 seemed of the world, straining every nerve in 
 the race of life. 
 
202 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 When he heard my step, he did not turn his 
 head or stop his writing ; but raising his left hand 
 with a gesture of beckoning, he spoke in a low 
 voice words which I could not hear. I stepped 
 closer to him. In a moment he spoke again, with 
 some shade of displeasure in his tone. 
 
 " I have asked you, Monsignor," he said, 
 " what news you bring of Capellari." 
 
 For a little while I did not perceive his mean 
 ing, so full was my mind of what I was come to say 
 to him ; so I made no answer. Then of a sudden 
 I remembered how there were stories abroad in 
 Rome that Pope Gregory was ailing, and that 
 churchmen were busying their brains about 
 who should be his successor. Of these tales I 
 had thought little, for to me it mattered not 
 who sat in the Vatican. But here before me 
 was one to whom it mattered much ; and full 
 of the thought of what might come to him he 
 asked me, whom he thought his wily chaplain, 
 for news of the man whose death he longed for. 
 I was sick at heart, thinking how far his mind 
 had travelled from such thoughts as I had 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 203 
 
 hoped to find it busy with. And he, when I 
 did not speak, stopped his pen and turned 
 about, his face full of displeasure. 
 
 "Do you not hear my question ? " he began. 
 Then, when he saw who was with him, he 
 flung down his pen and sat erect facing me, 
 his features flushed with anger. 
 
 By what right, he asked me, was I come 
 thither ? He had bidden me come no more. 
 He had spoken out those things which the 
 spells I cast upon him had forced from his lips. 
 As he spoke he grew troubled. My presence 
 seemed to bring back the old thoughts that he 
 had put aside. In God s name, he cried, leave 
 him in peace ! Go, or he would have me thrust 
 forth by his lackeys. 
 
 Then I spoke to him gently. It was for no 
 affair of mine nor of his, I said, that I was come. 
 For my sake and for his I would have left him 
 in peace with all my heart, arid borne with no 
 groans those burdens of his which he had laid 
 upon me, even as I bore my own. It was for 
 the sake of others that I was come, of others 
 
204 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 whom he loved ; and, with the blessing of 
 Heaven, I would come before him no more on 
 this earth if he would let me speak to-day. 
 
 He looked at me for a moment without an 
 answer, his face full of anger and of doubt. 
 Nay, it seemed that in his eye there was some 
 touch of fear. For though he could not know 
 what I am, he could not but feel that I am 
 such a thing as never crossed his path before. 
 Old sins in this earth lie buried to rise only 
 when the day of reckoning shall come ; but I, 
 by that strange doom that is half a blessing, 
 walk the earth, a living sin. I cast my shadow 
 upon all about me ; and most of all upon him 
 who knew me in the form that of old was mine. 
 
 Speak, he said at length, but let my words 
 be numbered, and let them be the last that he 
 should ever hear from my lips. 
 
 So I spoke, with a flood of passion that \vas 
 strange to me. My words came to my lips and 
 I spoke them out unthinking, my heart full of 
 the mission on which I was come. And Giulio 
 Colonna listened arid was moved. At first 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 205 
 
 he seemed impatient, longing that I should be 
 done ; but as I spoke I saw his face grow grave 
 and passionate, and his eyes flash with a fire as 
 if of sympathy. Then the strength that his 
 form had shown seemed to leave him ; and he 
 leaned back in his carven chair, busy with no 
 thoughts save those which I poured forth. 
 
 At first, I think, I began to speak of the 
 olden time of which he had told me the story, 
 reminding him how he knew what love might 
 make men do. Blessed by Heaven, no holier 
 power than love dwells on the earth ; unblessed, 
 there is no fouler fiend. And that, I told him, 
 none could know better than he, who has 
 praj 7 ed through long years to be freed from its 
 curses ; nor yet than Emilia, who groans out 
 such agonies as death alone can bring. 
 
 When I spoke her name he moaned aloud, 
 but I did not check my speech ; and presently 
 he asked me why I dragged his sins back from 
 the grave. 
 
 Then I told him that it was to show into what 
 dangers others might fall. And he asked me 
 
206 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 what others I meant, and what they had to do 
 with him. And I told him that I meant the girl 
 whom he was giving over to a loveless wedlock. 
 Thereupon he asked me what I knew of her. And 
 I said that by chance I knew more than he. 
 
 With that he turned upon me with a face of 
 such passion as in all my life I had never seen. 
 Had I dared, he cried, to play the knave within 
 his doors? Then, by Heaven, I should feel 
 what he could do ! 
 
 But when he spoke thus I broke into anger 
 too, and cried out louder than he. Was his 
 mind so foul, I asked him, that even in the 
 quiet of the home that he had made holy with his 
 prayers, he could harbor no thought of purity? 
 Then truly the curse that had fallen upon him 
 when he sinned with Emilia was upon him still 
 in all its blackness. And I spoke more to the 
 same end, full of anger ; and presently I saw 
 that he was struck with shame. For he bent 
 down his head, and spoke gently, bidding me 
 tell him what, then, my words had meant, 
 
 A simple thing, I answered him. Only that 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 207 
 
 Filippa, whom he would sell to grinning Palchi, 
 loved another as dearly as in the olden time 
 Emilia had loved him. By a strange chance 
 the knowledge of this love was come to me ; 
 and now I brought it to him, so that he might 
 draw back in time, and check the fresh begin 
 ning of work such as had wrought the misery 
 of his life. For in loving wedlock the girl 
 might still live pure, and give to the world 
 children on whom she could look without a 
 blush, in the pride of holy motherhood. But 
 if she should wed as he bade her, then in the 
 ages to come he should hear her groans mingled 
 with the groans of Emilia rising above the 
 echoes of hell. And even though he who heard 
 might be sitting among the blessed, he should 
 sit there damned by the knowledge that deeds 
 of his had set these sinners a-groaning. 
 
 So I called upon him, in the name of the dead 
 Emilia, to stop this work before it was too late ; 
 to cast off Palchi, to join Filippa to her love. I 
 called upon him in the name of Emilia, in mine 
 own. 
 
208 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 In God s name, he asked me, who was I that 
 spoke ? 
 
 Then I found that I could not tell him, for 
 something bade me keep back the truth. But 
 this I said : I was one who had sinned as in 
 the olden time Emilia had sinned ; who knew 
 tortures like hers ; who would give my life-blood 
 to save another from such a life as I dragged 
 out in agony deeper than the agony which he 
 had known through all the years of his repent 
 ance. For my sake, I cried again, for the sake 
 of one who knows as no other living thing can 
 know what comes to those who have forgotten 
 the commands of God, let no such work begin 
 again ! 
 
 Then I saw that he was greatly moved ; for 
 his face was very pale and very grave. And it 
 seemed as if in the depths of his heart there was 
 such a struggle as heaven wages with hell when 
 the souls of men are at stake. And presently 
 he asked me who the man was whose cause I 
 came to plead. And I told him that it was the 
 Count Luigi. 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 209 
 
 When he heard that name his anger blazed 
 up afresh. Did I know, he asked me, of whom 
 "I spoke ? He had cherished the Count Luigi 
 as he would have cherished his own child ; and 
 with black treachery Luigi had turned upon 
 him and betrayed him to his enemies. Yes ; and 
 the treachery with which I charged Luigi in 
 stealing Filippa s heart made the old treachery 
 doubly black. This creature whose cause I 
 came to plead had done his best to overthrow 
 the structure which he, Giulio Colonna, this 
 creature s greatest benefactor, had reared with 
 the labor of all his lifetime. And to serve the 
 pleasure of this traitor I would have him break 
 his pledged word. The plan was mad. So he 
 raved on in his anger. 
 
 When he paused I spoke very solemnly. Did 
 I guess his meaning aright? I asked him. Had 
 he set his heart, as men said that he had set it, 
 on Saint Peter s chair ? And had the Count s 
 flight made men whisper that the Count s 
 friends were privy to the plots of those who 
 work against the Pope ? Beneath the holy 
 
 14 
 
210 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 surface of his daily life, was his heart in truth 
 full of such wiles as his grinning chaplain, with 
 all his art, had not the art to conceal ? Did - 
 he, Giulio, with his white hair and his saint s 
 f ace? still pant for the prizes of this world ? 
 
 What right had I, he cried, to catechise him ? 
 
 The right, I told him, of one who was come 
 to warn him in time. Let him with all his heart 
 fall to the prayers that in the past he had only 
 mouthed. Let him, as he hoped for pardon and 
 salvation in the world to come, and soon to 
 come for him, cast aside all care for what 
 might chance in this. 
 
 In God s name, he cried, had not his fastings 
 and his prayers won him freedom from thoughts 
 like these ? 
 
 Then I told him that freedom from thoughts 
 like these comes only when God s judges have 
 spoken words of mercy to a pardoned soul. As 
 he hoped for that mercy, let his only thoughts 
 on earth be of what good he might still do to 
 make amends for the evil that in the past 
 he had wrought. Unknowing, I was come with 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 211 
 
 a message of salvation to him too, who stood in 
 sorer need even than those whom I would check 
 from plunging into sin. As he loved his soul, 
 let not that message pass unheeded ! 
 
 How could he know, he cried, that what I 
 said was not all a lie ? 
 
 Send for Filippa, I told him. Ask her for the 
 truth. 
 
 Even as I spoke the door opened, and Dei 
 Bardi stood before us. Some message of state 
 craft was on his lips, for before he saw me he 
 had spoken the name of Capellari. But when 
 he saw that the Cardinal Giulio was not alone, 
 he stood still, his broad-brimmed hat in his 
 hand, his face full of stern business. 
 
 " I must speak with His Eminence," he said 
 almost roughly. 
 
 With no answer, I turned to Giulio Colonna 
 and bade him send the priest for Filippa. He 
 looked upon me full of surprise, for in all the 
 years that had passed since he had been a 
 prince of the Church no man had dared speak 
 to him as I spoke. I did not hesitate. I spoke 
 
212 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 to him again, bidding him, as he loved his soul, 
 send the priest to fetch the girl. 
 
 Then, very slowly, the Cardinal Giulio turned 
 to Dei Bardi, and told him that he could hear 
 no message, for he had business with Filippa, 
 whom he prayed that the priest would summon. 
 And in the depths of my heart I thanked God 
 that I had won my fight. 
 
 The black-robed priest, seized with astonish 
 ment, spoke some word of remonstrance, whereat 
 Giulio s wrath was aroused once more. With 
 a burst of passion as fierce as the Count Luigi s, 
 he bade the priest hasten to do what he had 
 commanded. No man should disobey his word. 
 
 "Go!" he cried. And Dei Bardi, with a 
 low bow, glided off, amazed. Before long he 
 came back, saying that the girl was at hand. 
 Then Giulio, who had said no word since the 
 priest had left us, bade him wait without until 
 he was summoned. So, full of vexation, he 
 withdrew ; and presently Filippa came. 
 
 When she saw that I was there, her face 
 blazed with such anger as in the faces of 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 213 
 
 Grecian gods struck death to the hearts of men. 
 Was I come after all, she cried, to persecute her 
 with my lies ? 
 
 Very gently I answered her that she had best 
 go ask the Cardinal Colonna what I had said ; 
 and as she loved her happiness and her soul she 
 had best speak the truth. 
 
 Very gently, then, the Cardinal Giulio beck 
 oned her to come to him, and took her by the 
 hand, and spoke to her in a whisper that I 
 could not hear. And I, turning aside, saw 
 that I was close to the crucifix where the 
 Cardinal Giulio was used to pray in the hours 
 of his trouble. So I kneeled me down, and 
 prayed in silence that the work which I was 
 about might prosper ; that these lives which 
 my life had crossed might be blessed by my 
 passage ; that Giulio and Luigi and Filippa 
 might be saved from such misery as mine ; and 
 that, when God in Heaven deemed that my 
 hour was come, some light might gleam to me 
 over the path by which I might struggle on to 
 the salvation which is rest. 
 
214 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 Then, when my prayer was done, and once 
 more I began to listen to what was going on 
 about me, I heard the sound of weeping. And 
 turning about, I saw Filippa kneeling at Giulio s 
 feet, her face hidden in his robes, her form 
 quivering with great sobs ; and Giulio s old 
 eyes were full of tears, and his thin hand with 
 its gleaming jewel stroked her black hair, and 
 his face was as gentle as the face of an angel. 
 Then I knew that he was saved, and that she 
 was saved, and that the words he whispered in 
 her ear were the words that bore from God the 
 message of their salvation. So, full of grati 
 tude that my prayer for them had been an 
 swered, I knelt again, and poured forth a flood 
 of thanksgiving, trusting that in days to come 
 the mercy that has been shown to them may 
 at last be shown to me. 
 
XVI. 
 
 \ T 7ITH these words Beverly s journal ends. 
 * * The manuscript breaks off abruptly in 
 the middle of a page. There is no record of 
 how or when the last lines were written; but 
 from what I have been able to learn of the rest of 
 his story I have grown to think that there was 
 but one time when he could have written them. 
 This was during the last hours of the day when 
 he had found Luigi at the palace door and had 
 gone from him to the Cardinal Colonna. There 
 is nothing except what happened afterwards to 
 show how his interview with the Cardinal and 
 Filippa ended. From what happened after 
 wards, however, I feel sure that it was short. 
 Beverly must have told them where Luigi lay 
 hidden ; the Cardinal must have promised that 
 in the quiet of the night he would bring the girl 
 up the palace stairs to the chamber where her 
 
216 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 lover waited, and there join them with the 
 blessing of the Church. Then they should go 
 in peace to some place of safety. 
 
 I like to think, then, that in the early hours 
 of the night, while Beverly and Ltiigi watched 
 together for those who were coming, Beverly 
 took his pen, and wrote in his book the thoughts 
 that troubled his brain. I like to think, too, 
 that in writing them he found such comfort as 
 men always find in speaking out, even to deaf 
 leaves of paper. It is your silent men, who 
 keep all things to themselves, that go mad. 
 Richard Beverly s father, they say, had no 
 friends to whom he opened his heart, and, like 
 many another prudent man, held that one who 
 wrote clown what might not be read by all the 
 world was a fool. By and by he cut his throat. 
 Richard Beverly s mother left reams of senti 
 mental journals behind her, and lived to a good 
 old age. 
 
 So I like to think of Richard Beverly, in his 
 great chamber lighted by a single candle, turn 
 ing to these pages that received his secrets forty 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 217 
 
 years ago, and writing them down while Rome 
 slept about him, in the last clays of the old papal 
 rule. I like to think that as he wrote he sighed 
 with the relief of one who for a time at least 
 lays aside his burden. I like io think that all 
 the while the gallant young Roman, whose 
 happiness Beverly had wrought that day, waited 
 beside him in the dim light, with throbbing 
 heart, and ears strained to catch the sound of 
 the footsteps that should tell him of his coming 
 bride. I like to think that the sound of those 
 footsteps came as the last lines in the old jour 
 nal were writing ; that Richard Beverly flung 
 down his pen where he was, and went and 
 opened his door, and that there he found the 
 old Cardinal and Filippa. I like to think that 
 when this faded ink was still wet, the Count 
 Luigi was clasping his love in his arms, while 
 Richard Beverly and the Cardinal Giulio Co- 
 lonna stood aside with brimming eyes, as they 
 thought of the unblessed loves of Emilia that in 
 a happier time might have been as pure as 
 these. But this is all a fancy. 
 
218 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 What comes afterwards I have learned partly 
 from letters of Cleveland s, partly from traditions 
 of what Cleveland wrote and said about the last 
 hours of Beverly s life. For Cleveland died 
 years ago, and so did his wife, long before I 
 was old enough to know anything about these 
 matters, which nobody else could have told me. 
 So I have had to put the tale together as best 
 I could ; but in so doing I have come to feel as 
 if every word that I wrote were true. 
 
 What I shall write next happens to be pretty 
 well authenticated. To be sure, the letter in 
 which Cleveland wrote it down has been lost ; 
 but I have talked with people who read it for 
 themselves, and I find that all the versions 
 agree in the main. 
 
 In the middle of the night, the same night, 
 it must have been, when Beverly wrote the last 
 words in his journal, there came a low knock 
 at Cleveland s door. Whereupon Cleveland, 
 who was a light sleeper, rose, with sundry oaths 
 that he should be disturbed at such an hour, and 
 went to see who disturbed him. To his surprise 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 219 
 
 he found Beverly, who had not deigned to visit 
 him for some weeks. And Beverly, without 
 waiting for any formalities, told the artist that 
 he must put on his clothes and come with him, 
 on a matter of life and death. 
 
 " There is not a moment to lose," said Bev 
 erly. fct We must have a man that we can trust ; 
 and I know that we can trust you, for you are 
 a gentleman," - a charge, as Cleveland re 
 marked in his letter, to which it was his habit 
 invariably to plead guilty. 
 
 So, wondering what on earth was up, Cleve 
 land hurried into his clothes, and climbed the 
 stairs that led to Beverly s rooms. 
 
 There they found three figures waiting for 
 them, all wrapped in cloaks. By the light of 
 the single candle that burned in the great room 
 Cleveland could not at first make out their 
 faces ; but presently he was astonished to rec 
 ognize, in a man who stood as erect as if he had 
 been young, the Cardinal Colonna. For the 
 Cardinal beckoned him forward ; and in a few 
 words thanked him for his presence, and told 
 
220 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 him that he had been sent for to witness a mar 
 riage which circumstances compelled them to 
 solemnize in secret. Then, without more ado, 
 the Cardinal Colonna turned to the other figures 
 who were with him ; and they knelt down, and 
 with a short formal service the Cardinal made 
 them man and wife. Meanwhile Cleveland and 
 Beverly stood by ; and Cleveland told how in 
 the candle-light it had seemed to him that the 
 gleam in Beverly s wide-open eyes was the gleam 
 of tears. 
 
 AYhen the service was over, the wedded couple 
 kissed the Cardinal s hand. Then they slowly 
 rose, and clasping each other in their arms 
 stood in close embrace, gazing into each other s 
 eyes. Meanwhile the Cardinal Colonna moved 
 toward the table where the candle stood, and 
 bending down signed his name with a firm hand 
 to a paper that lay there. Then he beckoned 
 to Cleveland and to Beverly ; and with his 
 thin white finger pointed out the places where 
 they should sign. And when their names 
 were written he took up the paper, and folding 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 221 
 
 it turned to the lovers whom he had joined 
 together, and held it out to them. 
 
 " God be with you, my children," he said. 
 " I seal the beginning of your earthly hopes 
 with the end of mine. But my heart is light ; 
 for I have done God s will. May He smile on 
 you through all your lives as He smiles on me 
 to-night." 
 
 He spoke in a low, firm voice ; and the hand 
 that held the paper did not tremble. The 
 lovers turned toward him to take the paper ; 
 and, as they turned, Cleveland knew them for 
 the Count Luigi and the Contessina Filippa. 
 The Count took the paper with a look of loving 
 gratitude that meant more, Cleveland wrote, 
 than a whole oration, with applause into the 
 bargain. For all that, the Count was not satis 
 fied with looks, but began to speak his gratitude 
 in words. Whereupon the Cardinal Colonna 
 raised his hand with a gesture of remonstrance, 
 and pointing to Beverly, who stood aside, bade 
 them thank him, to whom all the gratitude 
 was due. Then, before the Count had time 
 
222 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 to speak again, the Cardinal Colonna himself 
 spoke to Beverly. 
 
 " Friend," he said, " I too owe you grateful 
 thanks ; for the voice of God tells me in my 
 heart that it is to you that I shall owe my 
 salvation, and to no deeds of mine." 
 
 And what the devil it all meant, Cleveland 
 wrote, he could not imagine. 
 
 The scene of gratitude was short, however ; 
 for Beverly, who seemed more master of him 
 self than any of the others, warned them that 
 there was no time to spare, and blowing out 
 the light, led the way with soft steps to the 
 door-way. Then the whole company slowly and 
 silently passed down the chilly stairway, until 
 they came to the Cardinal Colonna s door. 
 There they left him, the lovers kissing his hand 
 once more, and he once more whispering a word 
 of blessing. And as they crept on down the 
 stairway, the} heard his door softly close behind 
 him. 
 
 Beverly and Cleveland were side by side in 
 the darkness ; the lovers just before them. As 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 223 
 
 they passed on, Cleveland felt his kinsman 
 clutch his arm. 
 
 " Cleveland," he heard him whisper, in a tone 
 of strange joy, "the shadows are here no more. 
 What does it mean ? The end is not come, yet 
 the shadows are here no more/ 
 
 Before Cleveland could answer this speech, 
 which seemed to him a burst of madness, the 
 little company came to the outer door of the 
 palace. There a small gate in the great door 
 stood open. And the lovers, turning once to 
 press Beverly s hand, passed without into the 
 dark street, alone together at last. And whither 
 they went, and what befell them from that time 
 on, I have never known. 
 
 Then with stealthy movements Beverly closed 
 the little gate and drew the bolts to. And then, 
 muttering a word of thanks to Cleveland for 
 coming at his bidding, he turned ; and together 
 they set about climbing the stairs once more. 
 
 Of a sudden, just as they were close to the 
 Cardinal Colonna s door, a great noise burst 
 upon the quiet of the night. The Cardinal s 
 
224 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 door was flung open. There was a sound of 
 voices and of hurrying steps within. There 
 was a flash of lights ; and forth rushed a man, 
 shouting in anger, who turned toward the stair 
 way where Cleveland and Beverly stood. Who 
 it was Cleveland could not see. Beverly s eyes 
 seemed better. 
 
 u It is that black devil! " he cried. " He shall 
 not chase them ! " And leaping forward he bade 
 him stop. 
 
 The man tried to push him aside ; whereupon 
 Beverly clutched him by the throat. For an 
 instant they struggled on the landing. Then 
 together they pitched headlong down the stone 
 stairs into the darkness below. 
 
 In a moment more, there came out of the 
 Cardinal s rooms servants with lights. With 
 them Cleveland hurried down the stairs to the 
 bottom, where all was still. There, side by 
 side, they found the forms of Beverly and Dei 
 Bardi. The priest wa dead. His neck was 
 broken. He lay staring upwards, his thin lips 
 parted, his thin cheeks puckered with a grin of 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 225 
 
 agony. He looked, Cleveland wrote, like one 
 who was already in hell. 
 
 Beverly lay as quiet as he ; but on his face 
 was a look of peace. And as they bent over 
 him they saw that he still breathed ; so they 
 lifted him up and gently bore him to Cleve 
 land s chambers. There they laid him on a bed, 
 where he rested with closed eyes. 
 
 Meanwhile others bore the priest back to the 
 room whence he had rushed forth. And the 
 Cardinal Giulio Colonna, they say, when they 
 told him what had happened, and that Beverly 
 still lived, said no word ; but knelt beside the 
 form of his dead servant, and prayed throughout 
 the Roman night for the wily soul that had 
 given all its wiles to his service. 
 
o 
 
 XVII. 
 
 r what happened hereafter among the Ro 
 mans whose lives Beverly had changed I 
 have no record. Indeed, I caie to know noth 
 ing of what the Prince Palchi said and did, or 
 of what oaths the angry Countess swore, or of 
 what busied the brains of those churchmen who 
 had plotted with the dead Florentine to place 
 the Cardinal Giulio Colonna on Pope Gregory s 
 seat. For what I am writing is the story of 
 Richard Beverly s life and nothing else. And 
 now I am come close to the end of it. 
 
 Born in the clear air of our New England, 
 reared in the simple traditions of a time that 
 still remembered the lessons of the fathers, he 
 was come in his manhood to a world where all 
 was different, where the air was full of golden 
 haze, where all external life was beautiful and 
 soft, where life stretched back to farthest time, 
 
Tlie Duchess Emilia. 227 
 
 and with it the roots of the sin that flourished 
 even in the shadow of God s church. There he 
 had lived as best he could, never failing the 
 traditions in which he had been reared. There 
 his New- World purity had fought and won its 
 little battle ; and had sown in the soil of the 
 beautiful, corrupt old Rome that Victor Em 
 manuel s soldiers have swept from the earth, a 
 seed of truth and of goodness that I love to 
 think may still be growing and strengthening 
 in the new Italy, whose banners now wave in 
 the Roman sunshine. It was the musket-shot 
 of Concord that awoke old Europe to liberty. 
 I like to think that it shall be the mission of 
 our New World to win her back to purity. Bat 
 when I fall to talking as I find that I am writing 
 now, my sensible friends smile in a pitying way. 
 Perhaps the whole notion is a wild one, caught 
 from the madness of poor Richard Beverly with 
 which I have lived so much of late. I must 
 back to him, once for all. 
 
 After the night when they bore him up the 
 great stairway and laid him on the bed in 
 
228 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 Cleveland s chambers, he lay for days in a stu 
 por. Cleveland was all kindness ; and so was his 
 wife, who nursed the sick man as tenderly as a 
 mother. But for days he knew nothing of what 
 was about him ; and the doctors who came shook 
 their heads, and said that he might die without 
 awakening to consciousness. Most of the time 
 he rested quietly ; but now and then he would 
 utter incoherent words, always in the language 
 of Italy. Finally, as a night more troubled than 
 most was drawing to a close, he began to rave 
 aloud, crying out as if his mind were in a great 
 agony. But by and by his eyes opened wide, 
 with a look of wondering joy, and he lay very 
 still, gazing at something which those about him 
 could not see. His heart seemed too full to 
 speak. The look of joy brightened more and 
 more, till at last he swooned, as one swoons in a 
 summer air too full of the scent of flowers. 
 Then they thought he was dying ; but he fell 
 into a short sleep, and finally he opened his eyes 
 and spoke in a low voice, as if he knew at last 
 what words he spoke. 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 229 
 
 They hurried to his side. There he called 
 them byname, and thanked them for the gentle 
 ness with which they had cared for him. But 
 when they asked him what he would have 
 them do, his answer made them think that his 
 mind still wandered ; for he asked them to call 
 Giulio. 
 
 Whom did he mean ? they asked. 
 
 Then he smiled as if he saw his own folly, 
 and asked them to go and pray that the Cardi 
 nal Colonna would come to him. They thought 
 that he was still wandering, that he did not 
 know what he said. But though they spoke 
 gentle words of remonstrance, and tried to 
 soothe him, he would not give up his purpose. 
 Gently smiling, with no touch of anger in his 
 persistence, he kept on asking them to summon 
 the Cardinal Colonna to his side. The Cardi 
 nal would come, he said, when they told him 
 that a dying man had words to speak to him, 
 and to him alone, before he could die. 
 
 So at last, fearing all the while that the Car 
 dinal Colonna might take great offence at whaf 
 
230 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 they did, they went to him with Beverly s mes 
 sage, encouraging themselves with the thought 
 that each day a servant of the Cardinal s had 
 knocked at Cleveland s door to hear news of 
 the sick man. When they came to the Cardi 
 nal s rooms they were not permitted to enter his 
 presence ; but their message was carried to him, 
 and in return he sent them a word of thanks. 
 In a few moments he would come, as the sick 
 man prayed. And hardly had they brought 
 back this word, when he followed in their foot 
 steps to the room where Beverly la} 7 . 
 
 When he stood before them, they say, the 
 old man seemed as near his end as did the sick 
 man who lay on his death-bed. For his thin 
 face was as pale as death ; and his steps were 
 so feeble that it seemed as if he must fall, even 
 though a servant held his arm on either side. 
 But in his face there was a look of such holi 
 ness as even those who had known his face 
 when all Rome said that it was the face of an 
 angel, had never dreamed of. For if of old his 
 face had been like that of one who from afar off 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 231 
 
 looked upon the peace of heaven, now it was 
 like the face of one who dwelt therein. So, 
 with peaceful face and tottering steps, the old 
 Cardinal made his way to Beverly s side, and 
 stood above the sick man. 
 
 What passed then passed between those two. 
 The others who were by stood aside, and list 
 ened with awe to words which they could not 
 understand. So they kept silent ; and the old 
 Cardinal and the sick man were face to face, 
 and seemed not to know that any other men 
 were by. 
 
 At first Beverly smiled, and held out his right 
 hand with a feeble movement, as if he had hardly 
 the power to stir it, and all his power came from 
 his will and not from the muscles that had 
 moved his arm in the days of his strength. 
 And the old Cardinal took the wasted hand and 
 held it in his. Then they heard Beverly call 
 him by his name Giulio, in a tone that was full 
 of love. 
 
 The Cardinal Colonna started, and gazed 
 down on the sick man wit# i look of won- 
 
232 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 der. And Beverly called him by his name 
 again, and told him with a smile that he 
 had known that he would come to hear his 
 message. 
 
 Then, with slow words, the old Cardinal 
 prayed the sick man, in the name of God, to 
 tell him who and what he was. 
 
 And Beverly answered that he might speak 
 out at last: that the spirit which was passing 
 was the spirit which in the olden time Giulio 
 had loved. 
 
 Thereupon, with a loud cry, the Cardinal 
 Colonna uttered the name of Emilia, and bend 
 ing down over the sick man, looked into his 
 eyes with a look of fear. But Beverly looked 
 up with a loving smile; and the old Cardinal 
 raised himself up full of wonder, and made the 
 sign of the cross, and motioned those who had 
 pressed near him to stand away. So they moved 
 hack ; and the Cardinal Giulio Colonna stood 
 rilone beside the sick man s bed, gazing into 
 ln s great eyes and listening to the words which 
 he spoke. 
 
Duchess Emilia. 233 
 
 Then Beverly told him how he had just 
 awakened from a vision. 
 
 "It seemed to me," he said, "that I was in 
 the garden where in the olden time we loved. 
 And whether I was that which I am or that 
 which I was I could not tell. But full of 
 trouble for the sin I had done I knelt among 
 the flowers ; and gazing up to the heavens I 
 prayed with all my heart for light, that I might 
 see the way to work out my salvation. It was 
 in the night-time ; and as I prayed I found 
 my eyes fixed upon a star that burned brighter 
 than the rest. Then presently its light grew, 
 and spread about me until I could see no other 
 thing, but knelt surrounded by the glory it 
 shed about me. Then I looked into the depths 
 of the glory of the star, and afar off I saw the 
 throne of heaven. And as I looked, there came 
 before the throne one who wore a crown and 
 bore in her hand a palm. Her I knew for the 
 virgin Emilia, who gave her life for Christ in 
 old Eome. Then kneeling before the throne she 
 spoke pitiful words, and prayed that the peace 
 
234 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 of God might be granted to the soul of one who 
 in the earth had borne her name. And she told 
 how in time past when that soul had hovereA 
 above the brink of hell she had prayed for ? 
 respite, and the respite had been granted. And 
 now she prayed that the misery it had suffered 
 and the work it had done might be deemed 
 enough. This she prayed in the name of her 
 Lord Christ. Then from out the glory of the 
 throne came a voice that answered her and 
 said, Yet a little while and her prayer should 
 be granted. Then I stretched out my hands 
 and strove to rise into the glory of the star ; 
 but I could not. And presently I was kneeling 
 again in the Roman garden, and the star was 
 again only the brightest of the stars that 
 shone in the Roman night. But my heart was 
 troubled no more ; for I had heard the promise 
 of peace." 
 
 Then his voice stopped, and through his form 
 there went a shiver, and his eyes closed ; and 
 those who were about him knew that his spirit 
 was passing, and fell upon their knees. But the 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 235 
 
 Cardinal Giulio Colonna stood erect, with a face 
 full of such joy as the saints feel when first they 
 enter into their rest. In his right hand he held 
 on high the crucifix, where the eyes of the sick 
 man should see it if by chance they opened once 
 more. And he spoke aloud, in tones of triumph, 
 prayers for a passing soul such as he might 
 speak for one of his own believers. Then by 
 and by the face of Beverly was lighted again 
 with a radiance of joy such as might have shone 
 from it in his vision, when in the star-lit gar 
 den the glory of Heaven beamed upon him. 
 Once more his eyes were opened. Once more 
 he spoke. 
 
 " Giulio !" he said, "give thanks to God; 
 for the end is come. And the end is peace." 
 
 Then he looked with one last look on the 
 crucifix, and closed his eyes ; and gently as 
 a little child falls into sleep he ceased to 
 breathe. 
 
 Then the Cardinal Giulio Colonna, first look 
 ing down to be assured that Beverly was no 
 more, turned his face heavenward, and in a loud 
 
236 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 voice spoke the words of praise that the saints 
 have taught to the lips of men : 
 
 " Gloria Patrl et Filio et Spiritui Sancto : 
 sicut erat in principio et nunc et semper in saecula 
 saeculorum" 
 
CONCLUSION. 
 
 , T T ERE, I thought, the story of Richard 
 * * Beverly should have ended; and when 
 I wrote the last words I put it aside feeling that 
 my work was done. But afterwards I happened 
 to go back to Rome, where more than ever the 
 traces of the old papal times are being swept 
 away. I saw new fragments of the Forum; and 
 new boulevards ; and dashing young officers, in 
 jackets trimmed with Astrachan fur ; and Pied- 
 montese soldiers, with floating plumes of dark 
 feathers, marching to the sound of the bugle ; 
 and amid all the bustle of modern life, staring 
 King Humbert himself, driving with his fair- 
 faced queen, while thin Pope Leo sulked in 
 his prison of the Vatican. 
 
 More than ever I felt that the Rome of which I 
 had written, the Rome where Richard Beverly 
 came to meet his end, was a shadowy thing 
 
238 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 that had vanished from the earth. I rubbed 
 my eyes, wondering if after all it had been 
 anything but a dream. Nor, indeed, did I feel 
 that it was much more real when I went with 
 out the gate of Saint Paul, and there, in the 
 burying-place where Keats and Shelley lie in 
 the shadow of the monument that the gold of 
 the Roman Cestius built for him in the days 
 of the Emperors, found among the flowers a little 
 stone on which was cut the name of Beverly. 
 
 But by and by I made my way again to the 
 church of Santa Emilia. There the same old 
 custode I had seen before unlocked the gates of 
 the Colonna chapel, and followed me within them 
 to tell in his cracked old voice how like Para 
 dise its marble glories were. Like Paradise 
 indeed they were in one respect ; for they were 
 in no way changed. They were just as they 
 had been in the days when the popes still ruled 
 Rome, when Beverly found here the key to his 
 life-mystery. Here, just as they had been, were 
 the blazing marbles that the old princes had 
 brought together to gladden their burial-place. 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 239 
 
 Here was the tomb of Emilia Colonna just as 
 Beverly had seen it. 
 
 At least, so I thought until I fell to talking 
 with the old custode, to whom I would not 
 listen when I came to the chapel before. This 
 time I was less surly ; and perhaps with time 
 the old man had grown even more garrulous. 
 For I found myself, after a while, listening with 
 interest to his tales of the Colonnas, and to hia 
 laments that the race was no more. 
 
 Were they all dead ? I asked him. 
 
 All, he said, with a sigh and a shake of the 
 head. Then, tottering over to a corner of the 
 chapel, he stood above a simple slab in the floor, 
 which I had not noticed ; and pointing to it with 
 his bony hand, he croaked out that here lay the 
 last, who had been laid there forty years ago. 
 
 I looked at the slab. There were but three 
 words carved thereon : 
 
 IVLIVS COLVMNA CARDINAL 
 
 He would have it just so, the old custode told 
 me. He was a very holy man, full of humility, 
 
240 The Duchess Emilia. 
 
 very holy indeed. They used to say that if 
 he had not died before Pius the Ninth was 
 made pope he might have been made pope him 
 self. But the old custode did not believe this 
 story ; the Cardinal Colonna had doubtless been 
 a very holy man, but And here the old fel 
 low shook his wrinkled head, and slowly tapped 
 his forehead with his gnarled finger. 
 
 What did he mean ? I asked. Did the Car 
 dinal s mind fail? 
 
 Well, that was as one might please to think. 
 For his part, the old custode did not see how a 
 man whose mind was clear could Choose to lie 
 under a miserable little slab when he might have 
 had a tomb fit to take with him to Paradise. 
 Besides, just before he died, the old Cardinal had 
 had a strange fancy. He had insisted that they 
 should add to the epitaph of one of his kinsfolk 
 who lay here some words that meant nothing, and 
 that quite destroyed the effect of the sculpture. 
 A man whose mind was clear would have known 
 better than to deface such carving as this to 
 make room for words that had no meaning. 
 
The Duchess Emilia. 241 
 
 The old custode had hobbled across the chapel, 
 and stood before the tomb of Emilia Colonna. 
 As he spoke he pointed to three words below 
 the old inscription. To make room for them 
 a bit of the ornamental border of the slab on 
 which the name of Emilia was carved had been 
 cut away. And as the old custode pointed at 
 them with one hand, he shook his head again, 
 with a look of commiseration, and tapped his 
 forehead with the other hand once more. 
 
 But what he showed me meant much to me. 
 For there, beneath the name of Emilia Colonna, 
 and the simple dates that told when she had 
 come into the world and when she had left it, 
 were the three words which in his last days the 
 Cardinal Giulio had placed on her tomb, 
 
 NYNC IN PACE 
 

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY 
 
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