1 BERKELEY 
 JBRARY 
 JNIVPRS1TY OF 
 CALIFORNIA 
 
 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
popular 30. 6D, Hovels 
 
 THE TOWkR OF TADDEO. By OUIDA. 
 
 THE O'CONNORS OF BALLINAHINCH. By Mrs. HUNGERFORD. 
 
 THE JUSTIFICATION OF ANDREW LEBRUN. By FRANK BARRETT. 
 
 A COMEDY OF MASKS. By E. DOWSON and A. MOORE. 
 
 APPASSIONATA. By ELSA D'ESTERRE-KEELING. 
 
 ELI'S DAUGHTER. By J. H. PEARCE. 
 
 INCONSEQUENT LIVES. By J. H. PEARCE. 
 
 HER OWN FOLK. By HECTOR MALOT. 
 
 CAPT'N DAVY'S HONEYMOON. By HALL CAINE. 
 
 A MARKED MAN. By ADA CAMBRIDGE. 
 
 THE THREE MISS KINGS. By ADA CAMBRIDGE. 
 
 A LITTLE MINX. By ADA CAMBRIDGE. 
 
 NOT ALL IN VAIN. By ADA CAMBRIDGE. 
 
 A KNIGHT OF THE WHITE FEATHER. By TASMA. 
 
 UNCLE PIPER OF PIPER'S HILL, By TASMA. 
 
 THE PENANCE OF PORTIA JAMES. By TASMA. 
 
 THE COPPERHEAD. By HAROLD FREDERIC. 
 
 THE RETURN OF THE O'MAHONY. By HAROLD FREDERIC. 
 
 IN THE VALLEY. By HAROLD FREDERIC. 
 
 THE SURRENDER OF MARGARET BELLARMINE. By ADELINE 
 
 SERGEANT. 
 
 THE STORY OF A PENITENT SOUL. By ADELINE SERGEANT. 
 NOR WIFE, NOR MAID. By Mrs. HUNGERFORD. 
 THE HOYDEN. By Mrs. HUNGERFORD. 
 MAMMON. By Mrs. ALEXANDER. 
 DAUGHTERS OF MEN. By HANNAH LYNCH. 
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE CAPE FRONTIER. By BERTRAM MlTFORD. 
 'TWEEN SNOW AND FIRE. By BERTRAM MlTFORD. 
 ORIOLE'S DAUGHTER. By JESSIE FOTHERGILL. 
 THE MASTER OF THE MAGICIANS. By E. S. PHELPS and H. D. 
 
 WARD. 
 
 THE HliAD OF THE FIRM. By Mrs. RlUDELL. 
 A CONSPIRACY OF SILENCE. By G. COLMORE. 
 A DAUGHTER OF MUSIC. By G. COLMORE. 
 ACCORDING TO ST. JOHN. By AMELIE RIVES. 
 KITTY'S FATHER. By FRANK BARRETT. 
 A QUESTION OF TASTE. By MAARTEN MAARTENS. 
 COME LIVE WITH ME AND BE MY LOVE. By ROBERT BUCHANAN. 
 
 London : WM. HEINEMANN, 21 Bedford Street, W.C. 
 
" From her own platform at the top of tlic tower, Bcldia could see the river-reaches, 
 
 and the beautiful lines of the mountains." 
 
 Seepage 10. 
 
THE 
 
 TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 BY 
 
 QUID A 
 
 AUTHOR OF " UNDER TWO FLAGS," ETC. 
 
 WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY HOLLAND TRINGHAM 
 
 LONDON 
 
 WILLIAM HEINEMANN 
 
 1896 
 
 [All rights reserved} 
 
First printed, j vols. , November i8()2. 
 Reprinted, i vol. , September 1893. 
 
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 BELDIA ON THE TOWER - Frontispiece 
 
 THE PALAZZO VECCHIO - 10 
 
 THE CHURCH OF SAN JACOPO - 46 
 
 DANTE'S HOUSE - 88 
 
 SAN MICHELE - 126 
 
 FLORENCE 158 
 
 THE PONTE VECCHIO - 207 
 
 'GOOD PEOPLE, WHAT ARE YOU DOING THERE?' 254 
 
 304 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 IT was a high square tower, brown and gray, stand- 
 ing in a narrow street ; one of the oldest of the once 
 numerous towers of Florence. It was of great 
 height, and dark with age, and rose above the lofty 
 houses which surrounded it ; its machicolated roofs 
 and its iron vane and wooden flagstaff looked black 
 against the sky. But warlike, and stalwart, and 
 austere as it was, it had been given both grace and 
 poetry by its builders, who had belonged to that age 
 in which men knew so well how to unite the useful 
 and the beautiful, how to harmonize the lovely with 
 the formidable, and how to use the sports of peace to 
 hide the strength of war. For it had been built by 
 the great builder of its neighbour, the Jeweller's 
 Bridge, and it was called now, as it had been called 
 in the days of its rising, the Tower of Taddeo. 
 
 Tradition indicated it also as at one time his 
 residence, but this rested only on rumour ; that he 
 had been its architect the archives of the city proved 
 beyond any doubt. He had built it as he built and 
 
2 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 painted so much else that was beautiful. Beauty in 
 those days was necessary as air to those men, so 
 much greater in every art than are the men of these 
 days ; and the makers of all these mighty mediaeval 
 streets of Italy loved to decorate them with marble 
 and majolica and terra-cotta, and to put niches in 
 them for Madonna's shrines and statues of thesaints, 
 and allegorical devices, and inscriptions in the Latin 
 tongue and iron scrollwork made by hand into the 
 utmost delicacy of flower and foliage. 
 
 This tower was rich in all such decoration, and 
 was sometimes called as well the House of the Loves 
 (Casa degli Amorini), from the winged children, by 
 Luca della Robbia, which clustered together over its 
 archway, and held aloft the shield of the great family 
 for whom it had been built, a Tuscan branch of those 
 Brancaleone who once were lords of Cesena and 
 Imola. 
 
 Above their shield was a shrine, with the Virgin 
 and Child seated beneath a canopy, which had, it 
 was said, wrought a miracle in the plague, and a 
 framework of white and green lilies was around 
 them. Above these were other winged children, 
 and other garlands of lilies, and above these, again, 
 was the figure of a bishop with a lamb at his feet ; 
 and all this ornament went upward, upward, upward, 
 until figures and flowers mounted as high as the 
 lines of the battlements, and were full of bright 
 colour, and wholly unspoiled, although four centuries, 
 if one, had gone by since they had been placed there 
 to brighten the dark and gruesome walls, which were 
 pierced with ogive windows and kneeling windows, 
 barred with iron gratings, while below these were 
 
THE TOWER OF TAD DEO 3 
 
 iron rings for torches, and iron sconces for lamps, 
 and one massive oaken iron-studded door. 
 
 A narrow and dark staircase of stone, very steep, 
 went from top to bottom of the tower ; half its lower 
 chambers served as a store place for oils, cheeses, 
 and pastes to a chandler ; and a seller of fuel had 
 the other half filled with his charcoal wood and pine 
 cones ; on the narrow mezzanina above lived a 
 cabinet-maker, a tailor, and a shoemaker, whilst 
 the first, second, and third floors were occupied by 
 a bookseller and librarian, and were known in the 
 quarter as the Libreria Ardiglione. 
 
 On these floors every yard of space was filled 
 to overflowing with books. There was a little 
 kitchen, a little sitting-room, two little bedrooms, 
 mere closets ; and all the rest served as storage for 
 books, books, books, nothing but books and old 
 books all of them, moreover for their owner would 
 no more have sold new books than he would have 
 sold daily newspapers ; either were abominations in 
 his sight. A place of business might easily have 
 been put in a more accessible locality than the 
 Tower of Taddeo. But his father had been there 
 before him, and his grandfather also ; and if the 
 dark, steep, breakneck stairs deterred customers from 
 mounting them, its present proprietor, Francesco 
 Ardiglione, commonly called Ser Checchi, had more 
 leisure time in which to pore over his treasures, and 
 chase the mice away from them, and add to them by 
 visits to bookstalls in the town, and to any remote 
 ancient rural place where it was known that there were 
 any volumes of interest or age to be purchased. Books, 
 even choice and antique ones, fetch but little in 
 
4 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 Italy; and many scores of valuable volumes rot 
 away in old rooms or granaries, or cellars, no one 
 noticing them except the rats. In the country 
 which once produced the noblest literature in the 
 world, books are in the present era the least esteemed, 
 are read the least, and are regarded with the most in- 
 difference and contempt. 
 
 Ardiglione was a man of some sixty-five years old ; 
 he had the true scholar's stoop of the throat and 
 shoulders, and the true scholar's eyes, luminous and 
 benign and dreamy ; his head was fine, with white 
 hair which fell softly off a broad and noble forehead, 
 and a complexion smooth, pale, and delicate, of 
 the faint yellow hue of old ivory. In stature he was 
 short, and in build frail and spare. His clothes were 
 always very shabby, and his gait was awkward ; but 
 no one who looked on him could doubt that he 
 had gentle blood in his veins and vast learning in his 
 brain. 
 
 Everyone called him Ser Checchi, which is the 
 Tuscan diminutive of Francesco, and he was the jest 
 of the neighbourhood for his absence of mind and his 
 simplicity in money matters ; but no one, not the 
 boldest and most impudent little rascal of the streets, 
 would have dared to joke at him to his face, and the 
 rudest rough of the populace stood aside respectfully 
 to let him go by on the curbstone. 
 
 He had married late in life, but his wife had long 
 been dead, having bequeathed to him a ceaseless 
 regret and two young children a son, Cirillo, and 
 a daughter, Beldia. Cirillo was a cause of trouble, 
 Beldia was a perennial spring of joy. Their mother 
 had been a German Swiss from the Canton of Frei- 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 5 
 
 burg, and they and her great-grandmother, a woman 
 of Leyden, had given to the girl her sweet serenity 
 of temper, as well as her fair hair, her fair skin, and 
 her fine health. The boy had gone back for his 
 type to far-off ancestors of more violent and head- 
 strong temper, and had the dark brows, the black 
 close-curling hair, the olive skin, the olive face, the 
 slender limbs, of the young men of Luca Signorelli. 
 In bygone days the Ardiglione had been amongst 
 the territorial nobility of the Casentino, wild and ar- 
 rogant people, riding out from their own castle gates, 
 and holding their own against the Pope and the 
 devil. In recent generations their impoverished 
 descendants had become harmless, plodding, labori- 
 ous citizens, tradespeople, and the like, living quietly, 
 plainly, and honestly ; but Cirillo seemed to have 
 soared high over the heads of these his nearer 
 progenitors, and to have come straight down from 
 the days of the free lances and the mountain 
 lords. 
 
 ' Race is a strange thing!' said Ser Checchi, 
 whenever he looked at his young son. ' You may 
 bury the warrior's seed in a trader's till for centuries 
 and centuries, and at the end of them it will start up 
 armed, and cry for blood.' 
 
 He was sorely troubled by his son ; and shaken 
 by his exorbitant demands out of that peaceful, dusty, 
 fragrant atmosphere which surrounds those who 
 live amongst old books. Beldia, on the contrary, 
 never had given him a moment's uneasiness since 
 her babyish limbs had been strapped down in her 
 swaddling clothes, and laid out in the sun by her 
 country nurse, amongst the honeyed figs and the 
 
6 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 drying tomatoes on the bench of a farmhouse door 
 in the southern hills. 
 
 Despite the infantine captivity of her swaddling 
 bands, she had grown into a tall and gracious 
 woman, very finely formed, and having the more 
 massive muscle of her mother's race and her mother's 
 sunny hair and milk-white complexion. On her re- 
 posed all the government of the family : the domestic 
 direction, the tutelage of the youth who helped to 
 carry on such business as was done, and all matters 
 great and small appertaining to the Ardiglione house- 
 hold and to the small country place lying to the 
 south of the city which belonged to her father. All 
 larger financial questions were settled by Ser Checchi 
 himself, but all smaller ones were the affair of Beldia ; 
 and even at seventeen years old her hands and her 
 mind were full, and her thoughts as busied as though 
 she were a matron of fifty. She had a single servant 
 who cooked, swept, ironed and dusted ; a sturdy 
 widow, by name Veronica, who did the marketing, 
 saw to the linen, and cleaned as much as the 
 presence of so many books allowed to be cleaned ; 
 but this was all the help which Ser Checchi's 
 daughter ever had, and she worked diligently and 
 cheerfully herself all the year round. 
 
 It was she who set the flowers in fresh water 
 under the Madonna's shrine every morning, who 
 kept pots of geraniums and clove pinks and lemon 
 verbena growing behind the broad casements, who 
 on the flat roof behind the battlements had a little 
 garden of young lemon -trees and rose-bushes, 
 mignonette and sweet herbs, protected by matting 
 in winter-time from the north winds which sweep 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 7 
 
 down the Apennines. It was Beldia who freed the 
 mice from the traps which Veronica set, and 
 cherished the swallows who built beneath the 
 machicolations, and petted Lillo the warehouse 
 mastiff, and her own white Maremma dog Folko ; 
 and threw crumbs to the sparrows perching among 
 the plants on the roofs, and carried carrots, and 
 crusts, and cabbage-leaves to the charcoal-seller's 
 mule, who was stabled in the basement. 
 
 ' If she were not so clever, one would say she was 
 daft,' said Veronica, a good-natured soul, to whom, 
 nevertheless, a sparrow only existed for the spit, and 
 mice for the cats, and the food of a dog and the 
 provender of a mule only concerned those who 
 owned them. 
 
 Beldia had inherited from her mother one of those 
 benignant and tender souls whose compassion is as 
 wide as the sea, and whose kindness embraces all 
 earth's creatures. 
 
 ' The heart of St. Francis came back into the 
 world in your body,' her father said to her once, 
 seeing her standing on the roof in the sunshine 
 amongst the young lemon-trees, with the pigeons 
 and sparrows and swallows flying about her. 
 
 ' Beldia was only a nurse, not a saint,' she said, 
 with a smile. Her namesake was nurse to Santa 
 Fina, of San Gemignano, aqd so has a humble place 
 in Hagiology. 
 
 ' It is well for me that I shall have you to be 
 mine,' said Ser Checchi, thinking that the day might 
 not be so far distant from him when he should 
 grow dull of sight, and stiff of limb, and able only 
 to sit and dream of books long read, and days 
 
8 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 long dead, as Petrarca used to sit in the loggia at 
 Arqua. 
 
 At present, however, he was, though of slight 
 frame, strong, and active after his own serious and 
 leisurely fashion, and his physical and mental strength 
 had been little -impaired by his sedentary habits and 
 his preference of the study to the air. His daughter 
 incessantly meditated on and provided for his comfort 
 and safety ; and dry shoes after a muddy walk, warm 
 possets after a chilly day, well-aired linen, and well- 
 cooked food, had not a little to do with his excellent 
 enjoyment of health. 
 
 When he always found his coffee ready at six in 
 the morning, his dinner ready at mid-day, his linen 
 fresh and whole, his papers arranged and docketed, 
 his beloved books classified as far as he would permit 
 such classification to disturb their chaos, he owed it 
 all to Beldia, but it never occurred to him that it 
 was so. 
 
 'Good child, good child!' he said sometimes to 
 her dreamily, and she was more than content. 
 
 ' He never sees that the signorina is letting all her 
 youth and playtime go by for his sake,' the servant 
 Veronica grumbled to herself. ' He thinks a sight 
 more of that graceless, heartless, devil-may-care 
 spendthrift, Cirillo.' 
 
 Yet it was not that Ser Checchi thought little of 
 his daughter : he thought much of her, but he was 
 so used to rely on her, to turn to her, and to have 
 all his material necessities forestalled by her, that he 
 noticed what he owed to her no more than most 
 people alas for them ! notice the beauty of sun- 
 shine and sky. 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 9 
 
 Beldia was esteemed by the few, the very few, 
 who knew her as a grave, strong, energetic maiden, 
 careful as to pence, watchful as to waste, thinking 
 constantly of the little clerk's misdemeanours, the 
 price of fish and meat, the cost of clothing, the rise 
 in charcoal, the wear and tear of linen. But under- 
 neath that prosaic surface there were in her a musing 
 and poetic nature, an imagination which was mute, 
 but none the less vitally and quickly touched to fine 
 excess. When she sat in the dusk of the early 
 evening, or in the faint lamplight of the later night, 
 whilst her father was busied amongst his books 
 below her, and the serving-woman in her kitchen 
 above, she would let her work drop on her lap, and 
 the shadowy spirits of the past come about her. 
 
 As a little child she had been brought up on their 
 farm in the Casentino ; and those early years had 
 filled her with a need of and longing for country 
 sights and sounds, wide landscapes and broad skies. 
 But the tower was still more dear to her, too, in its 
 own way, and when the wood burned on its hearth, 
 and the lamplight flickered on its grated windows, 
 and its oaken chests, and its dusky ancient pictures, 
 it had for her the warm, deep, abiding charm of 
 home : that charm of which those of her generation 
 usually understood nothing. 
 
 It is a charm which takes most hold, and can best 
 be felt, in ancient houses, where many generations 
 have lived and loved, where the suffering of birth 
 and of death has gone on for centuries, where the 
 painted angels on the ceilings have looked down in 
 pity on so many beds of pain, and the bright cherubs 
 on the walls have laughed through their maze of 
 
io THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 flowers on so many lovers whose bones have 
 mouldered for so many years ; in ancient houses, 
 whence emanates a sense of multitudinous life, of 
 sacred and softened death, of ghosts who come 
 tenderly and in affection amongst the living who 
 have replaced them ; and in such houses there is a 
 sanctity which endears them to the dwellers in 
 them, if these have eyes to see the unseen, and souls 
 tender enough to venerate the dead. 
 
 The back of the tower rose above the Arno amidst 
 red-roofed and brown-roofed buildings, gray and 
 moss-grown with age, with terraces on which linen 
 was blowing, and wallflowers were blossoming, and 
 weather-vanes of all kinds and colours and shapes 
 were shifting about to the winds. From her own 
 platform at the top of the tower Beldia could see 
 the river-reaches to right and left of her, and the 
 beautiful lines of the mountains ; the cool dark 
 woods of the Cascine and the shining marbles of 
 San Miniato ; and across the water, above the 
 palaces on the opposite quay, the dome of the 
 cathedral and the lantern-tower of the Palazzo 
 Vecchio. It was her supreme happiness and re- 
 creation to stand there at sunrise or at sunset, and 
 look up at the glad and glorious sky above, and the 
 gliding stream beneath, now green, now brown, now 
 dun coloured, with the reflections of the lights 
 trembling on its surface, and all the sounds of the 
 city softened and spiritualized by distance. 
 
 There were so many of those towers once in this 
 city; and now they are nearly all levelled and de- 
 stroyed by people who prefer factory chimneys with 
 their hellish stench, and the frightful follies of the 
 
as* 
 
 ' 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 11 
 
 jerry-builder. Dante would have sat quite content 
 amongst its book-lined walls, and Fra Angelico 
 would have painted happily at its barred casement, 
 and Leonardo would have drawn and modelled joy- 
 fully on its flat roof so near the clouds, amidst the 
 pigeons and the bells ; but what could any one of 
 them do in a machine-room or in a modern villa ? 
 
 The old tower dated far back to the earliest days 
 of the Republic. It had felt iron and lead and 
 flame. It had seen combat rage and blood flow like 
 water down its narrow street. It had known all 
 that full, rich, various, splendid life which came 
 with the effulgence of the Renaissance. It was 
 itself a part and parcel of all that noble and splendid 
 existence, and as such it was doubly dear to this 
 quiet maiden, deep down in whose heart was the 
 reverence for all great things, and heroic lives, and 
 beautiful creations. 
 
 She could make a fritter ably, and could iron like 
 a clear-starcher, and could see quickly when the 
 butcher and the baker tried to cheat her ; but all 
 the same she honoured art and nature, and when 
 she saw them outraged she was herself ashamed. 
 She had been born with the eyes which see, and the 
 ears which hear, and the scholarly and historic 
 atmosphere in which she had been reared from her 
 babyhood made her perceptions clearer, and her 
 thoughts finer, than are those of most women. She 
 loved these things which were around her ; and she 
 knew why she loved them, which was more. 
 
 For an unintelligent love, whether for man or for 
 nature, is of little benefit to either, because it knows 
 not what it does ; and so does ofttimes more harm 
 
12 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 than good, and only tortures when it seeks to 
 serve. 
 
 When she had leisure to dream, she liked to lay 
 her head back against her chair, and close her eyes, 
 and think of all those scenes on which the iron 
 torch-rings and stanchions and the dark and grue- 
 some walls had gazed. Full many a time must they 
 have seen their creator, Gaddi himself, watching 
 them in their rising, his fine straight profile like a 
 cameo against the light, and the woollen lucco 
 wrapped about his head to keep out the north wind. 
 
 She had a great reverence for the elder Gaddi ; it 
 seemed to her that he had never got his full meed of 
 fame. He built the Campanile, and it is called 
 Giotto's ; he built San Michele, and it is called 
 Orcagna's. True, those masters did design both 
 belfry and church ; but he built them, and all alone 
 he both designed and built the Ponte Vecchio, the 
 Goldsmith's Bridge, which has no rival anywhere 
 except the arch named after the alta Riva of Venice, 
 and which has stood the sieges and floods and 
 storms of six hundred years, and will stand six 
 centuries more unless the accursed greed of muni- 
 cipal speculation seizes on its stones. Taddeo 
 Gaddi led one of the loveliest, happiest, manliest 
 lives ever led on earth, such a life as it is impossible 
 to lead now, because the atmosphere which then 
 made it possible nowhere now exists. But of fame 
 in the mouths of posterity he has not had his full 
 portion. Of the many thousands who every season 
 pass over his bridge, scarce one Florentine, or one 
 foreigner, in a million remembers its architect. 
 
 In old times the tower had been a fortress, and 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 13 
 
 had felt the tramp of steel-clad feet and the roar of 
 discharging arquebuses ; many a dead body had been 
 flung or dragged down its stairs, many an awful 
 night of flame and fury had settled darkly down 
 upon its roof: torches had flared in its rings to light 
 many a mortal combat, and many a foeman had 
 fallen stiff and stark upon its stones. It had stood 
 there in the Borgo San Jacopo ever since A.D. 1230, 
 the date carved on the stone of its threshold, and 
 the whole course of Florentine history had passed 
 through the deep and narrowed street on which its 
 frontage looked. Like its street, it had seen the 
 citizens in mortal feud with the mercenaries, and 
 the artisans in fierce struggle with the ducal or 
 imperial soldiers ; and had seen also many lovelier, 
 happier, gayer scenes, when the white palfreys had 
 ambled with a nuptial party beneath its walls, and 
 the carnival masques had danced and rioted. It 
 had heard the rousing calls of trumpet and bugle ; 
 and the mellow rhythm of chant and anthem : the 
 hiss of burning oil and the shriek of ravaged women ; 
 the resounding tread of the warhorse and the sweet 
 singing of the Virgin's litany. It had beheld the 
 Conte Verde pace gaily over the bridge, and the 
 standard of justice rise in Michel di Lando's hand, 
 and Cosimo de' Medici sally out with his attendant 
 dwarf to the siege of Siena, and Tasso pass on his 
 tired horse, travelling from Ferrara, and Bianca 
 Cappello go by with her fatal beauty, and Boccaccio 
 hasten daily on his visits to his friend and scribe 
 Francesco Manelli; and the Bardia's Dianora watch 
 for her lover with her silken rope ; and Ariosto and 
 his lady of the golden palms come forth from the 
 
14 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 Hospice of the Knights of Malta and walk in peace 
 together. 
 
 Once, tradition said, Saint Catherine had come 
 up these very stairs when on her visit hard by to 
 Nicolo Soderini ; and Charles VIII. 's superb entry 
 and stealthy exit had both passed along under it, 
 and troops of wild condottiere had ridden past in 
 festal bravery, and ladies' silken litters had been 
 borne in gay procession, and painters and singers 
 had sung May-day lays and Christmas carols to 
 their mistresses in the moonlight ; and it had seen 
 the green maio blossoming and swinging in its door- 
 way ; and on the night of the Fierucolone had been 
 alive with sparkling, waving, fiery tow ; and the 
 rusty big bell which hung below its flagstaff had 
 added its voice to the clamour of the Carmine 
 chimes ringing in the rising of the Ciompi ; and 
 Francesco Ferruccio had run about under its 
 shadow, a bright, bold baby with fearless eyes and 
 sturdy limbs ; and its stones had been hot with the 
 reflection of the fires burning the Bardi palaces and 
 towers ; and Baccio della Porta and Giovanni di 
 San Giovanni had passed by there in gentler times, 
 going to their studios by the Romano Gate ; and in 
 the little church of San Jacopo close at hand the 
 nobles had once met to defend their rights and 
 demand their share of government ; and in the 
 greater church of Santo Spirito hard by Piero 
 Capponi had been brought to his burial with torches 
 and banners countless, and the whole magistracy 
 and populace weeping for his loss. 
 
 For anyone deeply versed in the traditions of the 
 past, and amorous of their beauty, as she was, the 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 15 
 
 dead arise and live again in such historic and hero- 
 haunted precincts. 
 
 To the fool, to the vain, to the puffed-up ape of 
 modernity, they are but dark walls, narrow ways, 
 dumb stones, closed portals : but to those who love 
 them with humility and tenderness they are full of 
 eloquent and undying life. 
 
 Beldia dreamed of these dead people often in her 
 rare enjoyment of unoccupied time, and when she 
 lay in her bed in the narrow chamber under the roof 
 they came about her, smiling gladly or weeping 
 wearily, and telling her many things. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 BUT her moments of leisure were few and always 
 brief, for she had a great deal of various work to do, 
 and when she was not actively occupied her father 
 gave her many papers to copy, and manuscripts to 
 write out clearly, for he loved to pen learned disser- 
 tations on disputed points of history or archaeology, 
 and printed some of these at his own cost for the 
 small, very small, number of persons who were 
 interested in the abstruse subjects which interested 
 himself. 
 
 Those square, solid rooms between the four brick 
 and stone walls of his tower, encumbered with 
 hundreds and thousands of books, bound and un- 
 bound, were the whole world of Ser Checchi ; and 
 the chiming of the church bells, the cries and noises 
 of the street, the twittering of the busy swallows, 
 
1 6 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 and the clang of the belfry clocks, had no power to 
 disturb him, as he plodded through a black letter 
 treatise of some extinct ecclesiastical order, or 
 noticed respectfully, but doubtingly, some question- 
 able copy of some of the Fathers of the Church, 
 or penned a learned essay on some disputed point 
 in Florentine history, or discoursed upon the pub- 
 lications of the Giuntina Classics, or the worth 
 of some early quarto from Bernardo Cennini's 
 press. 
 
 Custom came rarely, and money came sparsely to 
 the tower of the amorini ; too sparsely for all except 
 its master, who lived in the quiet shelter of his book- 
 shelves, and only woke up unwillingly to perceive 
 now and then that there were people around him 
 who needed such tiresome and common things as 
 oil and charcoal, boots and shoes, beans and 
 bread. 
 
 To the scholar his own need of such things is 
 always an odious necessity, importunate and dis- 
 agreeable ; and Ser Checchi, like Vespasino and 
 Magliabecchi and Anton Cocchi before him, was a 
 scholar to the inmost fibre of his heart, although 
 only nominally a librarian and a bookseller. 
 
 At such rare occasions as he was absent on book- 
 buying errands or antiquarian researches, Beldia 
 stayed in those two sacred chambers of the library 
 to be in readiness for any customers who might 
 come thither; but few customers of any kind 
 climbed the steep stair. She sat at a little ancient 
 desk amongst a sea of books, and watched the boy- 
 clerk Poldo, who was as agile as a squirrel and as 
 mischievous as a monkey, and answered in her 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 17 
 
 grave, sweet voice all such questions and demands 
 as people put to her. 
 
 The clientela of the tower was a sparse but a 
 cultured one ; it consisted chiefly of . aged men, 
 grown gray in meditation, bibliophiles, antiquaries, 
 philologists, professors of abstruse sciences, students 
 of ecclesiastical history, lovers of what was old and 
 obscure and difficult to procure or decipher. From 
 these learned priests and professors, who were 
 friends of her father, she acquired a mass of informa- 
 tion of a grave and noble kind, though not of the 
 kind which is popular or usual in a world busied 
 with modern things. She knew as well as her 
 father what volumes treated of this, that, or the 
 other subject, and could find such authorities un- 
 erringly amongst the thousands of books tossed all 
 together in a great heap, like the stones on a way- 
 side cairn. 'We will ask the maiden,' said all these 
 rusty scholars one to another, when they wanted 
 any treatise found, or any monograph on a forgotten 
 theme discovered. Beldia could find it, if anybody 
 could. Altogether unknown to herself, the name of 
 Ser Checchi's daughter became spoken of beyond 
 these reverend gentlemen by younger and more 
 imaginative men ; a narrow circle still, for it was 
 limited to scholars, and scholars of a certain kind, 
 but these, though few, brought others, less learned, 
 but equally curious about a pretty girl enshrined in 
 musty books like a flower growing among sand and 
 rocks. These younger visitants, lawyers, teachers, 
 professors, architects, and the like, received but a 
 cold welcome from Beldia, and a suggestion that 
 they could as well pursue their studies at the Mag- 
 
 2 
 
1 8 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 liabecchian or Laurentian libraries. Nevertheless, 
 two or three of them had, undaunted by her recep- 
 tion, made her offers of marriage, which she had at 
 once, and without consideration, rejected ; not even 
 disturbing the peace of her father by telling him of 
 such follies. 
 
 She loved the books and the city, the country and 
 the mountains ; and that was all. She had hardly 
 even read of love, for, from the severity of her 
 father's intellectual tastes, most of the poets and all 
 the novelists were banished. She knew that men 
 and women loved, and sometimes were married and 
 sometimes were not ; but it all seemed very foolish, 
 and altogether out of her own path. Ser Checchi 
 always told her that Beatrice was only a metaphor, 
 and Laura only a symbol, and it seemed to her that 
 any love which she might ever feel would be also 
 only a metaphor, only a symbol. But the young 
 men who were patronized by Veronica did not 
 suggest to her either of these. 
 
 For the moment she had no sentiment save for 
 her father, who, if he did not fully appreciate her 
 value, was most gentle, kind, and reverent to her, as 
 he was to all living and dead things, from the 
 chandler's mastiff who kept guard at the warehouse, 
 to the nuns who came to solicit alms at his door ; 
 from the old woman who sold vegetables on the 
 other side of the street, to the beautiful bronze 
 Bacchus which stands in a niche at the corner of 
 his street, to which he took off his hat once a day 
 regularly in memory of the classic past which it 
 symbolized. It was not because he was neglectful 
 or unfeeling that it never occurred to him that the 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 19 
 
 life led by Beldia was a dull and sad one for a 
 woman of her years ; he had taught her Latin, and 
 she had free and unrestricted access to all his books: 
 what more could any human soul desire ? Moreover, 
 when the heats of July came, he went away reluc- 
 tantly, for her sake, to their little place in the 
 Casentino ; locking up the beloved books with 
 enormous iron keys, which had in other times 
 served to lock in human prisoners in the precincts 
 of the tower. He descended twice a week into the 
 city to visit them, and carried up into the hill with 
 him new purchases which required looking into, or 
 rebacking, or were worthy of study or annotation ; 
 but these summer months at Antella were painful to 
 him, though he bore them meekly, and he was never 
 really happy until he was down again in the narrow, 
 dusky street, under the wings of his own angels and 
 amorini. To Beldia the return was not so joyful : 
 she loved the breezy hills, the windswept stretches 
 of heather and gorse, the pomp of the sunset, the 
 spirituality of the sunrise, the tall, straight trunks of 
 the pine-trees with the woodpeckers and the cuckoos 
 flitting between them ; the steep, narrow, sandy 
 roads, with the mule-carts of the charcoal-burners 
 winding down them ; the divine rural stillness in 
 which the distant bells rang softly as with a bless- 
 ing. 
 
 She loved all these things with that ardour which 
 lovers of the country know so well ; and when she 
 came back into the city life, its confinement, and 
 want of light and restricted horizon were painful to 
 her, but she said nothing, and took up her yoke of 
 daily tasks, and bore it bravely; and after all she 
 
20 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 loved the tower with a fonder passion, a more filial 
 affection, than she felt for any other thing or 
 place. 
 
 She rarely went out when in the town for pleasure : 
 she attended Mass at one of the many churches 
 near at hand, and bought what she wanted at the 
 shops of her quarter; sometimes she went to market 
 on such days as her woman was busy ironing the 
 linen which had been washed in the country, or 
 bottling off into flasks the barrels of oil and of wine 
 which had come from there. 
 
 Other generations will not know the old Florence 
 market as Beldia and Veronica knew it, under the 
 gloomy and noble shadows of the ancient towers 
 and palaces ; a union of colour, form, light, shade, 
 costume, and architecture which was delightful to 
 the eyes and which now is to be no more seen, 
 because greed, and bad taste, and passion for 
 change, and shame of ancient ways, and jealousy of 
 ancient fame, have conspired together and decided 
 to raze its precincts to the ground. The old market, 
 with its amber-hued leathern awnings, its good- 
 humoured populace, its piles of fruits, and herbs, 
 and vegetables, its centre of jest and bargain, its 
 ever-turning public spits, its noisy and joyous anima- 
 tion, gathered underneath the stately walls, the high 
 roofs, the grated casements, was a picture meet for 
 the burin of Callot and the brush of Carpaccio. 
 Now it is no more; the venders are shut up in cases 
 of iron and glass hideous to behold, and the buyers 
 hurry over their purchases, cross and cantankerous, 
 and the old grace and the old mirth and old colours 
 are things dead and gone for ever. 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 21 
 
 But when Beldia dwelt in the tower of Taddeo 
 they were still existent ; and she was wont to take 
 her way, as soon as the sun was up, over the 
 Jeweller's Bridge to the market ; always giving a 
 thought backward over the centuries to Cammilla 
 Martelli, who, for her sorrow, was once seen sitting 
 at her lone casement on that bridge by the great 
 Medici, and knew a sultry, brief summer of love and 
 happiness, followed by a long life-time of enforced 
 seclusion and unavailing regret. 
 
 And yet Cammilla's had been an enviable fate, 
 she thought ; to have known that wondrous magical 
 transformation of circumstance, and to be remem- 
 bered by the poets and the scholars and the artists, 
 whenever they pass over the paved road between 
 the little quaint, glittering shops ; to live in memory 
 thus, associated for ever with the stories of the city 
 such a destiny seemed to Beldia the most beautiful 
 kind of immortality that anyone could wish or gain. 
 
 But her remembrance of Cammilla and of many 
 another lovely legend did not prevent her, when she 
 came to the market stalls, from looking very shrewdly 
 at the feet of the chickens she bought, and at the 
 gills of the fish she purchased, to be sure of their 
 age and freshness, and no one would have been able 
 by specious words to persuade her that stale spinach 
 was fresh, or that eggs from a crate were new-laid. 
 The poetic side of her nature made her say a prayer 
 for the soul of Cammilla ; but the practical side of 
 her character made her get due value for every 
 centime she spent. She would give to the poor as 
 though she had Ceres' horn of plenty ; but she 
 would not be cheated out of a bronze halfpenny. 
 
22 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 Veronica scolded, shrieked, bullied, and wrangled 
 violently for an hour, only to be put off at last with 
 inferior victuals ; but Beldia, though she never raised 
 her voice a semitone higher, and never said a harsh 
 word to anyone, was not to be imposed upon, and 
 all the market knew it. 
 
 ' It is the maiden of Taddeo's tower. She must 
 have her own way,' said the sellers of fish, flesh, and 
 fowl, provoked, and yet admiring. 
 
 In these early morning excursions she was dressed 
 like a girl of the people, with thick shoes and a 
 short kirtle ; a handkerchief, woollen or silken 
 according to the season, was tied over her shining 
 hair, and a big basket was poised upon her arm. 
 But there was something in her walk, and in the 
 carriage of her head, and in her soft, clear, low 
 speech, which spoke of race and of culture, and 
 opened a free, unmolested passage for her amongst 
 the noisy and rough throng there. Many young 
 men looked at, followed, and would have addressed 
 her, but she daunted them by the absolute un- 
 consciousness which she seemed to have of their 
 existence, and a certain severity of pride which now 
 and then hardened her features, which were attrac- 
 tive, gentle, and fair, not unlike the Madonnas of 
 Lippo Lippi. 
 
 * One could paint her with a nimbus, and a little 
 Christ sucking at her breast, and a St. John with 
 a lily standing at her knee,' said one of these 
 persons watching her as she stood for a moment at 
 the flower-stall : he was a teacher at the Belle Arte, 
 and spoke to a friend younger than himself, who was 
 an architect from Lombardy. 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 23 
 
 f Yes; I see,' said the younger man. 'I would 
 sooner make her a statue of Charity, with a rod of 
 white lilies in her hand, and her foot on a snake, and 
 a star on her brow shedding rays of light ; that is 
 my idea of Charity the Charity which thinks no 
 evil. We have had enough of Charities modelled on 
 nursing mothers. No, I am not disrespectful to 
 Correggio and Holbein, nor even to Bouguereau.' 
 
 They were standing by the pillar which is called the 
 Column of Mars, and where it is said that Buondel- 
 monte fell. Beldia had just passed them carrying 
 her basket, and had stopped at the corner of the 
 Strozzi palace to look at the flowers which were 
 there for sale. 
 
 ' How admirably she walks !' the Lombard added. 
 ' Who is she ? A poor girl ? A maiden or a 
 matron ?' 
 
 * Not poor and not married. She is the daughter of 
 the old librarian at the old tower of the Brancaleone 
 which Taddeo Gaddi built,' replied the Florentine. 
 
 ' I know the tower, I think,' said his companion. 
 ' What kind of books does he sell ?' 
 
 ' Old books, ecclesiastical, historical, philosophical, 
 architectural, which will suit you. He is a droll old 
 fellow, crammed with useless learning ; we go there 
 sometimes to see him and his girl : she is often all 
 alone amongst the books, and knows a good deal 
 about them also.' 
 
 * She looks like some learned daughter of docta 
 Bonnonia.' 
 
 ' Despite the market basket and the handkerchief 
 on her head ?' 
 
 * Yes ; she wears the one till it looks like Minerva's 
 
24 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 casque, and carries the other as if it contained the 
 books of the Sibyl.' 
 
 ' She is more a Madonna than a Sibyl, I think.' 
 
 ' Then let us hope, for her own sake, that she will 
 have the sucking Gesu, not the Sibylline tomes.' 
 
 They parted company a few moments later, the 
 Florentine to go to his class at the Accademia, 
 where he was a teacher of perspective ; the other, a 
 stranger in the town, strolled towards the river, 
 which was in a flood from recent rainfalls, yellow 
 and brown with earth, and carrying shrubs, and 
 trees, and hay, and straw, and planks, and rocks 
 which it had loosened and whirled down on its 
 way. 
 
 Insensibly following a romantic impulse, the 
 Lombard, a man of Brescia, crossed the bridge of 
 the Holy Trinity and bent his steps to that old 
 shady quarter of Oltarno, where the tower of the 
 loves was to be found. It was very little past eight 
 of the clock : a fine, clear, breezy morning after the 
 storms of the night. The deep bell of Santo Spirito 
 was tolling sonorously for some citizen's death. 
 
 ' It is too early to go and buy a book,' he thought ; 
 ' I had better go and breakfast first. 1 
 
 Nearly opposite to the tower which he wished to 
 observe was a humble eating place, half bakery, 
 half coffee - house, with round, big loaves, and 
 baskets of eggs, and a card which intimated that 
 within might be had a cup of coffee and a white 
 roll for the small price of thirty centimes. 
 
 ' This collation will not ruin me,' thought the 
 student of Brescia, whose purse was scantily 
 furnished ; and he pushed open the door and 
 
THE TOWER OF T ADDED 25 
 
 entered, disturbing a sleek white and gray cat by 
 his entrance. 
 
 They served him quickly, for the coffee was already 
 on the fire in a back-kitchen behind the shop ; the 
 air was full of the sweet, appetising smell of newly- 
 baked bread ; the cat came and had a share of the 
 milk. Whilst he ate and drank the Brescian looked 
 at the tower, which was visible a few yards farther 
 down the street, the morning sunshine glistening on 
 its amorini, and its garlands, and its saints. 
 
 ' A fine old tower, that,' he said to the woman who 
 had served him, a clean, buxom young woman, with 
 red Titian-coloured hair, and a yellow cotton jacket. 
 1 It was built by Taddeo, was it not ?' 
 
 She shrugged her shoulders. 
 
 ' We call it Taddeo's tower, or the tower of the 
 loves, if you like that better. You see all those little 
 loves gambolling above the doorway? It belongs to 
 old Maso Donati, the grain merchant, and Ser 
 Checchi has lived in it all his life, and so did his 
 fathers before him.' 
 
 ' Ser Checchi ?' repeated the Brescian inquir- 
 ingly. 
 
 1 The old man who lives in the books like a worm. 
 The whole place is full of books up to the roof; he 
 could fill the cellars, too, only Nani and Peppino 
 have them for their goods. Ser Checchi is a little 
 cracked, you know. Those over-learned people 
 always are half daft. If you overfill the barrel it 
 will leak somewhere.' 
 
 ' No doubt. But I am fond of books myself. 
 Will he sell any ?' 
 
 ' Surely ! Selling them is his trade ; but nobody 
 
26 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 ever buys. They go there, the old ones to read and 
 jabber and steal his learning, and the young ones to 
 make court to the signorina, for she is handsome, 
 and some think she will have money ; but I know 
 better che ! the old man is a leaking barrel, I tell 
 you, and his money trickles away with his wits.' 
 
 She looked very knowing, and made a gesture as 
 of one who pours water upon the ground, and struck 
 the silver pin in her hair a smart blow, with the air 
 of a person who could tell a great deal if she chose. 
 The Brescian conceived an instantaneous hatred 
 of her. 
 
 ' Do they buy your bread ?' he said with curt sig- 
 nificance. 
 
 ' Che ! not they. They make their own. They 
 bake once a week, and so eat well one day in seven, 
 and all the other six eat crusts as hard as bricks.' 
 
 ' I see,' said her customer, and thought to himself, 
 ' When you want a baker's good word do not eat 
 home-made bread/ 
 
 ' There is old Ser Checchi ! look !' said the young 
 woman, pointing to a stooping figure, clothed in old- 
 fashioned clothes, which came forth from the door- 
 way underneath the playing loves. 
 
 ' Going to buy more books, I will warrant !' she 
 said with supreme contempt. ' That is the way his 
 daughter's dower goes, in old musty, fusty, mouldy, 
 mildewed, worm-eaten things which nobody in their 
 senses would ever use to wrap up a pat of butter. 
 And when I asked him once if he could sell me a 
 copy of the Sesto Astrologer's Calendar, which tells 
 you all that is going to happen all through the year, 
 he laughed at me, and said he did not keep such silly 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 27 
 
 rubbish in his place. Silly ! the Astrologer of Sesto ! 
 Did ever you know such impudence ?' 
 
 ' Rank blasphemy,' replied the Lombard, gazing 
 curiously and reverently at the venerable figure of 
 Ser Checchi as it went down the narrow street in 
 the shadow cast by the tall dark houses. 
 
 ( But the librarian is away now,' he added. ' If 
 anyone wanted to buy books, or to look over some in 
 stock, would the shop be open ?' 
 
 ' Shop ! Che ! He has no shop he has nothing 
 so sensible. There are rooms and rooms, and there 
 are books in all of them, one over another, like the 
 flotsam and jetsam floating and tossing on Arno to- 
 day, and there is Madonna Beldia to tell you all about 
 them as if she were a printed book herself. If there 
 were a shop where the warehouse is, with some glass 
 and gilding and fine-bound books behind it, in red 
 and blue and yellow, as you see them in Tornabuoni 
 Street, I dare say he would sell some and wouldn't 
 be out at elbows, as he is, they say, and at his wits' 
 end how to pay Cirillo's debts. Yes, Cirillo is the 
 son : a fine lad, the only one of them who has any 
 spirit or sense. He has been a soldier, and now he 
 is a painter down in Rome.' 
 
 ' Art is a poor trade to all but the few who 
 " arrive," as the French say,' answered the Brescian 
 as he rose, paid his three bronze coins, thanked her 
 courteously, and left the place. 
 
 With that instinct of secrecy which accompanies 
 the dawn of all amorous fancy, he did not choose 
 that the loquacious and malicious neighbour should 
 see him go to the tower. So he sauntered in a leisurely 
 fashion along the street, lighted a cigarette and 
 
28 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 smoked it, and went as far as the Piazza of Santo 
 Spirito, where he stood awhile gazing at the massive 
 dome and the graceful campanile ; then he turned 
 back and retraced his steps, and before many 
 minutes had passed found himself back again in 
 that most ancient street, where the loves of Luca 
 della Robbia guarded the tower portal. Arrived 
 before the door, he threw away the cigarette, and 
 began to ascend the staircase Lillo, the big 
 brindled mastiff who belonged to the warehouse, 
 smelling in a distant but not unfriendly manner at 
 him as he went by ; he was a stranger, but Lillo let 
 him go by unchallenged. 
 
 The staircase was dark as night, being lighted 
 only by small slits in the wall like portholes, through 
 which in other ages the defenders of the place had 
 been able to fire their arquebuses, or pour their hot 
 pitch on their assailants below in the street. On 
 the first floor he found an open door, above which 
 he could read in a dim light the words ' Libreria 
 Ardiglione ' written on a placard, and underneath 
 them the inscription which used to be above the 
 entrance of the Marrucillian library : ' Publicae 
 Maxime Pauperum Utilitatio.' With uncovered 
 head he entered this chamber, and found himself, 
 as the bakeress had told him that he would do, in a 
 sea of books tossed one over another like the petrified 
 waves of a once heaving ocean. That chamber 
 was only occupied by the books, but in a farther 
 room he saw a boy writing at a desk, and at another 
 desk was seated the woman or girl whom he had 
 seen by the Column of Mars. 
 
 Then a great diffidence came over him, and 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 29 
 
 although in Brescia, in Cremona, in Bergamo, he 
 had always been ready to talk and laugh with 
 women, he stood now on the threshold of the inner 
 room hesitating and mute. 
 
 Then Beldia saw him and rose. 
 
 ' Good-morning, sir,' she said to him in her 
 serene, harmonious tones. ' Is there anything in 
 which I can have the pleasure to serve you ?' 
 
 She was dressed in a plain gray gown, and had no 
 ornament of any sort, and her hair was as closely 
 wound around her head as its large coils would 
 allow ; but standing there amongst the sea of books, 
 she looked to his already captured fancy, as she 
 leaned one arm upon her desk, like the Sibylla 
 Persica of Guercino : she had the Sibyl's serious and 
 yet smiling expression, a look at once of meditation 
 and of expectation, of brightness and of repose. 
 
 He gazed at her with such earnestness that he 
 embarrassed her, and, seeing that he did so, he 
 stammered some request for works on architecture. 
 
 ' That is rather a vague demand,' said Beldia 
 doubtfully. ' Of what kind, of what epoch, of what 
 tongue ?' 
 
 ' Any age you will,' answered her customer inco- 
 herently, ' and whether Italian or Latin, it is the 
 same to me.' 
 
 Beldia hesitated, feeling that the request was only 
 a feint to excuse his entrance. 
 
 ' If you could return in the afternoon my father 
 would be here,' she said at last. ' He is more ac- 
 quainted with such works than I ; he is an archaeo- 
 logist, and very learned.' 
 
 ' I should be honoured to make the acquaintance 
 
30 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 of Ser Francesco,' replied the Brescian, recovering 
 his address as he observed her embarrassment. 
 ' But I need I greatly need at once a copy of 
 Piranesi : or, at least, I cannot afford to purchase it, 
 but might I be allowed to verify one passage ?' 
 
 'We have a before-letter copy of Piranesi here,' 
 said Beldia, ' and you are welcome to look through 
 any of the volumes.' 
 
 She went to one spot in the crowded shelves 
 where various works of that date were gathered, 
 and pointed out the ' Antichitae Romanse ' to the 
 stranger, whilst she bade the boy Poldo take the 
 books down and carry them to the table. 
 
 * You are too good,' murmured the young man ; 
 1 1 am ashamed to give so much trouble.' 
 
 ' It is no trouble,' she answered. ' And my father 
 is always glad if he can be of use to scholars. Ours 
 is a library rather than a shop.' 
 
 * And a very hospitable one,' he said gratefully. 
 ' I am an architect from the North, I know no one 
 in your city, and can have no claim upon your 
 literary hospitality. My name is Odisio Fontano,' 
 he added timidly. ' Is it familiar to you ?' he asked, 
 as he saw a light as of recognition pass over her face. 
 
 1 Oh, in the past,' she answered. ' It was a good 
 and great name of Lombardy.' 
 
 ' That is a very long while ago,' said the young 
 man. f We have fallen from our high estate, and 
 have been poor people for centuries.' 
 
 ' That does not alter anything. What was, was ; 
 and the Fontano shield hangs, I believe, on the 
 Broletto of Bergamo.' 
 
 ' Yes, truly, we were lords in Bergamo. But that 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 31 
 
 is long, long ago, as I said. Now we are very 
 poor.' 
 
 ' But how did your people change from Bergamo 
 to Brescia ?' 
 
 ' It was in the last century. My great-grandfather 
 married a gentlewoman of Brescia.' 
 
 ' Indeed !' said Beldia, intimating by her accent 
 that this colloquy had lasted long enough. 
 
 It took him a long while to find the plate or 
 the passage which he required, and ever and again 
 he kept looking off divers volumes to where Beldia 
 sat, who was writing diligently, making a copy for 
 her father of some monograph or some annotated 
 paragraph, and was wholly undisturbed by the pre- 
 sence of a stranger. 
 
 The sound from the narrow street came muffled 
 to that height, seeming far away as in a dream ; 
 Poldo caught flies and yawned, and furtively nibbled 
 nuts, where he sat at his desk, with his back turned 
 to his mistress ; the mouldy yet fragrant smell of old 
 books and of old walls filled the chamber ; a stray 
 sunbeam came in through the thick, dull glass, and 
 touched the maiden's throat and hair. 
 
 The young man sighed, and closed a copy of 
 Marco Recci's designs as the clock tolled eleven. 
 
 ' Can you not find what you want ? Tell me what 
 it is, and perhaps I can help you,' said Beldia, as she 
 ended the last line of her copy. 
 
 He coloured and murmured his thanks and 
 excuses. 
 
 As he wanted nothing that any books could give 
 him, and his search was wholly fictitious, he could 
 not reply more clearly ; he could not say : ' I only 
 
32 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 wanted to look at you, and see the sunshine play 
 amongst the little curls above your throat.' 
 
 ' May I return to have the honour of seeing your 
 father?' he asked her, as he rose and replaced the 
 big volume with respect upon its shelf. 
 
 ' Our library is always open until six,' said Beldia, 
 taking his inquiry literally, ' and my father is always 
 glad to be of use to scholars, as I told you.' 
 
 She remained standing, as a hint to him to take 
 his departure. But he still lingered, fascinated by 
 the still, ancient, studious place, and its fair-haired 
 occupant. 
 
 'Have you anything to say?' she asked at last, 
 a little impatiently. ' Is there any message which 
 you wish to leave any work or passage which you 
 wish especially to consult ?' 
 
 ' No, no ; nothing,' said the Lombard hurriedly. 
 * Pardon me, madamigella ; I have intruded so long. 
 I will return at three, by your kind permission.' 
 
 Then at last he went ; and Beldia, returning to 
 her seat, sought out other work to do, and bent her 
 fair head over her inkstand. 
 
 The stranger had made little impression upon her; 
 she was so used to see men come and go, and she 
 did not concern herself with them except as scholars. 
 This one had seemed to her a desultory and half- 
 hearted student by the distraught manner in which 
 he had turned over the precious pages of the famous 
 works. 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 33 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 AT eleven Ser Checchi returned, and at two o'clock 
 they sat down to their dinner in a little room which, 
 though nominally set aside for eating, was over- 
 flowing with books and papers. Their dinner was 
 frugal, but Beldia had been taught by her mother 
 that good cooking means good digestion, and the 
 dishes were savoury and excellent, though few in 
 number; the wine was the sound though simple 
 drink of their own vineyards, and artistic instinct 
 had made her set a few daffodils and late anemones 
 in a vase of Casteldurante pottery four centuries old. 
 The slovenliness and unloveliness and disorder of 
 ordinary Italian ways were alien to her ; and the 
 antique silver shone, the old china was bright, and 
 the homespun linen was white and scented with iris 
 and rosemary, upon her table. Ser Checchi did not 
 notice these things, but he derived a vague, uncon- 
 scious gratification from them, and would have missed 
 them had they been wanting there. 
 
 To him his daughter remained always a little girl. 
 He never realized that she was now twenty-three 
 years old, and that her life had not much more 
 pleasure in it than a nun's, except in so far as her 
 intelligence and her perceptions gave her joys and 
 interests, and her power of ruling her house taught 
 her that independence which is to the character 
 what a fresh sea-wind blowing over it is to an ex- 
 panse of waters. 
 
 It was a very simple, regular, retired life which 
 she led in her old tower. She had few friends and 
 
 3 
 
34 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 no distractions ; but she was happy and interested 
 in her many occupations, and whether she sat in 
 winter by the open hearth with its brass dogs, or in 
 summer on her terrace amongst the carnations and 
 mignonettes, her hand was busied with work, and 
 her eyes regaled themselves on a book. 
 
 It was what most women of her age would have 
 called a dull life, but she was never dull ; there was 
 so much to do, so much to see to, so much to think 
 of, and her rare leisure was never long enough to 
 learn all that she desired to learn from history and 
 art. 
 
 Her father was the great occupation of her exist- 
 ence. To forestall all his wishes, to get the best and 
 uttermost that could be got out of their means for 
 him, to spare him all trouble and worry, and to be, 
 as it were, a lamp before his feet in all shadows, was 
 her constant desire and effort. Ser Checchi, man- 
 like, never guessed or measured all the continual 
 thought and care and sacrifice which went to make 
 up the sum of his daily comforts and customs, and 
 kept the atmosphere of his household clear and 
 serene about him. 
 
 He loved his daughter with a great and most tender 
 love, but he thought her lot an enviable one, and 
 underrated, because he did not understand, the un- 
 selfishness of her devotion to himself. For the rest, 
 gentle and sweet of temper although he was, he held 
 to ancient views concerning parental authority, and 
 had unconsciously something of the old Greek and 
 Roman contempt for the mind and the opinions of 
 women. 
 
 She, indeed, could read Latin well, and could quote 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 35 
 
 great authors without error, and could find chapter 
 and verse in the classics and the Fathers of the 
 Church ; and this he knew, because it was his own 
 doing that her studies had taken this bent ; still, he 
 would never have consulted her seriously upon any 
 matter of business or learning, and would not have 
 deemed her opinion worth asking on anything be- 
 yond a fruit-pudding, a roll of linen, or a sack of 
 fresh coffee-berries. 
 
 Therefore of his affairs, and of his possessions, 
 she knew little if anything : all she had to do was 
 to lay out to the utmost of her ability the sum given 
 her for household expenses, rent, taxes, and the 
 wages of Veronica ; the boy, Poldo, was in a manner 
 apprenticed, and received nothing but his food, which 
 was no small matter, for his appetite was huge, as the 
 human appetite usually is when it can be indulged at 
 another person's expense. 
 
 To the Lombard she seemed like a fair and fine 
 lily growing in a sunless garden-border ; but to her 
 father, as to herself, she appeared a maiden excep- 
 tionally blest, and safe, and happy, with little money, 
 indeed, but otherwise most favoured. 
 
 Many a time Veronica longed to take her master 
 to task for his negligence of his daughter's interest, 
 in not having had her married, or at least betrothed, 
 before her twentieth year, a period which seems in 
 Italy the commencement of old age for every woman. 
 But Ser Checchi, with his dreamy gentleness, inspired 
 a. respect which amounted to awe in the breast of his 
 dependents. Out of his sight she despised him as a 
 useless oddity, who did not know his right hand from 
 his left, and who would drink vinegar for wine without 
 
36 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 perceiving it ; but in his presence the rough, coarse, 
 sensual mind of the servant felt the influence which 
 emanates from a high intelligence and a stainless 
 character ; she did not dare to blame her employer 
 to his face. She had never, in the twenty years that 
 she had been in his service, seen him seriously 
 angry, except once. It was when Cirillo was about 
 twelve years of age ; he had stolen a cake of 
 panforte (a kind of petrified plum-pudding, dear 
 to the appetite of Tuscans) from the cupboard 
 of a neighbour, and then the wrath of the gentle- 
 scholar had been terrible, and had left an inefface- 
 able impression on the memories of all around 
 him. Since then Cirillo had done many worse 
 things, but Veronica had never forgotten that 
 scene after the theft of the cake. ' From the 
 anger of meek Ser Checchi the saints deliver me !' 
 she said often whilst crossing herself. 
 
 ' Why will you send all the youths away ?' she 
 asked her young mistress once ; she had many a 
 silver coin slipped into her hand by these suitors, 
 and favoured them one and all impartially. ' I 
 suppose you will not spend all your life dusting 
 books and copying papers, and tending on Ser 
 Checchi day and night ?' 
 
 ' I dare say I shall,' replied Beldia tranquilly. 
 ' Do you think that I should have to work, and dust, 
 and write, and sew the less for any one of those 
 young men ? They all wish to marry me because 
 they know I am useful.' 
 
 * But you are beautiful, too, my dear/ said 
 Veronica. ' And the lads see that, and they would 
 make a queen of you.' 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 37 
 
 1 For a week or two, yes. And then they would 
 want their shirts, and their soup, and their cigarettes, 
 and their absinthe ; and I should be the slave. I 
 would rather be my father's slave. He is a tender 
 master/ 
 
 ' Ser Checchi is good. I never said he was not 
 good,' said Veronica crossly. ' But there is such a 
 thing as pleasure, and such a thing as love ; and like 
 goes to like, and youth to youth.' 
 
 ' Oh !' Beldia laughed a little with the supreme 
 derision of ignorance. 'You know I do not think of 
 these follies, 'Nica, and the youngsters you patronize 
 are not likely to inspire them.' 
 
 'What do you wait for?' grumbled the old 
 servant. ' Do you think a god will come down 
 from the skies or a knight out of the tapestry ?' 
 
 ' I wait for Ulysses,' said Beldia gaily. 
 
 ' Anybody over seas ? A stranger ?' said Veronica 
 sharply, with sudden suspicion : could her young 
 mistress have an affection unknown to her faithful 
 servant ? 
 
 ' Very far over seas,' replied Beldia. ' Over the 
 far, far seas of death.' 
 
 ' Pish ! Some of your rubbishing history men !' 
 said Veronica, with scorn ; to her thinking a living 
 lover, who wore a gold watch, chain, and a ruby ring, 
 and who could take his dama to the Pagliano and 
 the Politeama, was worth all the heroes of Greece 
 and of Rome. 
 
 To Beldia, whose mind was filled with the heroic 
 figures of the men of old, from the days of Troy to 
 the days of Montemurlo, the young men of her own 
 generation, with their round hats, their foul cigars, 
 
38 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 their checked trousers, their cropped pates, their 
 bad manners, seemed rather like apes, corrupted in 
 morals and ill-dressed in person, than beings of the 
 same humanity as Odysseus or Caracciolo, Leonidas 
 or Ferruceio. 
 
 Her heart had never been touched to even so 
 much as a passing sentiment by any of these suitors 
 of modern days. She loved her father, she loved 
 her brother, she loved the tower of Taddeo, and 
 these three rilled up her heart. 
 
 Of all outside worlds, the worlds of great passions 
 and great ambitions, of ceaseless movement and 
 breathless excitement, she knew nothing whatever. 
 She saw, indeed, the equipages rolling by along the 
 river's length, with the young and graceful people in 
 them, to whom, surely, she thought, life must be 
 like one long play-hour. But she knew nothing of 
 these, and they never troubled her. Envy was not 
 in her nature, and her days were full of content- 
 ment. The only anxiety which she had was the 
 culpable extravagance of her brother and the harm- 
 less extravagance of her father. Neither of these 
 male creatures attached the smallest value to 
 money. It was always Beldia on whom the bur- 
 den devolved of making ends meet in the house- 
 hold. If everything, indeed, had been in her 
 hands, the task would have been easier; but in 
 many matters Ser Checchi kept his own counsel 
 carefully ; she was ignorant of all the resources 
 which he possessed and of many things which 
 he did. 
 
 Scarcely was their dinner over this afternoon, and 
 she had peeled for him a Bergamot pear, preserved 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 39 
 
 in straw through the winter, than a knock came at 
 the door of the dining-room, and a pleasant, cheer- 
 ful voice asked through the keyhole : 
 
 ' May Vestuccio speak a moment with the 
 honoured master ?' 
 
 Even as the words were being uttered, the door 
 was softly opened, and the speaker advanced into 
 the room. 
 
 He was a man of middle age, and of that indefin- 
 able class to which belong working men who have 
 made money ; he had a candid, kind, and attractive 
 countenance, his eyes were clear and laughing, and 
 his mouth good-natured, with a quiet smile very 
 familiar to it ; his glance was quick, too, and not so 
 frank as was his smile. 
 
 Across the calm, thoughtful features of Ser Checchi 
 a shadow of troubled impatience passed. He rose 
 hurriedly, leaving the pear untasted, and passed to 
 the door. 
 
 ' Not here, not here, Vestuccio,' he said quickly. 
 ' Go to my own room ; in a moment I will be with 
 
 you.' 
 
 ' Your servant, Ser Checchi,' said the new-comer, 
 pausing a moment in the doorway, whilst his eyes 
 rested on the Casteldurante vase with an expression 
 of inquisitive appreciation. 
 
 ' Good-morning, Signor Aurelio,' said Beldia 
 courteously ; and Aurelio Vestuccio bowed his salu- 
 tation in return with flattered eagerness and his 
 brightest smile. 
 
 Ser Checchi, in a hurried manner, unlike his slow 
 and quiet movements, did not return to his seat, but 
 led his visitor away. 
 
40 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 ' Oh, father ! the pear !' cried Beldia, in dismay at 
 such neglect of her finest fruit. 
 
 ' Eat it yourself, my love,' said Ser Checchi, as he 
 hastily closed the door behind him. 
 
 * The master seems troubled,' said Veronica to her 
 mistress, and Beldia looked at her apprehensively 
 and wistfully. 
 
 ' No, no ; he is always pleased to see Ser Aurelio,' 
 she said, with a trace of anxiety in her glance at the 
 closed doorway. ' I dare say Vestuccio has come 
 to let him know that some manuscript or copy he 
 wishes for is beyond his reach, and that vexes 
 him.' 
 
 ' Some people speak ill of Vestuccio,' said the 
 servant dubiously. 
 
 ' Some people speak ill of the saints in heaven/ 
 replied Beldia. 
 
 * Ugh ! He is no saint/ said Veronica. ' But he 
 has a good name on the Piazza, that I grant.' 
 
 A good name on the Piazza means a fair repute 
 amongst your fellows. It is derived from the habit 
 which the Italian citizens had in the past, and still 
 have in the present, of congregating in some public 
 square generally before the communal palace to 
 make their bargains and discuss the solvency or in- 
 solvency of their debtors. A good name on the 
 Piazza will carry a man far and well in his com- 
 mercial transactions, as a fair breeze carries a sail- 
 ing boat. 
 
 Aurelio Vestuccio had this good name. 
 
 ' I hope they will not be away long/ said Beldia ; 
 ' for that stranger of this forenoon is returning to 
 see my father and talk about architecture. If you 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 41 
 
 hear anyone coming up the stairs, ask him to wait in 
 the book-room.' 
 
 Veronica grumbled inaudibly, and began to clear 
 away the dinner dishes, leaving the Casteldurante 
 pot and the spring-tide flowers sole occupants of the 
 table. 
 
 At that moment the bell attached to the entrance 
 door, which opened on the staircase, rang gently. 
 There is a great deal of character shown in ringing 
 a bell, and the temper of the ringer is often disclosed 
 in its tintinnabulations. 
 
 * You must go : that is the Brescian student, 
 Veronica,' said Beldia. 
 
 ' I cannot ; you know that, signorina,' said the 
 serving woman crossly. ' Who is to do my work ? 
 All the washing up arid the ironing ? Three o'clock 
 now, and the days getting so short there is hardly 
 room to turn round in them.' 
 
 ' Go and open the door, and show the stranger in/ 
 said Beldia. ' He can amuse himself amongst the 
 books till my father is free.' 
 
 Veronica went, grumbling ; she was always 
 reduced to obedience when her young mistress spoke 
 with that tone of decision. Beldia went to her own 
 chamber. It was a little narrow place, with a grated 
 window looking only on the red-brick, moss-grown 
 tiles of the houses at the back of the tower ; but it 
 was picturesque and home-like, with a timber ceiling, 
 and some pieces of old tapestry on its walls, and a 
 little stair led up from it to the platform where her 
 air-garden was ; and swallows had nested under its 
 cornice for more centuries than could be counted on 
 the fingers of each hand ; they were at this moment 
 
42 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 circling round and round above the house roof, 
 arranging for that autumn flight which caused so 
 much regret every year to Beldia. Even the bats, 
 at the approach of winter, would withdraw them- 
 selves into their homes in the belfries, and lofts, 
 and old monastic turrets and cloisters round, and 
 no winged creatures would remain there except the 
 sparrows. 
 
 This afternoon she could give little thought to the 
 birds or the flowers ; she had received a letter from 
 her brother, which she re-read in the solitude of her 
 chamber, whilst her father was closeted with his 
 visitor Vestuccio. It caused her long and painful 
 thought, for it was one with which it seemed to her 
 wholly impossible to comply. 
 
 Cirillo asked for money, money, money, as if 
 money could be gathered off the stonecrop growing 
 on the tiles, or the Madonna's herb flourishing in 
 the crevices of the parapet. 
 
 ' My dearest child,' he wrote to her, ' I want two 
 thousand francs at once. Get them from the old 
 man for me, and post them as soon as you receive 
 this. If I do not get them I shall be dishonoured in 
 the sight of all my friends. You know, my little 
 angel, what a man's honour means.' 
 
 ' Yes,' thought Beldia sadly ; ' it means to take all 
 he wishes for from others, however he may pain or 
 ruin them !' 
 
 The letter was long, the same arguments being 
 again and again repeated in it with ingenuity and 
 eloquence, but with that false ring in them all which 
 comes from insincerity in the writer. The percep- 
 tion of this want of candour jarred on his sister, 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 43 
 
 and hurt her as his clever and heartless impositions 
 had often troubled her in their childhood ; her finer 
 moral sense becoming conscious of them, whilst her 
 love and affection turned in vain from them, striving 
 resolutely to be blind. 
 
 The plea of honour offended her. It was a note 
 he was too found of sounding. She tried with all 
 her might to believe in the necessity which he 
 pleaded ; but she could not. It was a necessity, 
 perhaps, but one of coarser mould than the kind 
 alleged. Well as she loved Cirillo, she knew that 
 he constantly tampered with the exigencies of 
 honour, and wore its yoke but lightly. 
 
 It was often difficult for her to make the weekly 
 allowance which her father gave suffice for all their 
 needs, and when each Saturday came round, and 
 she discharged her household accounts, inclusive of 
 the woman's wage, there was no margin left. 
 Besides which, she knew that large sums slipped 
 away in the purchase of those multitudinous books 
 which were for ever increasing : and the demands 
 of her brother were numerous and unsparing upon 
 the family purse. He was an artist of promise, but 
 an extravagant one ; and he never denied himself 
 any pleasure for so simple a reason as the mere fact 
 that he had not the money to pay for it. 
 
 Cirillo never credited that his father was not rich ; 
 he thought the librarian old-fashioned, prejudiced, 
 abstemious, eccentric ; but he argued that no man 
 would ever throw away such large sums on musty 
 folios and decaying pamphlets, unless there were 
 plenty of money behind the bookshelves ; besides, 
 there was always the land in the Casentino. He 
 
44 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 had never known any particulars of his father's 
 means ; but he always supposed him to be well off, 
 and spoke of him to all his Roman comrades as a 
 rich old fellow with queer, miserly ways ; so that he 
 never hesitated to worry and importune his sister to 
 obtain whatever funds he wanted, and he wanted 
 much often. 
 
 Many women are not good to men ; many women 
 are niggardly, suspicious, foolish, jealous, and unkind 
 in their relations with the men belonging to them ; 
 but when they are good to such men they are very 
 good, and Beldia was one of those. Her affection, 
 patience, and comprehension were of infinite dura- 
 tion and elasticity. And she understood, what few 
 young women ever do understand, that the measure 
 which was abundant for herself could not possibly 
 content Cirillo. He was one year older than herself, 
 and she had always been accustomed to obey him 
 without criticism or hesitation ; what he wished she 
 never doubted must be accomplished. 
 
 She had read and re-read this letter, with pain 
 and perplexity, when the voice of Veronica roused 
 her, shouting up the shaft of the ladder-like stair- 
 case. 
 
 ' Signorina ! the master says you are to come 
 down into the library and see this strange gentle- 
 man ; he himself has business with Vestuccio which 
 will take him a half-hour or more. Come down, do 
 you hear ?' 
 
 Beldia heard, and obeyed, because it was her 
 habit to obey. She went without even casting a 
 glance at herself in the little old silver-framed 
 mirror which had belonged in the Trecento to some 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 45 
 
 lady of the Brancaleone race, and now served her- 
 self. Old men or young, good-looking or ill-favoured, 
 they counted nothing to her; they were merely 
 buyers or sellers of books ; or else graceless robbers 
 of her father's erudition. 
 
 The Brescian student was waiting in the inner 
 back room ; he had changed his clothes ; he wore 
 the velvet coat and broad-leaved hat common to 
 artists ; his crisp auburn hair and soft silken beard 
 were carefully brushed. He had a look of distinction 
 and grace, and an air which would have better suited 
 the times in which the tower of Taddeo had been 
 built, than these in which the modest and dusty 
 library of Ser Checchi was established in it ; it 
 seemed to Beldia difficult to believe that he could 
 be only a poor architect seeking his fortunes, and 
 the doubt made her suspicious of, and cold to, him. 
 
 Old races have been too often impoverished and 
 vulgarized, all their features are too often obliterated 
 and stamped down into the common, meaningless, 
 banal modern type, but still in Italy at times one 
 meets the knights of Giorgione in Venice, the youths 
 of Massaccio in Florence, the men and women of 
 Sodoma in Siena, the forms and physiognomies of 
 Signorelli in Orvieto, the children and the virgins of 
 Correggio under the vines of Lombardy ; still often 
 there stands beneath a stone archway, or leans over 
 a bridge parapet, or comes across a marble pave- 
 ment, a figure which seems to have stepped down 
 from the heroic pageants emblazoned on the storied 
 walls, or to be the statue of the Discobolus or of the 
 Faun, animated, and breathing once more the sunny 
 air in which they were begotten. 
 
46 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 The blood of Lombard nobles ran quick and warm 
 in the veins of this artist, who owned nothing in the 
 world except a little old house under the shadow of 
 the Broletto where he had been born, the only relic 
 left of what had once been a wide and princely heri- 
 tage ; and though he was but a poor wanderer who 
 had to push his own way to fortune with his pencil 
 and compasses, if ever he reached it at all, he had 
 the carriage of a knight and the head of a trouba- 
 dour. 
 
 He now saluted Beldia gravely, apologizing for his 
 too early arrival. 
 
 ' Nay, you are very punctual. It is my father who 
 is engaged at the hour I named to you,' she an- 
 swered, not well pleased to be forced to attend to 
 him. ' He will be here, I think, before very long ; 
 meantime, what works can I show you ?' 
 
 He gave some names at random, but they were of 
 authors too recent to be found in the Ardiglione 
 collection ; then, though he could ill afford to do so, 
 he purchased some odd volumes of Giuseppe Vasi 
 and some sheets of plans by Baldassare Peruzzi. 
 
 He felt ashamed to come here again and trouble 
 this stately maiden for nothing, and again go away 
 with empty hands. He leaned over the counters 
 strewn with old books and old pamplets of all kinds, 
 and did his best to draw her on from architectural 
 subjects into general conversation; but she was 
 reserved by habit and from a secluded life, seldom 
 going farther off her own doorstep than the church 
 close by in the Piazza, and was so accustomed to 
 treat the younger visitors who came thither with 
 formality, that he did not make much progress with 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 47 
 
 her until he spoke of the tower in which she dwelt. 
 Then her eyes lightened, her lips smiled, her voice 
 became full of feeling. She answered readily as to 
 its architect, its age, its traditions ; she told him the 
 history of its building ; she grew eloquent over the 
 legends attached to its loves and garlands, and the 
 tale of the plague, which was associated with its 
 shrine of the Madonna. She never tired of talking 
 of her home, and of all it had seen and heard and 
 known, and in him she found an eager listener, 
 ready to share her enthusiasm and veneration for its 
 dark and massive stones. In turn he told her of 
 Brescia and Bergamo, and of his own little house 
 there, once the mere loggia to the great palace 
 owned by the Fontana family. Its arches had been 
 filled in towards the beginning of the eighteenth 
 century, and its columns had then been roofed, and 
 its once stately frescoed beauty changed into a 
 humble dwelling-house such as it was still, and in 
 which his mother now lived, a widow, all alone, pious, 
 gentle, and cheerful, thinking ever of his graceless 
 self in many sleepless nights and useless prayers. 
 
 He had succeeded in interesting his companion, 
 when Ser Checchi at last appeared ; a shadow on 
 his calm features as of worried moments lately 
 passed, but ready to enter into any subjects, 
 classical or mediaeval, which it might please his 
 customer to suggest. It is at once the joy and the 
 peril of scholars, like artists, that their mundane and 
 prosaic interests are immediately laid aside and for- 
 gotten, if the impersonal topics which attract them 
 are mooted in their presence. To them the abstract 
 far outweighs and eclipses the practical ; and to the 
 
48 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 scholar's, as to the artist's, mind, the impersonal is 
 so infinitely greater than the personal that the 
 claims of the latter are cast aside for the charms of 
 the former, without a moment's hesitation or con- 
 trition. Whatever the business was on which 
 Vestuccio had come to the old librarian, its vexa- 
 tious recollections were now put aside and forgotten 
 the moment that the new-comer questioned him as 
 to the place of burial of II Magnifico, a disputed 
 point amongst Tuscan scholars. 
 
 They conversed long and cordially, with that 
 satisfaction which comes from mutual tastes and 
 opinions, whilst Beldia listened, working at a piece 
 of sewing which she kept in a drawer under the 
 desk, to fill up her idle moments in the book-room. 
 
 She perceived reluctantly, but clearly, the use 
 which many unscrupulous visitors made so fre- 
 quently of her father ; the avidity with which they 
 drove the sharp pickaxe of their minor intelligence 
 into the gold-mine of his long-amassed knowledge, 
 and took thence all they needed to make their paltry 
 storehouse rich. 
 
 He, in the single-hearted devotion of the humanist, 
 out of the generous abundance of the enthusiast, 
 delighted to aid, to encourage, to enlighten, to assist 
 all who came to him ; was blind to all the petty 
 larcenies by which he was robbed of information 
 and experience, of authority and data, while the 
 gems stolen from his store were set up in the caps 
 of these beardless knaves, without acknowledgment 
 or thanks. 
 
 Many an article in newspaper and review was 
 brilliant with the borrowed learning which he had 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 49 
 
 unconsciously supplied to some young scribbler of 
 the public press, and more than one ambitious 
 aspirant to public life had forced himself into notice 
 in high quarters by the antiquarian and philological 
 investigations opened out by the elder scholar, 
 which had been innocently shown and liberally lent 
 to him. 
 
 The old man in his book-room, with the sun-rays 
 from the window, or the lamp from the table, shed 
 on his benign and noble countenance, felt like Eras- 
 mus or Boethius amongst the pupils of a golden 
 time, as these young men pressed around him, plying 
 him with questions, listening to his suggestions, 
 putting down his dates and judgments with their 
 pencils. He was touched, flattered, mollified, and 
 thought that those of his contemporaries who com- 
 plained of the rudeness and indifference and cyni- 
 cism of the younger generation did it wrong. 
 
 But Beldia, sitting apart, silent, over her ledgers 
 or her linen, saw what he did not see, overheard 
 what he did not hear, and understood the motives 
 with which these callous and scornful youngsters 
 affected so much deference to age and so much 
 desire of instruction. 
 
 There was one amongst them in especial whom 
 she distrusted and detested. He was a young 
 lawyer, by name Pampilio Querci ; he was clever, 
 cunning, and of an ambition reaching far beyond 
 the desk and stool of an attorney's office; he had 
 mental power, and had education enough to be able 
 to estimate and admire the vast accumulation of 
 Ser Checchi's learning ; and he had skill enough to 
 send his own little bucket of a mind deep down 
 
 4 
 
So THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 again and again into the profound wells of the 
 librarian's intellect, and to draw up the waters of 
 knowledge, which he knew how to pour forth again 
 thinly and carefully, as if brought from his own 
 especial springs. 
 
 Again and again could Beldia recognise her 
 father's erudition, so generously and imprudently 
 displayed, retailed by this young man in the public 
 press, without acknowledgment of or allusion to its 
 giver, in papers signed ' Lex et Lux,' which was the 
 press-name of Pampilio Querci. Once or twice she 
 had pointed out these articles to her father ; but he, 
 in whose character there were mingled simplicity 
 and vanity, had waived them aside impatiently. 
 
 ' If the youngster can find pleasure in these ab- 
 struse questions, it is well, it is laudable/ he an- 
 swered to her ; ' let us not check his zeal, my 
 daughter. After all, the fount of learning is open to 
 high and low, to old and young. Let who will drink 
 thereof. God forbid that I should send such away 
 thirsty.' 
 
 And Beldia felt with a pang how noble he was, 
 and how foolish ; how liberal and how unwise. He 
 set open his jar of honey from Mount Parnassus, 
 and let these flies and wasps come round and upon 
 it, and they sucked their fill, and stung him as their 
 only thanks. 
 
 But she could do nothing to make him perceive 
 and believe this, and .the antiquarian and philo- 
 logical articles continued to be compiled and 
 printed, signed ' Lex et Lux,' until they attracted 
 the attention of the Minister of Education, who said 
 to the Prefect of Florence that the young writer of 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 51 
 
 them must be a brilliant scholar, and had better be 
 looked after and secured to the interest of the 
 Government with some good official place, lest he 
 should be taken away by the clericals, for whom he 
 seemed to have a leaning, Querci knowing well how 
 to run with the hare and hunt with the hounds. 
 
 Beldia, who saw his drift, and guessed the reward 
 he tried to obtain, was impatient of the sight of the 
 lean, small, spruce figure, and the pale, aquiline, 
 demure profile of the young attorney, and be- 
 grudged all the hours which her father wasted on 
 him, all the volumes he borrowed for an indefinite 
 time, and often forgot to return, and all the infor- 
 mation which he angled for so dexterously and 
 absorbed so ravenously. 
 
 Therefore she looked now with prejudice and ill- 
 favour upon the entry of the Brescian architect, 
 seeing in him only another of his younger generation 
 which used and abused her father's good-nature. 
 To allow students to transcribe from and consult 
 manuscripts and folios in the book-room was not 
 the way to sell books and make money by them ; 
 this the sober and practical side of her temperament 
 told her, and a volume or a pamphlet was indeed 
 hardly ever sold out of the thousands filling the 
 shelves and cumbering the floors. It pleased Ser 
 Checchi that this should be so, to see any work 
 go away in the hands of a stranger was always 
 painful to him ; if it were a rare and valuable work, 
 to sell it was to him like selling a child in bondage. 
 There were hundreds of books in his tower which 
 he had purchased in the days of his youth, and that 
 they should remain there all these years was delight- 
 
52 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 ful to him. But they did not till his purse by re- 
 maining there, and the additional purchases which 
 he was continually adding to them drained it. 
 
 ' Another young man to read, and smile, and 
 listen, and go away laden with borrowed learning, 
 which he will sell to editors and publishers,' thought 
 Beldia, glancing impatiently at the auburn head of 
 the Lombard stranger. But she could not refuse 
 to admit that the newcomer had a different physi- 
 ognomy to the bloodless face of Pampilio Querci, and 
 he left off his studies to choose some plates of 
 Palladio's plans, which he again paid for, honestly, 
 and at once, without trying to obtain an abatement 
 in their price. 
 
 He was of a manlier, finer, bolder type than the 
 undersized young scribes and quill-drivers who 
 came thither to suck the brain of her father. There 
 was something daring, chivalrous, candid, and 
 adventurous in his person and features and manners, 
 before which her suspicions and antipathies melted 
 away despite herself. 
 
 He asked frankly if he might return there. 
 
 ' You have so many volumes of architectural and 
 mechanical drawings,' he added, ' I may find so 
 much here that I have sought for vainly in my 
 native town. But I am well aware that it is most 
 unfair to expect to use a private bookseller's collec- 
 tion as though it were a public library, to be studied 
 in at pleasure.' 
 
 Before she could reply, Ser Checchi intervened 
 with his benignant smile and his grave nod of the 
 head. 
 
 * That is a very honest and thoughtful scruple, 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO S3 
 
 young sir,' he answered. ' But it is a needless 
 scruple here. I am delighted if you or anyone can 
 find any profit in what I am fortunate enough to 
 have gathered about me. My poor place is wholly 
 at your service at any hour of the day.' 
 
 Beldia reddened with vexation. There were 
 already so many of these idlers and thieves, who 
 choked up what little space there was left free in 
 the book-rooms, and wasted her time, and the boy's, 
 and her father's. But at least those frequenters 
 of the place were townsfolk, youths and old men 
 well known from their birth up in their native 
 streets ; it seemed natural, it might be only proper, 
 to afford them what advantages were to be secured 
 there ; but this was a stranger, a foreigner, a 
 Lombard. There could be no need or obligation 
 to open wide house and heart to him like this. 
 
 But Ser Checchi took no heed of her imploring 
 glances, nor of the restraining touch with which 
 she gently pulled the skirt of his long coat. He 
 reiterated his invitation to come and study, and the 
 Brescian accepted it with cordiality and gratitude ; 
 and as the latter at last left the library, carrying 
 his Palladian engravings with him, the old man 
 looked after his tall figure approvingly. 
 
 ' A well-made and well-mannered youth,' he said 
 with satisfaction. ' They grow fine manhood in the 
 north. Child, did you mark how eager he was con- 
 cerning the Domenican Fathers as printers at 
 Rifredi ? Let him come ; let him come ; if there 
 be anything here which can profit him, he is heartily 
 welcome to it.' 
 
 Beldia sighed. 
 
54 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 She had heard those generous words spoken so 
 many times, and she had never known any gratitude 
 shown for them from those for whose benefit they 
 were spoken. 
 
 ' An accomplished man and a modest one,' added 
 Ser Checchi, turning over the volumes used by his 
 visitor ; ' I shall be glad to afford him any possible 
 opportunities for study that he may be able to find 
 here. Mind that you make him welcome in my 
 absence, Beldia, and let him search for all the dates 
 and authorities which he may wish to find.' 
 
 ' Certainly, father,' she answered, a little unwil- 
 lingly. ' But no one will ever buy books if you 
 allow all your visitors to come and glean all they 
 want here without paying for the privilege.' 
 
 ' What a speech for my daughter to make !' cried 
 Ser Checchi, displeased and scandalized. ' Let the 
 State be vile enough to put a tax on art and learn- 
 ing, as it does at its libraries and galleries, I will 
 never grudge the free use of my book-shelves to 
 any serious scholar.' 
 
 ' But they will not buy if they can turn over a 
 hundred volumes for nothing.' 
 
 ' Perhaps they cannot buy. Perhaps they are 
 honest and earnest lovers of learning who are very 
 scantily supplied with this world's goods. Shall I 
 grudge them a ray from my poor lantern on their 
 path to help their search? Shall I refuse them 
 a crust from my cupboard, when they are honestly 
 hungering for the truth ? Fie, fie ! for shame, my 
 child ! You have not lived amongst the eloquence 
 of the dead to hide such sordid thoughts within 
 your breast ? Surely, surely not, Beldia ?' 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 55 
 
 She was silent. 
 
 She was too docile to contradict her father, and 
 too generous not to appreciate his generosity ; but 
 she knew what all these volumes cost, and she knew 
 what rent and taxes cost, and she knew that the 
 library of the tower was kept open year after year 
 at a dead loss. 
 
 She knew, also, enough of commerce to know that 
 trade cannot be carried on successfully on such 
 romantic principles as her father's But he, vaguely 
 sensible of the disagreement implied by her silence, 
 waxed warmer and warmer on the theme. 
 
 ' Who knows but that some one of these youths 
 may not be on the highway to immortality, though 
 he look to our purblind eyes but a needy idler ?' he 
 said vehemently. ' Was not Cervantes poor ? was 
 not Tasso deemed a madman ? was not Giotto a 
 shepherd on the hills ? was not Camoens sold for 
 a slave ? Has not Genius been impoverished, and 
 starved, and persecuted in every age of the world ? 
 If we help these stumbling feet on to even the lowest 
 rung of the ladder of renown nay, if we do what is 
 better still, happier still, help to confirnvthe bias of 
 a youth to the choice of the arts of peace and of 
 light, instead of the pursuits of gain or the lust of 
 war is it not some little good done for the Muses, 
 as they were used to say, for Humanity as men say 
 now ? Ah ! my dear, surely, surely, in learning, yet 
 more than in life, what is done to the least of these 
 is as if it were done to Deity itself.' 
 
 Beldia's eyes grew soft and suffused as they dwelt 
 on her father's face, which was lighted up with the 
 radiance of a high and impersonal passion. Her 
 
56 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 heart ached at this noble and guileless enthusiasm. 
 She knew how men traded on it to their own base 
 profit. She knew that it was not genius, but 
 cunning, which came there to glean the gold of his 
 knowledge and kindness ; that it was not the in- 
 genious youth of a Platonic Academy which sought 
 his counsels and teachings, but the keen, sharp, 
 narrow wits of modern youngsters pilfering to 
 prosper. She knew how his ideas were stolen, his 
 culture was borrowed, his library shelves were ran- 
 sacked by the journalists, writers, professors, 
 attorneys, and the like, who came to him to carry 
 off a harvest of quotation and knowledge which they 
 would have been incapable of gleaning for them- 
 selves. 
 
 She knew this well ; it was why she received all 
 younger men so coldly, and only smiled on the aged 
 scholars. 
 
 But how was she to say this to him ? How damp 
 that good faith, and lower that exaltation which had 
 carried on into old age the beautiful ignorance and 
 confidence of youth ? 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 SHE turned the subject by an allusion to Vestuccio. 
 ' Did Messer Aurelio vex you to-day, father ?' she 
 asked him. ' I thought you looked disturbed at his 
 arrival. Was his business so very urgent that he 
 need have come at dinner-time ?' 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 57 
 
 Her father's face clouded. 
 
 ' Vestuccio came about a financial matter,' he said 
 evasively. ' He is a careful man. It always vexes 
 me to lay aside study for practical matters. Business 
 is Martha, and study is Mary. I have dwelt with 
 Mary all my days, and walked with her in green and 
 shady places ; I am ill fitted for the noise and clatter, 
 however useful and well meant, which her ruder 
 sister makes about her work.' 
 
 ' Could not I see to this matter, whatever it is, 
 for you ?' asked Beldia wistfully. 
 
 ' Certainly not,' said her father peremptorily. 
 ' Buy your marketings, my love, and your linen, and 
 your sugar and spice, but leave graver business to 
 me. You are Mary and Martha in one person, I 
 know, but that is not a reason for overstepping your 
 duties. Attend to your daisy-roots on the roof, and 
 your pigeons, and sweet herbs, and do not offer me 
 counsel until I ask for it.' 
 
 ' I did not mean any forwardness or officious- 
 ness/ she murmured, distressed and ashamed at his 
 reproof. 
 
 ' No, no ; you meant nothing but what was right,' 
 he said kindly. * You are only too anxious to spare 
 me trouble, I know. Women should confine them- 
 selves to household cares. Now go to your room, 
 or out-of-doors, if you will. I will attend to the 
 library this afternoon, and I am expecting Don 
 Gervasio and Massimo. We are in doubt still if we 
 have read aright that passage in Avicenna. It is 
 very obscure.' 
 
 Don Gervasio was a priest, the vicar of a small 
 church near, and Massimo was the baptismal name 
 
58 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 of an aged teacher of Greek and Arabic, who was 
 the bosom friend of Ser Checchi. With these two 
 cronies he spent the happiest hours of every year, 
 re-reading disputed passages, questioning received 
 readings, searching obscure authorities, and fami- 
 liarizing themselves with the forgotten authors whose 
 bones were dust. 
 
 Beldia retired, as he bade her do ; but not to 
 work or to amuse herself. She had all the house- 
 hold needs upon her head and hands, all those daily 
 and small labours which go together to make up the 
 guidance of a house, and upon the discharge of 
 which, well or ill done, depends the comfort or dis- 
 comfort of that house. 
 
 Men rarely understand the labour which this in- 
 volves, and have neither compassion nor gratitude 
 for the efforts which surround them with creature- 
 comforts and create around them a serene domestic 
 atmosphere. Like other men, Ser Checchi believed 
 that his house ordered itself, and thought of his 
 daughter's life as of one long holiday of perfect and 
 continual ease. 
 
 He never dreamed of the constant supervision by 
 which the naturally noisy and careless servant was 
 kept quiet and made careful, the constant attention 
 by which the dusky old chambers were kept fresh 
 and sweet, the constant economy by which the best 
 possible was obtained and the least possible spent, and 
 the constant industry with which linen was repaired, 
 conserves were made, accounts were kept, and stores 
 were husbanded. Beldia knew that the means of her 
 father were not large, and that his habits were costly 
 from liberality of temper, and the absence of mind of 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 59 
 
 a man whose thoughts were with the dead rather than 
 with his butcher, and his baker and his tallow-chand- 
 ler. Keeping the accounts, indeed, as she did, she 
 saw that the commerce of the library was almost at a 
 standstill that few buyers ever came thither, and 
 that the purchases of books were a hundred times 
 in excess of the demand for them But as the books 
 of which she saw the entry were all bought cheaply 
 at sales, and those more costly purchases were un- 
 explained to her, the real price paid for such ad- 
 ditions remained unknown to her, and the outlay 
 which the library caused was, as far as she knew, 
 to be placed at a low figure. She thought it rather 
 her father's hobby than his trade, and was not 
 as uneasy as she would have been had she known 
 the true price of the beautiful and ancient copies 
 which were being every now and then added to the 
 already overflowing sea of literature which sur- 
 rounded her. The love of books was such a holy 
 and noble passion, that it seemed to her impossible 
 any harm should ever come out of it. 
 
 Yet she could not but perceive that her father 
 was often preoccupied, often troubled, and received 
 visits and letters which caused him perplexities of 
 which he explained nothing to her ; he did not even 
 permit her to allude to them. And Vestuccio she 
 did not understand them, but she was afraid of his 
 relations with Vestuccio. 
 
 The prosperous citizen who bore this name had 
 been born of poor parents, rope-makers and sail- 
 menders at a dirty but romantic village nestled 
 under a cliff near a large seaport on the Italian 
 Riviera. He had run about half naked in the sun 
 
60 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 and sand and surf, and grown strong and healthy 
 on his diet of fish and rye-bread. He had made 
 friends with the skippers of brigs at the port near, 
 and they had given him odds and ends of foreign 
 trifles, which he sold about the streets with such 
 pretty shells and seaweed, or bits of agate and cor- 
 nelian, as he had picked up along the shore. He 
 was a clever, agile, merry child, with an engaging 
 smile and bright blue eyes ; and people bought of 
 him because he asked them so nicely, his white 
 teeth shining, his brown curls blowing, and his tray 
 slung in front of his little bare chest. 
 
 Most boys would have either spent the pence thus 
 gained on food and drink, or carried them home to 
 their mothers. He did neither; he saved them up 
 and put them by, and, when he had enough to do so, 
 lent out little sums to his companions, or to the 
 fishermen and mariners, and did it so well that he 
 multiplied his pence very quickly, and yet, strange 
 to say, never made an enemy, and none grudged him 
 his gains. 
 
 Little by little the pence and the francs swelled, 
 till they became a goodly sum, and Aurelio, now be- 
 come a youth of eighteen, opened a little shop in the 
 seaport town a little den under an arch where 
 coral and shells and such cheap bits of Oriental 
 finery as he could buy, half damaged, off the quays, 
 were put together in the darkness ; and he himself 
 sat or stood, ever smiling, behind the board which 
 served him as a counter. 
 
 To buy something of 'Rello, as he was called, be- 
 came the fashion with the seafaring folks and their 
 sweethearts ; and many of the sailors brought him 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 61 
 
 pretty outlandish articles, ivories, and parrots and 
 ostrich feathers, and little jade idols, in exchange for 
 the good tobacco and brandy which he smuggled in 
 for them undetected ; and at his little cabin the sea- 
 faring men, native and foreign, met the buxom, 
 blowsy women of their hearts, and he could turn an 
 honest penny by helping on such amorous inter- 
 course. 
 
 After a few years of this small trading he had 
 realized enough to leave the sea-town, with its dis- 
 reputable associations, and quietly and sagaciously 
 he established himself in Florence, in a very modest 
 manner, as a seller of curios and foreign trifles ; his 
 old comrades, the sailors, still often put him in the 
 way of bargains from the East and West, and he was 
 always cordial and unassuming, and content with a 
 moderate percentage on what he sold. 
 
 It was a humble little dusky corner, hardly bigger 
 than a dog-kennel, but in it were sometimes found 
 really good and strange things, and before many 
 more years had passed over his head he was able 
 to move from this obscure dwelling, to a large 
 although unpretending shop in the Piazza della 
 Madonna, over the door of which he had painted 
 in bold lettering, 4 Aurelio Vestuccio, Antiquario,' 
 where, in a little office in a back-court, under a 
 plane-tree, he did much business, beside his osten- 
 sible traffic in majolica and bronzes and old furniture. 
 His career was made. 
 
 ' All gained by hard work and honest dealing,' he 
 said, with a glow of pride and self-respect. He had 
 married the daughter of a tallow-chandler with a 
 round little dowry of her own, and had put out 
 
62 THE TOWER OF TAD DEO 
 
 her little fortune in his business with the same 
 prudence and sagacity with which, as a child, he 
 had sold shell and seaweed. He had always a 
 pleasant, good-humoured, clean-shaved face, and 
 was always willing to do anyone a good turn. He 
 had become popular and respected in the town ; 
 and, from the dilettante who wanted a piece of old 
 stamped leather, to the embarrassed tradesman who 
 wanted a loan of twenty pounds, everyone who re- 
 quired something quickly found out and cheerfully 
 arranged for, went to the little office under the plane- 
 tree, where Aurelio Vestuccio was to be seen from 
 nine till four. 
 
 He was a model of what industry and thrift can 
 make of a man by the time he is forty, though all the 
 circumstances of his early life had been against him, 
 and he had had no advantages except his shrewd 
 and cautious mind and his pleasant and politic 
 manner. Many half-naked boys sell shells and sea- 
 weed on many shores ; but to few of-them is it given 
 to be born with a brain as quick as mercury, a clever 
 tongue which can chatter constantly yet reveal 
 nothing, and a heart as hard as a nether millstone. 
 This last possession was the most useful of all his 
 many gifts from nature, but it would have availed 
 nothing without the ever-watching, and ever-bright, 
 intelligence behind it. 
 
 Many people have hard hearts, but not many have 
 long heads : he had both, and he had also a most 
 admirable cordiality and simplicity of manner which 
 stood him in good stead. Then, he was known to 
 be a good father and husband ; and on Sunday, at 
 noon, might be seen listening to the military music 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 63 
 
 in the Piazza of San Marco, or in the Piazzone of 
 the Cascine, with a tribe of nice-looking and neatly- 
 clad children about him, hostages and warrants of 
 his many civic virtues. 
 
 Ser Checchi had known and helped him from the 
 earliest years of his establishment in his first modest 
 little shop ; and Vestuccio had ingratiated himself 
 with the old scholar by putting in his way many an 
 old pamphlet or volume which had come under his 
 hand in his various expeditions to far-off villages or 
 castles in the mountains north and south in search 
 of curiosities. 
 
 Some seven years before the arrival of the Lombard 
 student in the city, an incident had occurred which 
 had brought the bric-a-brac seller and the librarian 
 in closer commerce and communication. 
 
 Ser Checchi, when at Antella, was much given to 
 roaming over the hills and valleys of the Casentino 
 in the summer season in search of old books, such 
 as lie forgotten and neglected in many a sacristy 
 cupboard where the good priest is more learned in 
 village news and wine diseases than in the value of 
 Horae and Evangeliarium. Though he walked 
 apparently with feebleness, because his shoulders 
 were bowed and his gait was slow, he could cover 
 many a mile without fatigue, with no steed except 
 his ebony-handled stick, and no companion except 
 the white dog Folko, who always went into the 
 country when his master did. 
 
 In one of these country rambles he grew thirsty, 
 and paused to ask for a draught of water at the'forge 
 of a blacksmith called lo. The forge was]. high up 
 in the hills, and the anvil and hammer had little 
 
64 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 work to do, but the smith was also in a small way 
 a landowner and farmer, having inherited part and 
 bought part, of the arable land and of the pine-wood 
 around and about his smithy. lo was a well-known 
 man in the district, by name lorio Lencioni, and was 
 a familiar acquaintance of Ser Checchi's, whom he 
 now welcomed with delight, and for whom he in- 
 sisted on opening a flask of old Chianti, which his 
 visitor, sorely to his distress, insisted for his part on 
 mixing with spring water. 
 
 It was three o'clock, and the June day was hot. 
 Ser Checchi was tired, for he had strolled more 
 miles than he had counted along the fragrant hill- 
 side, where nightingales sang under the bay thickets 
 and the yellow gorse was blossoming and the wild 
 rose. 
 
 ' You are fatigued, sir ; rest for an hour or two,' 
 said the blacksmith, a big, good-tempered, middle- 
 aged man, with his reaping-hook in his hand and 
 his shirt-sleeves rolled up to his shoulder. 
 
 ' Thanks to you, I will do so,' said Ser Checchi ; 
 * at least, if you will promise me to go back to your 
 field-work, for your corn is over-ripe, and I fear me 
 that there is rain in the air for this evening, and your 
 grain is not half cut.' 
 
 ' Sit and rest, then, and we will go and finish cut- 
 ting the corner field,' said lorio to him ; ' and, by the 
 way, Ser Checchi, there is an old chest which you 
 may like to look over there are papers and such- 
 like in it. I found it under a heap of old hay in the 
 loft. It has been there, I be bound, as many years 
 as the house is old. We hoped there was something 
 good in it ; but there was nothing but an odd lot of 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 65 
 
 books, so we threw them back again, being spited 
 not to have laid our hand heartily on something 
 better. You are welcome to it if there be any paper 
 or book as may please you ; they are only a pack of 
 rubbish, I fear copybooks and ciphering-books and 
 the like ; but if you care to look over them the house 
 is yours, and we will get, by your leave, to our reap- 
 ing.' 
 
 Ser Checchi thanked him and looked longingly 
 towards a dusty, worm-eaten old wooden chest of 
 solid nutwood, with a coat-of-arms carved heavily 
 on its lid, and with rusty iron handles. 
 
 Old books ! the sound of the word was as 
 sweet to him as the promise of bridal gifts to a 
 maiden, or winter toys to a child by the fireside. 
 They might most probably be of no value, but old 
 volumes were always of interest, were they only 
 records of household expenditure or of clerkly memo- 
 randa. 
 
 A few minutes later the whole family trooped out 
 through the open doorway to go to finish their 
 reaping, even the small children clinging to the 
 women's skirts and eager to be taken to the field, 
 to lie and sleep amongst the warm wheat whilst 
 the sickles of their elders were at work. Ser 
 Checchi and Folko were left alone in the black- 
 smith's kitchen, with the sunshine streaming in 
 through the green tracery of the window and the 
 old clock drowsily ticking the minutes in a corner. 
 
 Ser Checchi slumbered a little while in the heat 
 and the stillness and the fragrant hill air, the dog 
 outstretched at his feet. Then he shook himself 
 awake, drank a little more of the watered wine, and 
 
 5 
 
66 THE TOWER OF TAD DEO 
 
 stooped over the chest, which the smith had con- 
 siderately drawn close to the window for his easier 
 inspection. There were quantities of yellow docu- 
 ments written in crabbed characters household and 
 farm books for the most part, belonging to the 
 seventeenth century, records of the credit and debit 
 of the large estate of which the house and lands 
 now owned by lorio had formed a portion. They 
 were large books, massive, heavy, covering the 
 expenditure of well-nigh a century. Ser Checchi, 
 with fatigue, lifted them up one after the other over 
 the tall sides of the chest. They interested him, 
 like everything which belonged to a past age and 
 had been written by dead hands, but to examine 
 them thoroughly would take days and weeks, and 
 he had many similar ones at home. Beneath all 
 these ancient folios were, however, a few bound 
 volumes lying under numbers of loose pages and 
 deeds, which all appeared to have reference to what 
 had once been the great estate of a great family 
 now extinct. 
 
 He took these volumes out and brushed from 
 them tenderly the dust, the dirt, and the seeds of 
 hay with which they were covered. They were all 
 books of the same date, the seventeenth century, 
 to which the ledgers and household books belonged ; 
 there were prayer-books, lives of saints, copies of 
 ecclesiastical works, in all some dozen volumes, 
 none of any rarity or especial mark, none of any 
 uncommon binding or unusual typography. But 
 one volume much longer and larger than the others, 
 with a binding of another epoch, caught his in- 
 structed eyes where it lay in a corner of the desk, 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 67 
 
 more than half hidden under the loose and dusty 
 hayseed. 
 
 His hands trembled as he drew it forth. His 
 sight swam as he opened its pages. His hands 
 shook, his whole person quivered, his eyes were full 
 of longing and light ; they were the eyes of a man 
 of twenty years old. 
 
 Learned in such things as he was, he knew its 
 antiquity and its value at a glance. To find such 
 a treasure mouldering neglected in a dusty chest in 
 a cottage had been the dream of his whole life. 
 Indignation, amaze, awe, delight, all held him 
 breathless and entranced before the worm-eaten 
 bench on which it lay. Oh, how happy the scribe 
 who had penned it, though long ago his hand had 
 crumbled to ashes ! 
 
 The sun poured in through the strings of flower- 
 ing beans which were running up the window, and 
 the gentle air blew the -yellow dry leaves to and fro 
 irreverently. He remained on his knees before the 
 manuscript, gazing with a lover's ardour and a 
 devotee's devotion at the marvellous fine regular 
 lines of the penman, the serried ranks of this black 
 letter, in which not a blot, nor a deviation, nor an 
 erasure was visible. Oh, the marvel of it ! Look 
 what the handwriting of men had become since the 
 days of printing ! Who wrote now what would be 
 clear and beautiful for ever as this was ? What 
 would the sprawled, careless, hurried, blotted cali- 
 graphy of the present age tell men, as this work 
 told them, of the beauty and holiness of ardour, 
 of perseverance, and of labour, where the hand was 
 but the instrument of the soul ? 
 
68 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 It was a Codex of the ' Divina Commedia,' dated 
 tinder the colophon as finished at Ravenna in May, 
 1320. 
 
 There are but few such in the world, and those 
 few are numbered and known to all bibliophiles, 
 like the folios of Shakespeare. To have discovered 
 one other was to a lover and student of books what 
 the discovery of a new world was to navigators of 
 old an ecstasy, an hononr, a miracle, an intoxica- 
 tion of happiness. 
 
 He examined the parchment, the capitals, the 
 writing, the headpiece, the colophon, the binding, 
 which was of leather much eaten and gnawed by 
 mice, with some unpolished cornelians, cut and 
 mounted on silver, on its clasps ; he scarcely 
 breathed as he bent over it, whilst the full sun fell 
 warm and golden on to these pages, which had once, 
 like enough, been touched and seen by Dante's self. 
 There could be no question of its age and its 
 authenticity; indeed, the finding of it in such a 
 place was proof enough of these. How many other 
 treasures there are, doubtless, lying unknown in 
 attic and cellar, in granary and wood-house in re- 
 mote country places, where even the tireless feet of 
 the collector and the dealer never wander, and the 
 wand of the modern Hermes of the book-mart is 
 unknown ! 
 
 The binding was of a much later date, and the 
 folio had been probably laid away by some scholar, 
 when the blast of trumpet or the smoke of torches 
 had told of the tide of war rolling up towards that 
 calm hillside, and there it had remained in its 
 obscurity ever since, visited only by the mice, who 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 69 
 
 had nibbled its edges and peeled its leather here and 
 there. 
 
 For the first time in all his pure and upright life, 
 a great temptation to an act of dishonour, of dis- 
 honesty, assailed him as he knelt there before it. 
 No one knew that it was there ; no one around him 
 even beholding it would see in it anything more 
 than an old book, quite worthless, only fit, perhaps, 
 to be torn up to kindle a fire or to stop a leak in a 
 cask. Nothing could be simpler, nothing more 
 easy, than to put it in his pocket or take it away 
 under his arm. No one on that hillside would ever 
 know or care. Unless his learning enlightened their 
 ignorance, no one of the people around him would 
 ever dream that this old brown volume, moth-eaten 
 and mice-gnawed, would be worth its weight in gold 
 to the libraries of great cities and great men. There 
 was not a soul near, not even in sight ; all the family 
 were out in the fields ; there was not even a child 
 asleep in the cradle, nor a dog, save his own by the 
 threshold. He had only to walk out of the open 
 doorway along the grass paths of the hillside towards 
 his own home, and carry the precious manuscript 
 with him. 
 
 Never was any temptation made more easy and 
 more alluring to an innocent soul ! 
 
 He bent over the Codex, his hands pressed around 
 it lovingly as a woman's hands round the body of 
 her child ; his was no cold appetite of a dryasdust, 
 but a passion infinitely tender, and yearning, and 
 even romantic ; beside all that old books said to him 
 as a scholar, they awoke his affections and his 
 imaginations; to hold thus, what likely enough 
 
70 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 Dante once had held, thrilled him to his utmost 
 soul ; he could never see a volume which had 
 weathered centuries, a manuscript which had been 
 written in other ages, without a strong emotion as 
 of tears. 
 
 He would have given half the few years remaining 
 to him to have had this one in his own possession, 
 safe locked under his own keys ; and to so possess 
 it he had nothing to do but to put it under his arm 
 and walk quietly away down the hillside ; no one 
 would ever have known. 
 
 It was so intense a temptation that the dew stood 
 on his temples, and the blue veins swelled in his 
 throat, as he knelt there, his hands about the old 
 dark rusty cover of it. There it had lain so long, 
 and no eyes but his could have recognised it for 
 what it was. It was his own by all right of affinity, 
 all title of sympathy. What was it to those who 
 owned it ? 
 
 He stayed there gazing on it so long that his 
 limbs grew cramped and stagnated, and he lost all 
 sense of nerve and pulse whilst the sun sank down 
 out of sight behind the mountain afar off in the west. 
 
 The sound of voices laughing and talking and 
 singing came to his ear as the reapers approached 
 from the fields. Then he arose slowly, for his knees 
 were stiff and bruised by the bricks on which he had 
 so long knelt. 
 
 He took the volume in his hand, and crossed the 
 kitchen, and met the peasants at the threshold. 
 
 * My friend ! my friend !' he said to the black- 
 smith. ' Here is a treasure I have found for you in 
 that which you thought was a mere heap of rubbish. 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 71 
 
 This volume is worth its weight in gold, if it be 
 truly that which I think. To-morrow we will go 
 together into the city and have it fully appraised.' 
 
 lorio drew near with startled round eyes, alight 
 with joy and covetousness, and the women with him 
 pressed close also in excitement and wonder, expect- 
 ing to see some vessels of gold and silver or some 
 jewelled pyx or cross. 
 
 'An old book! a leather book!' said the smith's 
 wife with derision and disappointment. ' You are 
 joking, Ser Checchi ! You are so fond of books that 
 your head gets turned about them. Any rubbish 
 bewitches you.' 
 
 ' You mistake,' said Ser Checchi almost harshly, 
 for his temptation to say otherwise was almost 
 greater than his strength. 'Take my word on a 
 matter of which you are yourself utterly ignorant. 
 This book is so old, and of such a nature, that it is 
 extremelyfvaluable. Keep it carefully all the night, 
 and to-morrow I will take you to those in the town 
 who will confirm what I say. You will learn from 
 them precisely its worth. Only, good man,' he 
 added, as he clasped the volume in both hands and 
 gazed at it with swimming, reverent eyes, ' if that 
 value be what I can pay you, you will let me become 
 the purchaser of it at its due price, will you not ?' 
 
 The smith, brawny, bare-legged, bare-armed, sun- 
 burnt till he was almost black, stared sheepishly at 
 the volume, which to him looked worth no more 
 than, nay, not half as much as, a clod of good 
 brown earth. The other men, with the women and 
 children, were all gaping with wide-open mouths, 
 and nudging one another, and whispering that it 
 
72 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 was commonly said that the good Ser Checchi was 
 in his dotage on certain matters. 
 
 ' You will find what I say is true,' said the old 
 man abruptly ; ' and and you will give me the 
 preference over other buyers, if the price come 
 within my means ?' 
 
 ' About what might be the price ?' asked lorio in 
 a shamefaced, awed tone, the avarice of the Tuscan 
 peasant beginning to stir in him at the idea of a 
 possible gain. 
 
 ' That I would rather not say, since I intend to 
 be, if possible, a buyer,' replied Ser Checchi a little 
 austerely, for what he had done had cost him a 
 sharp effort, and he suffered at the idea of this 
 precious treasure-trove going away from his own 
 hands, even for this one short summer night. 
 
 * Keep it as the apple of your eye,' he said to the 
 smith, and reluctantly relinquished it to the dirty 
 rough hand outstretched to take it. 
 
 ' Lord ! It's been in that chest, I will be bound, 
 for hundreds and hundreds of years,' said the smith, 
 staring confusedly down on this dingy, mouse- 
 nibbled, leathern folio, of which such wonders were 
 told him. 
 
 ' I will meet you at the foot of the hill at day- 
 break,' said Ser Checchi, hastily averting his eyes 
 from the sight of the volume in those ignorant and 
 impious hands. 
 
 Then he turned his back on them and went down 
 the steep grass path under the olive boughs, through 
 the sheaves of wheat. 
 
 ' " Lead us not into temptation/' ' he thought. 
 ' Who has not need to say that ?' 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 73 
 
 All the night he could not sleep for the memory 
 of the manuscript confided to the stupid care of a 
 peasant ignorant and contemptuous of its value, and 
 it made him restless and ashamed to feel how nearly, 
 how closely, the temptation to secrecy had assailed 
 him. 
 
 ' We are wretched creatures, and can find fair 
 sophisms to cover all our evil-doing,' he thought 
 sadly as he lay wide awake looking at the clouds 
 sweeping slowly past his moonlit casement, and 
 hearing the prolonged and harmonious call of the 
 scops owl through the shadows. 
 
 In the morning he kept his word, and went down 
 with the blacksmith into the city, lorio wholly 
 incredulous, but carrying with him, wrapped in a 
 bit of cotton stuff which his wife had given him, the 
 dingy volume which in his soul he utterly depised. 
 
 After long and careful examination the book was 
 pronounced by those most competent to judge on 
 such matters to be undoubtedly one of the very 
 earliest copies of the great poem extant, worth many 
 thousand francs in private sale, likely to be sold for 
 its weight in gold in an auction-room, 
 
 The smith was stupefied. That a common old 
 book, all nibbled and dog-eared as it looked, should 
 be likely to realize such a vast sum of money seemed 
 to turn the very world topsy-turvy to him. 
 
 ' Sure the wisest men are the biggest fools/ he 
 said to his wife, who had come with him to see that 
 he should not be cheated, ' An old black book all 
 in gnawed leather! Could any soul in his senses 
 care for it ?' 
 
 * Well, they do, and it's no business of yours to 
 
74 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 put them out of grace with it,' said his helpmeet. 
 ' Take time by the forelock, and the cat when she 
 jumps.' , 
 
 * But Ser Checchi might have kept it to himself, 
 and we been none the wiser !' 
 
 'Ay, ay,' said his wife. 'The good man always 
 was three parts daft, or he'd have kept his tongue 
 behind his teeth.' 
 
 ' lorio,' said Ser Checchi at that moment, 'you 
 see what I said is true. You have heard from 
 sound judges the value of your volume. Now, what 
 will you do with it ? Will you offer it to the State, 
 or will you let me have it, or will you wait your 
 chance to meet with some great fancier and collector 
 of these things ?' 
 
 He spoke quietly, but his hands shook as they had 
 done when he had first touched the precious manu- 
 script, and his eyes dwelt longingly on it where it lay 
 wrapped in the piece of flowered cotton. 
 
 ' Why, Ser Checchi, sure the volume is half yours 
 already, for you found it,' began lorio, who was a 
 simple and amiable man, but he was checked sud- 
 denly by his wife, who said quickly : 
 
 ' Of course, sir, we would sooner sell it to you than 
 to any mortal creature, so crazy fond of these things 
 as you are, and no offence meant ; but we are very 
 poor people, as your honour knows, and with nine 
 children and times so bad and taxes what they are, 
 we cannot follow just the first wish of our hearts, sir, 
 and the book these gentlemen seem to say is worth 
 ten times its weight in gold and more.' 
 
 ' Nay, nay not so much as that,' murmured 
 lorio. 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 75 
 
 Ser Checchi was very pale. He saw that the 
 folio was slipping from his hands. His stanch 
 rectitude forced him to admit the truth of what the 
 woman had said. 
 
 ' You may realize a fancy price by it, certainly,' 
 he answered ; ' but to make one of those sensational 
 prices you must wait the propitious season, and find 
 the willing purchaser. If you like to sell it to me 
 for the small sum which the public libraries here 
 would give you, I will buy it at that. If you prefer 
 to take your chance, you must wait till you find your 
 rich amateur. But amateurs do not come up in 
 your hills. You will have to trust to some dealer to 
 find you one, and you may trust unwisely.' 
 
 lorio opened his mouth to speak, but his wife 
 spoke before him. 
 
 1 Quite so, sir, we can see that,' she said, taking 
 up the volume in its flowered wrapper. ' But a 
 waiting race is always a safe race to ride. We will 
 wait about this rare book. It lay long years enough 
 in the old walnut chest, and it can go back there, 
 and no harm done. I will clean up the red stones 
 on it a bit, and we will ponder well what is best to 
 be done. I saw Vestuccio just now, and he spoke 
 of our sending it to Paris. But there's time enough 
 for Paris, say I.' 
 
 ' You have shown it to Vestuccio ?' asked Ser 
 Checchi, with anxious lines on his brow, his eyes 
 resting longingly on the treasure where it lay in the 
 woman's stout arms. 
 
 ' He had heard of it somehow already/ replied the 
 smith with some confusion, ' and asked to be allowed 
 to look at it. " Ser Checchi would give you a barrow- 
 
;6 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 load of gold plate for it," says he ; but you know, 
 sir, he always has a merry way. One never knows 
 if he be in joke or in earnest.' 
 
 * I have no gold plate to give, nor silver/ said Ser 
 Checchi sadly. ' Truly, to those who honour the 
 things of the spirit the volume were worth more 
 than many tons' weight of either.' 
 
 He murmured the last words rather to himself 
 than to the man and woman. His heart was 
 heavy. He had dealt by them with all candour, 
 loyalty, and honour. He had hoped that they 
 would show some sensibility of what he had done. 
 He offered the fair library price ; it seemed to him 
 hard that they would not give it him for that, when 
 but for him they would never have known that it 
 was theirs at all. 
 
 ' Good-day,' he said to them with a swelling heart, 
 and turned away. He was proud, and he was, like all 
 sensitive people, quickly rebuffed. 
 
 Their colloquy had taken place in the piazza of 
 San Lorenzo, in front of the warehouse where there 
 are sold terra-cotta images, and flower-pots, and 
 lemon-vases. The cart waited for the smith and 
 his wife, with the patient horse in the dusty shafts 
 dropping his nose over his bag of chaff and shaking 
 his worsted tassels. Ser Checchi went on towards 
 the Canto di' Nelli with slow steps and head hung 
 down. He longed inexpressibly for the Dante, with 
 that love of the bibliophile which has in it all the 
 tenderness of a lover, all the eagerness of a child, 
 all the devotion of a slave, all the hunger of a miser. 
 He had found it, he had aroused it from its slumber 
 beneath the dust of centuries, and restored it to the 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO /; 
 
 light of earth, and yet he could have no share in it. 
 A peasant who could not tell what its initial letters 
 meant, could bear it away from him held in her stout 
 stubborn arms, and covered with her unlovely cotton- 
 chintz. He did not repent him of his honesty, be- 
 cause he was an integrally honest man. But he felt, 
 what honest men feel sadly, often, that honesty costs 
 very dear. 
 
 ' It's cruel to take it from him, when he loves the 
 senseless old parcel so, God knows why,' whispered 
 lorio, with an uneasy sense that there must be some- 
 thing uncanny in the volume of which he knew 
 nothing. 
 
 ' Do not you be soft,' said his wife ; ' softness never 
 earned a penny yet.' 
 
 But the smith did not assent. He was a good- 
 hearted man, though his means were small and his 
 cupidity was excited by the idea of these vast sums 
 circling in the air above this strange, darksome old 
 volume. He overtook Ser Checchi with a few quick 
 strides, while his wife vainly screamed to him from 
 the seat to which she had climbed in the cart. 
 
 ' Ser Checchi,' he whispered, ' if it be really that 
 your heart is set on this book, why, it would be a 
 shame that you should not have it, if you will pay the 
 price the dealers here would give. You pay that, 
 sir, and you shall have it. No, do not say any more 
 now. My woman is looking after us ; the women are 
 always unreasoning and niggard. I would give it 
 to you, sir,' he added, ' give it you and right welcome, 
 for nothing ; but a man with a wife and children is 
 always a man bound ; he cannot help himself when 
 he is bid to do dirty things.' 
 
73 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 Then he left the old librarian's side as quickly as 
 he had overtaken him, and got up into his cart. 
 
 ' You have never promised him anything ?' said the 
 woman with suspicious anger. 
 
 ' Set your mind easy,' said lorio curtly. ' You've 
 made me as close and as nasty as yourself. I never 
 did a thing I was right-down ashamed of before to- 
 day, but to-day I have.' 
 
 Ser Checchi's heart had given a great leap of joy, 
 and the dusty stones of the crowded Canto di' Nelli 
 seemed to him precious gems glowing with colour 
 and light: the sky was blue between the walls; roses 
 and carnations were glowing in bunches on the 
 corner of the lane, the bells of the great church were 
 clanging and vibrating excellently, the whole morn- 
 ing seemed full of light and gladness to him. He 
 would be the owner of the manuscript of 1320. 
 
 To pay for it, indeed, would cause some difficulty, 
 but that question he put aside for the moment. Paid 
 for it should be, and within the week ; but like a lover, 
 like a child, he did not stay to count the cost which 
 might attend the fulfilment of his infinite desire. As 
 he went through the streets strangers turned to look 
 at the old man with his bowed shoulders on which 
 his silvery hair floated, for on his face there was a 
 radiance as of earliest youth. The joys of the spirit 
 illumine the countenance as a light shining through 
 a shell. 
 
 ' Good -morrow, Ser Checchi,' said a pleasant 
 voice at his elbow, as Vestuccio, with his good- 
 natured smile and deferential salutation, paused be- 
 side him somewhat later by the Croce al Trebbia. 
 
 ' Good - day to you,' answered Ser Checchi 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 79 
 
 dreamily, his thoughts always with the manuscript 
 Dante, and far from the throngs about him. 
 
 ' Might I have a word with you, Ser ?' asked the 
 younger man with hesitation. 
 
 ' Certainly,' said the elder, a vague disquietude 
 stirring in him ; the smith had said that the dealer 
 had seen the folio. 
 
 ' We are near my little place, if you would honour 
 me by stepping in and sitting down ; the sun is very 
 warm to-day,' said Vestuccio. 
 
 His ' little place,' where he had lately opened busi- 
 ness, was the shop in the Piazza della Madonna 
 degli Aldobrandini ; modest and unassuming, with 
 ' Aurelio Vestuccio, Antiquario ' painted above its 
 door, and the artistic medley of a bric-a-brac dealer's 
 odds and ends shown in its larger window ; bronzes, 
 carvings, jars, vases, marbles, woodwork, mosaics, 
 and brasses, most of them clever imitations of what 
 they pretended to be, filling up the rooms, which 
 opened one out of another. Ser Checchi passed 
 within its doors. He liked Vestuccio, who had 
 such a civil, pleasant, intelligent manner, and who 
 had more than once put in his way rare books which 
 the dealer had fallen in with, and of which, as he 
 said, he would have known nothing of the value but 
 for the lessons received from the librarian. 
 
 ' Walk in here, sir,' said Vestuccio now, opening 
 an inner door into a small den only big enough to 
 hold a desk and two stools, with some shelves filled 
 by ledgers. 
 
 He shut the door, although there was no one in 
 hearing. 
 
 The little office looked on a yard in which his 
 
8o THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 workmen were used to pack up sold goods, furbish 
 up old rubbish, fit plain old furniture with metal 
 brass handles and locks, and render more attractive 
 and picturesque all objects which required such em- 
 bellishment. It was now noonday ; and there was 
 no one in the yard ; the only living thing there was 
 a gray striped cat, asleep on a rusty and rickety 
 kneeling-chair. 
 
 * You want to speak to me ?' asked Ser Checchi 
 uneasily, his mind ever following the Dante where it 
 was jogging along, wrapped in the flowered print 
 and nursed on the fat woman's knees. 
 
 ' The smith of Giogoli brought me a manuscript,' 
 began Vestuccio. 
 
 * Ah !' said Ser Checchi, with a little gasping sigh 
 of inquiry and uneasiness. He understood that the 
 book was going away from him, that some rich pur- 
 chaser had been found. 
 
 ' He told me of your goodness in acquainting him 
 with its date and value,' continued Vestuccio. ' Is 
 it really worth so much ? You know, Ser, I am very 
 ignorant of manuscripts and their like.' 
 
 ' Its worth is incalculable,' said Ser Checchi, with 
 courageous integrity, though the admission tore at 
 his heart-strings ; ' that is, if it be sold to foreigners. 
 Our libraries have no money. Did lorio speak to 
 you of selling it to me ?' 
 
 ' He did,' answered Vestuccio. ' He is grateful, 
 and feels that you have no little right to command 
 its purchase. What would he have known of its 
 very existence even, had it not been for you ? I 
 ventured to inquire if you wished to buy it, because 
 I have a client, a German dealer, who would be 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 81 
 
 anxious to get it, before it could be offered to our 
 own Government or to the foreign libraries. But, 
 of course, if you intend to buy it yourself, your prior 
 claim would never be disputed by me.' 
 
 * I wish to buy it ; I mean to buy it,' said Ser 
 Checchi, with incautious haste. 
 
 Vestuccio's merry blue eyes smiled, as a grown 
 person's eyes may smile at the silliness of a child ; 
 but he answered seriously, and with great respect of 
 tone : 
 
 ' That is enough, sir ; for my part, I shall tell the 
 man from Hamburg that the volume is already dis- 
 posed of, and will never come into the market at all.' 
 
 ' Yes, yes,' said Ser Checchi hurriedly. * Quite 
 so. If lorio will cede it at the price he would ob- 
 tain in Italy, I will purchase it.' 
 
 ' Ready money ?' murmured Vestuccio, with a 
 vague apology in his tone for his mention of the two 
 words. 
 
 Ser Checchi hesitated. He was the most candid 
 of all men, and transparent as an alabaster vase. 
 He knew that he could not pay ready money for the 
 book ; that to pay for it at all would require thought, 
 negotiation, sacrifice, time. He had drooped his 
 head on his chest, his delicate pale hand played 
 nervously with a sheet of blotting-paper on the 
 office desk before him. Vestuccio, to whom all his 
 neighbours' affairs were as well known as the brass 
 nails which he had driven into a leathern chair, or 
 the new gilding with which he revived the glory of a 
 mediaeval nimbus, watched him with a gentle and 
 compassionate amusement. He knew that Ser 
 Checchi could no more put his hand at the moment 
 
 6 
 
82 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 on a thousand francs than he could have taken hold 
 of the moon or the sun in the heavens. 
 
 He saw the trouble and the perplexity of mind 
 which his two words had caused, and he left the old 
 man for a few minutes to his own meditations, while 
 he himself went out into the yard to drive the cat 
 away over the wall. When he came back Ser 
 Checchi was still nervously folding the blotting- 
 paper to and fro, a shadow cast on his mobile 
 features. Ready money ! Ready money should 
 and must be found. 
 
 'The truth is, Ser Checchi,' said the dealer, 
 coming in, and removing the square smoking-cap he 
 wore ' the truth is, that this good fellow of Giogoli 
 knows the wish which you have for this volume. It 
 was a thousand pities you let him know it ; a thou- 
 sand pities you did not keep the worth of the manu- 
 script dark ' 
 
 ' What ! Oh, hush ! how can you ?' said the 
 bookseller, lifting his head in pained indignation. 
 
 Vestuccio smiled and waved his hand. 
 
 ' Well, well, sir, pardon me ; I know that honour 
 and generosity rule your life. It was noble, very 
 noble, but you throw pearls before swine, you know. 
 However, what is done is done. This smith knows 
 now ; and, having the knowledge, he will take the 
 money too. We cannot blame him. Of course 
 your conscience ruled you. Mine rules me, and 
 loses me many a hundred-franc note in the year. It 
 is terrible yes, it is terrible in this knavish world 
 to be an honest man.' 
 
 Ser Checchi made an impatient and slightly 
 haughty movement. 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 83 
 
 ' It is an elementary virtue !' he said, with a 
 sarcastic intonation. ' It is known even amongst 
 savages.' 
 
 Vestuccio perceived that he had taken a wrong 
 tack ; that to congratulate a man of integrity upon 
 his integrity is an affront not easily condoned. 
 
 Ser Checchi rose and took his hat. 
 
 ' I thought you said that you had business with me. 
 I see I mistook. Good-day, Vestuccio.' 
 
 ' Stay a moment, sir,' said the dealer obsequiously. 
 ' Pray do not go in anger. I am a blunt, un- 
 polished fellow, but my heart is sound my heart is 
 sound. The truth is, sir, knowing how you wished 
 for this Dante folio, I ventured to hope that if you 
 cannot find it quite convenient to pay for it down on 
 the nail, you would let me have the pleasure of doing 
 so for you, and you could then repay me when you 
 pleased at your leisure. I owe you much, Ser 
 Checchi ; many a rare bit of knowledge and many a 
 date and secret of art have I, a poor, ignorant, 
 common fellow, learned from you and been your 
 debtor for, in my commerce.' 
 
 The elder man was silent. A faint flush came on 
 his cheeks and forehead : the proud and delicate 
 spirit in him winced and shrank at the idea that 
 his necessities, however slight, were known to 
 others. 
 
 1 You mean well, and I thank you, my good 
 Aurelio,' he said a little distantly. ' But I have not 
 asked your help.' 
 
 ' Help ! I would never give it such a name,' cried 
 Vestuccio. * It would be a favour which you would 
 do me, for I owe you much, and though I am a 
 
84 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 rough man, I am not a thankless one. I know how 
 you wish for this old book, which is, by all right of 
 treasure-trove, yours, and the fellow who owns it has 
 placed the sale of it in my hands. I suppose you are 
 sure of its authenticity ?' 
 
 Ser Checchi smiled with the pity of culture for 
 ignorance. 
 
 ' It is a Codex which the poet himself may have 
 had written !' 
 
 ' Well, well, sir ; I take your word for it, you are a 
 learned man,' said Vestuccio, who desired to depre- 
 ciate or appear sceptical of its value. 
 
 With that he lifted the lid of the desk, and took 
 out, from the hollow underneath, the Dante, and 
 with a careless touch opened it, and turned the 
 yellow parchment pages, whilst the sunlight slanting 
 in from the window shone on the regular lines of its 
 black-letter columns. 
 
 Ser Checchi thrilled from head to foot like a man 
 who beholds a beloved mistress. 
 
 ' lorio has sold it to you !' he exclaimed involun- 
 tarily. ' He promised me he promised rne the 
 preference.' 
 
 Vestuccio smiled. 
 
 'The good fellow has a wife; and the gray mare 
 is the better horse. He left it with me because he 
 wished you to have it. The woman would have 
 allowed him no peace if it had remained with 
 them.' 
 
 Ser Checchi leaned over the desk, touching the 
 manuscript caressingly with his long slender fingers ; 
 the colour came and went on his face ; he felt as if he 
 had been degraded and soiled by Vestuccio's praise 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 85 
 
 of his action and by his own sense of how sharp a 
 struggle it had cost him. And the sight of the 
 Dante on the dealer's desk brought home to him the 
 sense of how certainly, if it did not become his own 
 then and there, it would soon pass forever out of his 
 vision and grasp. 
 
 Vestuccio watched him smilingly an indulgent 
 smile as of a man looking down on a whimsical and 
 half-witted child ; after a pause he said gently : 
 
 ' See now, Ser Checchi, your heart is set on this 
 thing, and for sure, as I say, it is yours already by 
 all the right of treasure-trove. I will buy it of the 
 smith, and you shall buy it of me at your perfect 
 convenience. You will sign me a little paper, just 
 for form's sake, to set your mind at ease because 
 you are so proud and solitary : and you can take the 
 Dante home with you and put it under your pillow 
 if you like to-night, if it will make you sleep the 
 better. Leave me to deal with lorio. I know 
 those bumpkins ; they are as sharp as needles, 
 though they look such simple souls. Take the 
 Codex, as you call it, sir; you and I shall never 
 quarrel.' 
 
 * No, no ; I could not be so deeply beholden 
 to you or to anyone,' said Ser Checchi, as he closed 
 the volume and laid it inside the desk. ' You mean 
 well, that I am sure, but I should not be at peace a 
 moment if I took it on those terms. I do not do 
 business so.' 
 
 * Then the book must go to the Hamburg people,' 
 said Vestuccio, with a sigh, as he turned the key on 
 his safe. ' Think twice of what I have said, sir ; it 
 is no obligation ; you will just sign to pay me at three 
 
86 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 months, six, twelve at any date you please and 
 the Dante will belong to you, the one man in Europe 
 who is worthy of it !' 
 
 * But why should you do this service to me ?' asked 
 Ser Checchi, with a flash of insight lightening the 
 placid, even tenor of his trust in human nature. 
 
 ' It is no service,' said Vestuccio, * and, to prevent 
 your feeling that it is one, we will put it in as regular 
 a business form as you may please that it shall take. 
 I wish you to have the book, sir : first of all because 
 justice is justice, and should be done when it can; 
 and secondly because you have been a good friend to 
 me, and I am glad if I can do you ever so slight a 
 benefit. Take the volume home with you, honoured 
 sir, and we will write out the memorandum some 
 other day.' 
 
 Ser Checchi knew the ways of commerce, 
 although so little trade came nigh his tower, and 
 he ought to have remembered what had been his 
 experiences all his life, that he who leaves a sig- 
 nature behind him gives the costliest of hostages to 
 fortune. 
 
 But the manuscript folio allured him irresistibly ; 
 even shut away beneath the lid of the desk, like 
 a dead friend beneath a coffin lid, it seemed to draw 
 him towards it with a subtle and magnetic power, 
 and when he left the shop of Aurelio Vestuccio that 
 day, he carried the Codex of the ' Commedia ' with 
 him ; and in the desk, in its stead, was lying a small 
 oblong piece of stamped paper bearing his clear, 
 fine handwriting upon it, and at which Vestuccio 
 looked with a satisfied smile. 
 
 ' Chi va piano va sano,' murmured that shrewd 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 87 
 
 tradesman to himself; heaven had sent fools into 
 the world to be the support of clever men, as little 
 fish are made to be the food of big ones. 
 
 He watched the figure of Ser Checchi passing 
 through the artistic lumber of his yard with bene- 
 volent compassion, and saw the gates close on him 
 with that triumphant sense of cruel success which 
 moves the trapper in the woods when he sees the 
 gentle beast for whom the trap is set walk guilelessly 
 within its meshes. 
 
 And he turned his admirable mind on the morrow 
 to the successful and secret persuasion of the smith 
 of Giogoli that there had been a mistake about the 
 value of the old vellum book ; but that nothing 
 must be said about that to Ser Checchi, whose brain 
 was softening and growing childish. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 SER CHECCHI displayed the Codex to his daughter 
 with pride and joy, and found in her all the sym- 
 pathy with his pleasure which a cultured intelligence 
 and a warm heart could give. But he offered no 
 explanation of how it had come into his possession, 
 beyond saying that he had discovered it amongst 
 some musty and worthless volumes, which lorio the 
 blacksmith had turned out of an old chest ; and 
 Beldia, who was but sixteen at that time, was too 
 respectful to ask more than he chose to explain, and 
 too loyal to inquire from others any details which 
 
88 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 he did not himself proffer to her. She was not 
 curious ; and she was even then so accustomed to 
 have entire liberty in all household matters, but to 
 be wholly excluded from the affairs of her father's 
 business, that it never seemed to her rather odd or 
 ominous that the cost of the early Dante was con- 
 cealed from her. 
 
 Vestuccio had his own reasons for not speaking of 
 the matter : and lorio had been so rated by his wife 
 for not waiting for some princely purchaser, that the 
 subject was a sore one to him. But it was the 
 beginning of serious financial transactions between 
 Ser Checchi and the dealer in the Piazza della 
 Madonna ; and sometimes when he unlocked the 
 drawer in which the precious volume lay, even 
 though he loved it so dearly, the elder man almost 
 found it in his soul to wish that he had never 
 stopped for that fatal draught of watered wine on 
 the hillside of Giogoli. There were moments of 
 exquisite happiness, when he displayed his treasure 
 to scholars by whom it could be appreciated, and it 
 was a source of profound joy to him always to have 
 a contemporary Dante Codex for his very own ; but 
 at times he realized that he had entered into bond- 
 age through and for it. 
 
 To get money by merely writing your name is so 
 easy that its ease has been the ruin of tens of 
 thousands ; and Vestuccio beyond all others knew 
 how to render it so easy, that a man of absent mind, 
 of scholarly extravagance, and of dreamful indolence, 
 like Ser Checchi, never perceived what it might 
 ultimately cost him to possess himself of monastic 
 manuscripts and precious palimpsests by the mere 
 
M 
 
 DANTE'S HOUSK. 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 89 
 
 stroke of a pen in his fine, small, clear, clerkly hand- 
 writing. 
 
 He did not even know how many times he had 
 written * Francesco Ardiglione ' upon those stamped 
 sheets of paper, which the dealer put away with as 
 apparent a carelessness as though he were merely 
 going to light his pipe with them. 
 
 The bibliophile, like the artist, and the poet, and 
 the lover, will do anything wise or unwise, good or 
 bad, to reach the object of his desires. Sometimes 
 Beldia thought with a pang of what a source of 
 happiness his literary passion would have been to 
 him had he been a rich man. Alas ! rich men 
 usually look upon their libraries as mere show 
 places to assist their pomp, or as mere inherited 
 wealth, to be quickly sent to the hammer. Percep- 
 tion is so seldom united with possessions ; the 
 wisdom of the soul is so rarely given with the power 
 of the purse ! 
 
 Beldia was the most dutiful of daughters ; and 
 the infinite respect which she entertained for him 
 never permitted her to blame what he did, even in 
 her own thoughts ; but he did not care all the same 
 to meet the questioning gravity of her eyes when 
 he had been making unwise purchases, so that little 
 by little he had grown to conceal from her any un- 
 usually costly book or manuscript, and the various 
 straits to which he was sometimes put to pay for 
 them. For Ser Checchi would no more have bought 
 a book on credit than a fond mother would get into 
 debt for her child's christening robe. It would have 
 been difficult to do so, for most rare volumes were 
 found at auction rooms, or in antiquaries' shops, or 
 
90 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 in remote presbyteries and church-closets, where 
 immediate payment was the sine qua non of purchase. 
 But when he could have bought on credit he would 
 not ; credit would have seemed to him to soil the 
 pure grave faces of the beloved books and manu- 
 scripts, which he would touch with such a reverent, 
 caressing gesture of the hand, as you will see in a 
 sculptor when he passes his fingers softly down 
 some marble curve of arm or hip or breast. 
 
 ' It will sell for ten times its value, my dear,' he 
 would invariably say when she observed it ; but as 
 buyers of such costly goods hardly ever came to the 
 tower, and as, whenever they did so, he invariably 
 shrank from losing his favourite volumes, and to 
 that end either hid them, or named some prepos- 
 terous and prohibitive price, she knew by experience 
 that what their worth would or would not realize mat- 
 tered very little to her father, except in so far as his 
 pride as a bibliophile was flattered by the possession. 
 
 ' If he were a rich man collecting a library to 
 enjoy it, there could be no healthier or happier pur- 
 suit,' she thought ; ' but when it is his trade, when 
 he should only buy and sell, and do both wisely, his 
 adoration of his books is fatal.' 
 
 All the filial veneration of her soul could not blind 
 her clear and keen intelligence to the fact that the 
 commerce of books, as Ser Checchi conducted it, 
 could only be more ruinous than to pursue no trade 
 at all. 
 
 ' He is as dilettante as if he were a duke !' said 
 Cirillo angrily once. He, for his part, would have 
 made a bonfire of all the books with the utmost 
 pleasure. 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 91 
 
 Beldia would not admit the truth of it, but in her 
 heart she felt that it was only too true. All the 
 delicate research, the fastidious judgment, and the 
 severe taste of her father would have made the joy 
 and the renown of an amateur collector, but in a 
 librarian were but so many costly impediments. 
 Ser Checchi knew this himself, and it made his con- 
 science twinge and tremble at times ; but he thrust 
 the consciousness aside. He was ruled by his 
 master passion, and when he saw an old copy, of 
 undoubted age and value, or any manuscript of 
 some great dead hand, his whole gentle and un- 
 assuming person was transformed ; he became in- 
 different to everything, except the means by which 
 he might become the owner of such a treasure, and 
 he had even developed a clever and ingenious, 
 though childlike, cunning, in concealing the tempta- 
 tions of this sort which he met with in his daily 
 saunterings through the street. Once he had dis- 
 covered several pages of autograph verse of Polit- 
 ziano's in a chandler's shop, enwrapping some 
 butter, and this discovery had served him for excuse 
 and warrant ever since. True, his honesty had 
 compelled him to acquaint the butterman with the 
 value of his wrapping-paper before offering money 
 for it, but the butterman had been incredulous, and 
 had said with a pitying, benignant smile that it was 
 only robaccia (rubbish), so that he had taken his 
 Politziano home for the price of the butter itself, 
 and this lucky chance had served as an example, 
 and as an incentive to purchases, ever since. Many 
 things, however, cost him much more than a pound 
 of butter; and for some of his manuscripts and 
 
92 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 folios he had paid as heavily as though he had been 
 a curator for the Luxembourg or for the Bodleian. 
 
 ' They will be a fine dower for Beldia,' he told his 
 conscience. But at that thought his heart con- 
 tracted and his bowels yearned ; for to become a 
 dower for her they would have, of necessity, to be 
 sold. And the thought of selling them was torture 
 to him. He would have liked to think that his 
 coffin would be filled with them, and that he would 
 lie in his tomb with his folios on his breast, as knights 
 have their shields on theirs. 
 
 From the time of the purchase of the Dante, 
 Vestuccio had become the chief adviser and 
 assistant in financial matters of the librarian, by 
 whom money matters had always been esteemed 
 the most vulgar and debasing of all mundane 
 concerns. 
 
 Ser Checchi, though too trustful and compliant, 
 was no fool, however, and at times there came over 
 him with uneasiness the perception that he was 
 trusting too much and leaving too much to his good 
 friend of the Piazza della Madonna. Nor did he 
 desire that his daughter should know how thoroughly 
 Vestuccio had ingratiated himself with him, and 
 wound himself into his confidence. 
 
 Ser Checchi, like all scholars and people who love 
 impersonal meditation, was reluctant to be roused 
 out of his studies and pursuits, and forced into con- 
 tact with the vulgar and commonplace interests of 
 daily and practical life. The eminently practical 
 mind of Vestuccio quickly found out this tendency, 
 and knew how to turn it and humour it to serve his 
 own purpose. While the old philosopher floated in 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 93 
 
 an empyrean of fine thought, or pursued some philo- 
 logical or historical question, which for him seemed 
 of as vast import as the conquest of Asia seemed to 
 Alexander, he was very glad to find a quick-witted, 
 pleasant-tempered, and unobtrusive person who 
 spared him much trouble and attended to many 
 things in his name. 
 
 ' The Signorina Beldia does not like me, though 
 she is so good to my little ones,' said Vestuccio re- 
 gretfully more than once. 
 
 And Ser Checchi answered more than once : 
 
 * Tut, tut ! what does a young woman's fancy 
 matter, my good fellow, to you ? My daughter is 
 always very slow to give her liking, except to animals 
 and children/ 
 
 ' If she does not approve of men, who shall say 
 that she has not right on her side ?' answered the 
 dealer with his good-humoured smile, and added 
 more seriously : ' The signorina is certainly fitter 
 for babes and saints than for our clumsy and rough 
 company. They all call her Madonna Beldia, and 
 for certain such a woman as she is puts most of us 
 to shame.' 
 
 Being shrewd and full of tact, he did not try to 
 force his good qualities on her attention, but con- 
 tented himself with greeting her respectfully when- 
 ever he met her, and kept carefully away from her 
 knowledge the transactions which he and her father 
 had together. Something of them, however, she 
 dimly suspected, and the mere suspicion made her 
 uneasy. Aurelio Vestuccio had a good name on the 
 Piazza, and had a pleasant countenance and manner; 
 but Folko growled when he approached, and Folko's 
 
94 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 mistress felt the same instinct of distrust and appre- 
 hension as the dog. She liked his little girls, never- 
 theless, and the children were never so happy as 
 when they could climb the steep stone stair of the 
 tower, and mount the ladder which led on to the 
 roof amongst the flowering plants and the pigeons. 
 
 They were pretty little girls, with long fair hair 
 and dancing blue eyes, like what their father's had 
 been when he had sold his shells and seaweed at 
 their age ; they were known as Gemma and Dina, 
 and they were often seen tying up the pinks, drying 
 the rose-leaves fo.r pot-pourri, feeding the birds, or 
 otherwise aiding, or imagining that they aided, Ser 
 Checchi's daughter. Every Christmas their father 
 sent them with a bouquet and some dried fruit to 
 her, and every Easter they brought her a basket of 
 eggs and lemons in acknowledgment of, and return 
 for, the many kindnesses she showed to them, and 
 the courage with which she had nursed them in their 
 sickness. 
 
 ' Always be pretty behaved, my treasures,' said 
 Vestuccio to them. 
 
 Pretty behaviour had stood himself in such good 
 stead, and had paid him a hundred per cent, on it. 
 Vestuccio could never understand why people were 
 rough and rude, and coarse and repellent, and told 
 the truth and swore at their neighbours. It was so 
 much simpler and nicer to behave well, and speak 
 as if the world were a pot of cream and a bowl of 
 sugar. 
 
 You could put what poison you liked in the cream, 
 and you could disguise so many things with the 
 sugar. 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 95 
 
 Beldia was used to seeing Vestuccio come and go 
 about her father's chambers. She gave no thought 
 to his frequent visits, but she did not like him any 
 better than she liked the advocate Querci. She 
 knew, however, that her father esteemed him and 
 employed him, and therefore she endeavoured to 
 restrain her own prejudices, and at the end of each 
 year made pretty little presents for his children, 
 of whom he had many, as behoved a good citizen. 
 
 ' The signorina is an angel,' said Vestuccio more 
 than once, and said so with genuine tears in his 
 eyes when she saved the life of his eldest little girl 
 by her judicious and courageous nursing during 
 diphtheria, when the child's mother was helpless 
 and useless from fright, and lay on the floor in hys- 
 terics all day long. 
 
 But he did not for that reason cease to accumulate 
 Ser Checchi's signatures within his desk. 
 
 He would have said that the one thing had 
 nothing to do with the other. Feelings and 
 accounts are as far apart from each other as the 
 rose in your button-hole from the boots on your 
 feet. 
 
 He one day gave orders to his foreman never to 
 sell anything to a certain person ; the certain person 
 could not pay. The foreman, foolish and new to 
 the business, bluntly told the impecunious client 
 that it was of no use to come to the shop ; he would 
 be given nothing. Vestuccio, on learning this 
 coarse and unpardonable blunder, was as violently 
 angry as so good-tempered a man could be. 
 
 * This is how you should get rid of people without 
 offending them,' he said to the foreman, and planted 
 
96 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 a tall, high-backed chair in the middle of the ware- 
 house, and bowed to it with many smiles, softly 
 rubbing his hands together. ' Represent to yourself 
 that this chair is a well-born, well-bred person, 
 without credit, whom we know well and know will 
 never pay in twenty years' time, and has nothing 
 to render it worth our having the law upon him. 
 Now behold me receive him when he wishes to 
 purchase.' 
 
 And he walked in front of the chair, courteously 
 bending his supple backbone. 
 
 ' Most illustrious Sir Chair,' he said unctuously, 
 ' my very soul is rent, my pain is inexpressible, but, 
 alas ! that article which you desire is sold already ; 
 and this, and this, and this also all, alas ! that you 
 see around you. I will telegraph to the purchaser 
 to try and obtain a release of these objects for your 
 most eminent self; for there is no monarch or 
 minister in Europe whom I would serve with such 
 joy as I would serve you. Your taste is so perfect. 
 You appreciate so exquisitely. It is delightful to 
 feel that a beautiful object passes to your hands. 
 I will telegraph instantly, but if the buyer will not 
 release them, alas ! what can I do ? I would lose 
 twenty per cent, to know the joy of selling to you, 
 dear Sir Chair, but they are already promised, more 
 than promised sold ! And, alas ! one's commercial 
 word is one's bond !' 
 
 Then he rubbed his hands and made three grace- 
 ful bows, and walked backwards from the chair, 
 smiling and sighing. 
 
 'There, idiot!' he said, turning to the foreman 
 with a frown, ' that is how you should rid yourself 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 97 
 
 of a bad customer without making an enemy of him. 
 You will never give him a centime's worth, but he 
 will believe that you would trust him with millions. 
 Never make a foe, even of an insolvent debtor !' 
 
 The foreman, a stupid young man, unworthy of 
 the school in which it was his happiness to dwell, 
 shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 ' Life is too short for all that farce,' he said sheep- 
 ishly, replacing the high-backed chair amongst its 
 fellows. 
 
 His master eyed him with compassionate con- 
 tempt. 
 
 ' Life is long, my friend/ he answered, ' to those 
 who know how to play the farce long and sweet. 
 Sweet !' he repeated, smacking his lips with unction. 
 ' And, besides, one should never give pain unneces- 
 sarily not even to a debtor who cannot pay.' 
 
 The foreman looked at his employer and grinned : 
 the grin was disrespectful, but Aurelio Vestuccio 
 did not resent it. He smiled broadly and brightly 
 himself, the same smile with which when a little 
 lad on the seashore he had sold shells which were 
 cracked and rotting star-fish. 
 
 Life was sweet to him, whatever it might be to 
 his clients and customers, and everything in it was 
 sweet to him, from that straight, tall, ebony chair 
 which he had had made a few hours before with 
 1547 carved on its back, and the worm-holes drilled 
 along its legs to the round sums lent out at com- 
 pound interest, which multiplied themselves like ants 
 and rabbits. 
 
 Any bystander overhearing him talk of Ser Checchi, 
 as they sat at a little round marble table in some 
 
 7 
 
98 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 coffee-house, would have heard only such tender and 
 reverent praises, such fine phrases of respect and 
 esteem, as would have warmed his heart to hear ; he 
 only sighed over the old librarian's too credulous 
 virtue. 
 
 ' Business cannot be done as our dear Ser Checchi 
 does it,' he observed to Pampilio Querci one day 
 when they met at the Birraria Cornelio. 
 
 ' He believes everyone is as pure of mouth and of 
 hand as himself,' answered the young lawyer. 
 ' He is as trustful as a lamb/ said the dealer. 
 ' He is a saint and a sage, and thinks men's breasts 
 are made of glass,' said the man of law. 
 
 ' His own is so,' replied the other, and added 
 warmly and solemnly as he drained his glass, ' Woe 
 be to those who wrong him !' 
 
 * Woe be on them indeed !' said the lawyer, finish- 
 ing his vermuth. 
 
 So they spoke together, understanding one 
 another. 
 
 Rude, rough Northern men would have said 
 bluntly to each other : 
 
 ' This client is a goose let us pluck him.' 
 Vestuccio and Querci wrapped up the same 
 meaning in admirable and admiring sentences, 
 which deceived no one, indeed, but soothed and 
 pleased themselves, and preserved their self-respect 
 in their own sight and that of each other. 
 
 Vestuccio and Querci never trusted each other an 
 inch, and they always kept up an elaborate comedy 
 for each other's benefit. To each of them the world 
 was a stage, on which, as on the stage of the Greeks, 
 the masks and the stilts mattered more than the 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 99 
 
 words. Each of these worthies knew that he did 
 not for a moment deceive the other ; yet to play the 
 comedy pleased both, gratified their consciousness 
 of wit and wisdom, and gave the agreeable sense of 
 security which is given by a domino and mask. 
 
 Cicero's countrymen have still the same sense of 
 propriety and politeness which characterized his 
 gentle and polished utterance of vixerunt when his 
 enemies lay dying with throats bleeding like 
 slaughtered pigs. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 OF her father's learning and nobility of character 
 Beldia was passionately reverent and proud ; but to 
 certain weaknesses in him she could not be wholly 
 blind. When the new-comer from the north timidly 
 hinted to her his perception that she had little 
 pleasure in seeing him return frequently to the 
 library, she answered him with honesty and~candour. 
 
 ' It is true,' she replied, ' that I cannot fail to 
 perceive that my father trusts too much and gives 
 too much ; and many young men make him talk 
 that they may carry off the riches of intellect and 
 learning. For truly, sir/ she added proudly, 'the 
 mere crumbs from my father's stores would be more 
 rich than the fullest granaries of many.' 
 
 ' I understand,' said the Brescian ; ' I know now 
 what it is that you think. But God is my witness 
 that I had none such evil designs. I honour your 
 father, and gain wisdom from all he says, indeed ; 
 
ioo THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 but I assure you I have not the faintest thought of 
 making use of what he tells me in my own interests, 
 except in the sense that all must benefit who hear a 
 learned scholar.' 
 
 Beldia felt that she might have been ungenerous 
 and unjust. 
 
 ' I beg your pardon for harbouring such a doubt,' 
 she said more gently. ' Young men do too often 
 make my father a stepping-stone to their own 
 honour ; and when they have mounted where they 
 wished, forget the means by which they rose.' 
 
 ' I fear that ingratitude is too common in human 
 nature,' said the Lombard, ' and from whosoever 
 gives much, much is taken, and thanklessly. Ser 
 Checchi should go on his ways and not attend to 
 importunity.' 
 
 ' My father is most generous,' said Beldia, ' with 
 the food of the mind as well as the nourishment of 
 the body.' 
 
 * May it be rendered to him !' the Brescian 
 answered ; but it was rather the utterance of a desire 
 than of a belief, for he had seen enough of the world 
 to know that such liberality as Francesco Ardigli- 
 one's ruins the man who practises it more than all 
 selfish indulgence would ever do. 
 
 He had the quick apprehension of the artistic 
 temperament, and he could well imagine the diffi- 
 culties and conflicting duties by which she was beset 
 in her endeavour to approve her father in all he did, 
 yet fill up the vacuum which he left in their finances. 
 She had a serene and clear intelligence, fit for 
 Athene's self; but Athene herself could not have 
 filled up a bottomless vase. 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 101 
 
 He divined something of the anxieties and in- 
 effectual efforts of the scholar's daughter, and it 
 stimulated the admiration which he felt for her, and 
 gave his respect for her the softer and warmer glow 
 of pity. From the day when she had candidly 
 confessed to him her suspicions of his motives such 
 doubts had been dissipated ; and she and he had 
 become gradually companions and friends. 
 
 He was wholly unlike the young men whom she 
 had seen come to the tower, who were only of two 
 classes : the wild, dissipated comrades of Cirillo, or 
 the young doctrinaires and journalists who frequented 
 the library. He was of a higher type than either ; 
 the blood of a once martial and generous race ran in 
 his veins ; and though he was poor and humble in 
 position, he had the temper and the instincts of a 
 gentleman, and belonged to a different order to the 
 finical and varnished gentlemanhood of Pampilio 
 Querci and his fellows. 
 
 There were a candour, simplicity, and kindliness 
 about him which endeared him quickly to old people 
 and to young ; and he made himself at home in the 
 tower of Taddeo without the slightest presumption 
 or intrusiveness. It soon became quite natural in 
 her sight that he should accompany her father in his 
 evening rambles through the by-streets ; assist in 
 dusting and arranging the interminable volumes 
 which were piled one on another on the floors ; and 
 even venture upstairs on the roof at sunset to see 
 what he could do in trimming and watering the herbs 
 and flowers. 
 
 Little by little he had become a comrade and a 
 companion to her, without ever seeming to presume 
 
102 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 on the privileges. Ser Checchi found in him a 
 listener after his own heart, and Beldia, though she 
 was by nature reserved and slow to give her regard 
 to strangers, found much that was attractive and 
 akin to her in this frank-eyed and gentle-mannered 
 scholar from the north. 
 
 She was a woman who had thought little of men 
 as lovers ; like many women who have been accus- 
 tomed to male companionship and intellectual com- 
 merce, her life was too full and too various to leave 
 her leisure for the amorous fancies which lead the 
 lighter brains of the unoccupied and more frivolous 
 so many a useless dance after the marsh-lights of 
 imaginary passions. When men had asked her 
 hand, as they had done some few times, she had 
 thanked them gravely for the token of their esteem, 
 and declined to leave her father, or entertain any 
 suit, however favoured by him. 
 
 But she did not think that because a man watered 
 her carnations, or classified the pamphlets of the 
 book-rooms, he must of necessity fall at her feet 
 on the morrow ; and the intercourse between her 
 and the Lombard artist, when the ice of her reserve 
 had once been broken, was frank and friendly, as 
 it might have been between two youths of similar 
 tastes and studies. Only, in his own heart, he 
 speedily began to sigh for warmer things, freer 
 speech. 
 
 Ser Checchi, indeed, had taken him on trust, and 
 had made him welcome to his house, as Erasmus or 
 as Boethius might have done, simply on the strength 
 of mutual tastes and studies, and in the confidence 
 engendered by mutual simplicity and candour. But, 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 103 
 
 from being welcome as a reader of old books in a 
 library, to being welcome as a suitor to a woman's 
 hand from her family, there is a wide difference, of 
 which Odisio was keenly sensible. 
 
 ' How my mother would admire and welcome her !' 
 he thought, when he saw her diligently bending over 
 the catalogues and ledgers, so content and tranquil 
 in what would have been to any other woman of her 
 age an existence dull and laborious. It was not his 
 mother's fault that he had not wherewithal to offer 
 Ser Checchi's daughter a more cheerful and a 
 happier life. 
 
 His mother had given him a fine education, and 
 had denied herself of all luxuries to enable him to 
 study and to travel. It was his own fault, and no 
 one else's, that he had let the best years of his 
 youth drift away in a Bohemian's wandering, and 
 his talents and knowledge rust unused. With far 
 fewer opportunities, and far less intelligence than 
 he had been blessed with, men had made themselves 
 a place and a name before their thirtieth year. He 
 had enjoyed his liberty, and now he paid its cost. 
 And often, as he walked back at night to his tem- 
 porary lodging, he bitterly lamented the carelessness 
 with which he had let so many years go by without 
 making for himself such a place in life as would 
 have enabled him to become Beldia's suitor. He 
 had all the humility and timidity which accompany 
 a genuine passion ; and, though she was only the 
 daughter of the bookseller of the tower in San 
 Jacopo, she was to him as a queen clothed in 
 raiment of light. 
 
 He was poor ; he had only had seventy francs in his 
 
io 4 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 purse when he had entered the city, and of that he 
 had spent thirty in the purchase of the plates of 
 Palladio, and the other designs and volumes. He 
 had to work for his bread, but this did not affright 
 him ; he was a man of courage and energy, and his 
 wants were few ; the need of money hurt him most 
 when he could not aid others. He was generous 
 by temper, and came of what had been a lavish and 
 magnificent race in other days. 
 
 When he could make enough to live simply him- 
 self and send some little presents to his mother, of 
 fine coffee or wine, or fruits, or a little piece of old 
 lace, he was quite content. The future could take 
 care of itself, he had always thought ; he had no one 
 dependent on him. 
 
 But when he looked back over the years which 
 had fled since he had left the Paduan University, 
 and realized that, had he chosen, he might have so 
 employed them as to have had a fixed home and 
 a fair income to offer to Belda Ardiglione, he was 
 wroth with himself for the want of stability and of 
 application which had left him thus penniless in the 
 flower of his age. 
 
 He was like one of those errant students of the 
 Middle Ages, who roamed over Europe with nothing 
 but a staff and a satchel, welcome everywhere to 
 scholars for sake of their facile wit and well-stored 
 brain. But the times in which he was born were no 
 longer those in which this picturesque, wandering, 
 aimless life was judged wise and praiseworthy ; and 
 there were no longer monastery doors open to such 
 students, no ducal courts like those of the Can 
 Grande and Lionello d'Este, where fine Latin and 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 105 
 
 a love of the Humanities were passport enough to 
 board and lodging. Had he knocked now at any 
 great man's gates with no warrant but his portfolio 
 of designs and his classical knowledge, he would 
 have been consigned to the police or handed quickly 
 over to the mercies of a mendicant society. Al- 
 though he had fallen on evil, niggardly, and sus- 
 picious days, he had, however, always found life 
 pleasant and easy, until now that he had seen the 
 serene-eyed maiden of the tower of Taddeo. Since 
 then it seemed to him that at his years he 
 ought to have secured some sounder basis for sub- 
 sistence, some surer means whereby to be able to 
 maintain himself and others. What could he look 
 like to her and to her father except a careless 
 ne'er-do-well and vagabond ? 
 
 They might see that he had talent, and believe 
 that he had honour, but he was a man who, at 
 thirty years old, had neither place nor income. 
 
 It was now warm June weather ; not the season 
 in which strangers willingly stay in the city, and he, 
 Lombard-born, was used to spend his summers 
 where winds were cool, on high chestnut-wooded 
 hills, within sight of snow-clad mountains. Yet he 
 now remained in his attic by the fountain of San 
 Jacopo, finding excuse enough in his architectural 
 studies, and even being so fortunate as to obtain 
 momentary employment in making mechanical draw- 
 ings for an architect in the town, who chanced to be 
 a friend of that Milanese artist under whom he had 
 studied seven years earlier. 
 
 Odisio had a grace and candour in his manner 
 which attracted people, and, in his work, an exacti- 
 
io6 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 tude and zeal which confirmed the sympathy his 
 manner aroused. He had practical ability, as well 
 as imagination and invention. Something of the 
 fire and of the emotion were in him in his attitude 
 towards his art, which made the men of the Middle 
 Ages call the builder in stone magister in vive lapide. 
 These feelings had indeed no field for practical 
 expression, but they were evident in the depth and 
 ardour of his gaze, as he looked on great architec- 
 ture or great sculpture, in the freedom and fancy of 
 his sketches of imaginary buildings, and in the 
 torture which he suffered when he saw the mighty 
 walls and noble arches of a past age going down 
 under the dust of the leveller's pickaxes and the 
 shovels of the destroyers, as may be seen in this 
 age over all Italy. 
 
 His reverence for the past formed a common 
 bond between him and Ser Checchi ; and the latter 
 said approvingly that it was a good sight to see 
 a young man so unlike his own generation and 
 so full of respect for those who had gone before 
 him. 
 
 The spirit of the past had entered into him in 
 his studious boyhood, passed amongst the old 
 streets and ancient palaces of Brescia and Ber- 
 gamo, and some regret also for that time when 
 his forefathers had hung up their shields amongst 
 the knights and lords upon the frescoed walls of 
 the Broletto. 
 
 ' What a ninny !' said Pampilio Querci, as, going 
 one morning to his office, he saw the Lombard 
 gazing for many moments in rapt admiration of 
 Giotto's Campanile, with the soft and manifold 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 107 
 
 hues on its marbles, like those of the pigeons which 
 flew around it, and the morning light shed on it 
 so clear, so cool, so luminous, that the building 
 seemed scarcely more touched and made by the 
 hand of man than were the clouds which floated 
 in the sapphire sky. 
 
 Pampilio Querci admired nothing except the 
 smoke of the dirty tramway car in which he went 
 out to Sesto or Campi on feast days to shoot song- 
 birds in the hedges ; and the stuccoed box which 
 he was pleased to call a house, where he slept every 
 night amongst iron rails, pollarded acacias, a bran- 
 new jute factory, and an acre or two of hoarding 
 covered with posters and lithographed advertise- 
 ments of new soaps and cheap furniture. When 
 the young attorney went to sleep amongst those 
 surroundings, he felt indeed that his head was 
 pillowed on progress. 
 
 ' You look at the bell-tower ? It is most incon- 
 veniently placed, it sorely impedes traffic,' he said 
 with polite disdain to the Brescian as he passed 
 beside him. 
 
 The Brescian glanced down on him with a 
 wondering disdain of another kind. 
 
 1 Look? Ay, indeed!' he cried; 'the American 
 who took his hat off to it the other day was 
 worthier of it than the Florentines who brush by 
 it without a benediction.' 
 
 ' You are an enthusiast,' said Querci, with the 
 tips of his thin curled lips, and a little frigid, 
 cynical, pitying smile. 
 
 ' Thank Heaven ! yes, when I see what is worthy 
 of enthusiasm.' 
 
io8 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 'Ah/ said the young lawyer with bland contempt; 
 ' the American might take his hat off here to the 
 campanile. In his own country he would soon 
 change it into a grain-elevator !' 
 
 Then he gave a little twirl of his slim cane and 
 of his small moustache, and went on to his office, 
 where he sat down amongst his law books and law 
 papers, and wrote a clever archaeological article 
 for a learned society, based on matter which he 
 had gleaned from the too eloquent tongue of Ser 
 Checchi. 
 
 The Brescian looked after him with boundless 
 scorn. 
 
 * How would his wind last on the slope of Monte 
 Genneroso ?' he thought grimly; 'or swimming 
 from shore to shore on the Garda waters ?' 
 
 He felt that he should extremely like to have the 
 spruce, slender, self-satisfied lawyer out with him 
 in rough weather on one of those snow-filled passes 
 or wind-swept lakes, on which he himself was as 
 much at home as a chamois on the one or a trout 
 in the other. He had often seen Querci at the 
 tower, and knew, although he had never heard her 
 say so, that Beldia disliked him ; and he had a 
 shrewd instinct also that he had a rival in the pert 
 attorney, and felt, with a furious impotence to 
 retrace his steps, that he might, had he chosen, 
 have already occupied a higher position than the 
 lawyer owned. 
 
 His face grew hot with shame when he thought 
 that, if he even disclosed to her the admiration with 
 which he regarded her, he would only appear to her 
 and to her father as a mercenary seeker of a home 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 109 
 
 and of a dower. Ser Checchi seemed a man altogether 
 beyond and above his own hand-to-mouth existence, 
 and Beldia also herself daunted him and kept him 
 at a distance. 
 
 She was kind, but kindness was her nature. She 
 was gentle, but that also was natural to her. She 
 smiled at him, but she smiled in the same way when 
 she chided the boy Poldo for going upstairs with 
 dusty boots, or caressed the woolly white curls of 
 her dog, or mixed a glass of syrup and water for the 
 old priest, Don Gervasio. 
 
 The serenity and seriousness of her manner, so 
 unlike the excitability of Italian women, and that 
 dignity which he had noted in her on the first day 
 that he had seen her in the market-place, intensified 
 his admiration of her, but repressed all expression of 
 it. Her mind and heart and time appeared so 
 entirely and so well filled that it would have seemed 
 to him the most preposterous presumption to think 
 that there could be any place in them for him, or for 
 any ordinary human passions. 
 
 * You have lived under the wings of the amorini 
 until you scarcely belong to the earth,' he said to 
 her one evening when she stood on the flat roof of 
 the tower amongst her herbs and flowers, whilst the 
 sky above was all in a roseate glow, warm and fair 
 as the roses of May. 
 
 Beldia, who had her watering-pot in her hand 
 and her garden-scissors at her girdle, laughed a little 
 as she stooped over her carnations. 
 
 * No one was ever more earthly,' she made answer. 
 ' Surely you must have seen I am the busiest of 
 housewives. I have hardly ever a moment to look 
 
I io THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 up yonder. And yet all the whole world should pause 
 to adore that.' 
 
 She straightened her back and looked upward as 
 she spoke at that vault of azure light, flushed with 
 clouds like rose-leaves, which was above their heads, 
 above the whole city, the mountains, the plain, the 
 river, in a glory of transfigured radiance, in which 
 the stars and a crescent moon of silver were 
 shining. 
 
 She raised her left hand above her head, pointing 
 to the zenith. On her face shone reflected the 
 luminance from the skies ; on that high place, with 
 the sound of the streets far below them, and nothing 
 near except the belfries dark against the light, and 
 the black wings of whirling swallows and circling 
 bats, she might have been Beatrice or Laura, and 
 the world been young beneath her feet. 
 
 She forgot the stranger beside her. She was lost 
 in the beauty at which she gazed. Church bells 
 were chiming, deep and low, from the towers and 
 spires near. No other sound reached them there. 
 The soft crimson of the zenith glowed richer and 
 warmer as the azure darkened, and the planets grew 
 larger, and more stars shone out from the tremulous 
 blue. 
 
 And the Lombard thought : 
 
 * What could be the miserable, egotistical love of 
 a man to a woman who feels the whole heart of 
 nature throb in unison with hers as she does ?' 
 
 It seemed to him that she was as far away from 
 him as the crescent moon which shone amidst the 
 rose and gold of the horizon. 
 
 Yet she wore a rough linen apron tied over her 
 
THE TOWER OF TAD DEO in 
 
 cotton gown, and had a common watering-can in 
 her hand, and had been a moment before solely 
 intent on tying up her carnations and brushing the 
 ants off her picotees. 
 
 She stood, long gazing up at that evening splendour 
 stretched above the city, and the valley, and the 
 amethyst ring of the mountains. She had forgotten 
 that she was not alone. A pigeon, coming home to 
 roost, flew down on her shoulder, and pecked with 
 loving familiarity at her ear. 
 
 It startled her, and brought her thoughts to 
 earth. 
 
 As she turned to caress the bird, she saw the 
 gaze of Odisio Fontano fixed upon her as hers had 
 been upon the skies. 
 
 The warmth from the heavens made his face seem 
 full of light, and his eyes revealed what his lips 
 never ventured to speak. With an embarrassment 
 wholly novel to her, she put down the pigeon from 
 her shoulder and began to water her plants again, 
 whilst the cadence of the bells rocked drowsily 
 through the air, and the roseate vault of the evening 
 bent like a benediction over the city. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE following day Ser Checchi was busied in his 
 book-room. The accumulation of dust has few 
 terrors for scholars, and the derangement and dis- 
 turbance of the books have manifold terrors for 
 
U2 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 them. Nevertheless, having drops of Frisian blood 
 in him, through his maternal ancestress, he loved 
 cleanliness, and as he abhorred to see his volumes 
 touched, even by Beldia, he was wont at times to 
 clean his shelves himself from cobweb and that fine 
 powder-like sand which was blown up from the 
 street and the bed of the river. 
 
 This morning he was thus engaged, standing on a 
 pair of library-steps, and using a hand-brush made 
 of cocks' feathers. He was at the same time par- 
 tially rearranging the contents of the shelves, and 
 was so engrossed in his occupation that he did not 
 hear Odisio enter, and the respectful salutation of 
 the new-comer took him by surprise. 
 
 ' Sit down, sit down,' he said cordially ; * you will 
 pardon me if I continue my work. No, you cannot 
 help me. I thank you for the offer, but it is a thing 
 which I prefer to do, though it is troublesome. I 
 know where to lay my hand on every volume and 
 pamphlet when I arrange them myself, and I cannot 
 blame others if they be ill-arranged.' 
 
 ' But I wanted to speak to you,' said his visitor 
 shyly, standing irresolute beside the ladder instead 
 of going at once to the tables to resume his studies, 
 as it was his habit to do. 
 
 ' Well, speak on ; I can hear whilst I finish my 
 job,' said Ser Checchi indifferently. 
 
 His mind was but little in what he was saying, for 
 he had just come upon a * Father of the Church,' 
 stained and gnawed by mice, and the sight dis- 
 tressed him sorely. 
 
 ' What use is it to have cats and women in a 
 house ?' he murmured, as he turned over the dese- 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 113 
 
 crated pages, forgetful that neither his cats nor his 
 women were allowed to do what they chose in those 
 rooms. 
 
 The younger man continued to stand at the foot 
 of the steps, holding his soft felt hat in his hands. 
 He was embarrassed and constrained ; he had come 
 to do what was difficult and distressing to him, and 
 he would have been glad of any remark from Ser 
 Checchi which should have made it less abrupt and 
 painful to begin the subject on which he came 
 thither. But Ser Checchi said nothing; he stood 
 turning over the palimpsest regretfully, wholly en- 
 grossed by the sight of the sacrilegious inroads of 
 the mice. Odisio saw that he must break rudely 
 into the confession which he came prepared to make, 
 or leave it unconfessed. 
 
 ' Ser Checchi, you have been very kind to me,' 
 said the younger man, in a low voice. * I do not 
 wish to abuse or disgrace your kindness. So I go 
 whilst I still have done neither.' 
 
 ' What ?' asked Ser Checchi, pausing in his work 
 with his feather-brush poised in the air. It always 
 cost him an effort to leave the lucid air of imper- 
 sonal thought for the vexed and hazy atmosphere 
 of human fancies and actions. * What do you mean 
 to imply ? Have I accused you of any wrong- 
 doing ?' 
 
 Was it possible, he wondered, that the temptation 
 to steal some of his manuscripts, or purloin some of 
 his annotations upon them, was so strong that the 
 Brescian feared to succumb to its influence if he 
 stayed ? 
 
 ' No/ replied Odisio, with hesitation, ' I do not 
 
ii4 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 think that you remember or perceive. Ser Checchi, 
 I do not like to leave with any misunderstanding 
 between us. You have opened your doors and your 
 books so hospitably to a stranger, that I had better 
 be honest with you. If I remain near her I cannot 
 answer for my own self-control. I may say to your 
 daughter what would offend and distress you.' 
 
 The old man did not answer. He looked astonished 
 and perplexed, but not displeased. 
 
 * My daughter Beldia ?' he said aloud at last. 
 How strange and sad it was that a fine scholar and 
 diligent student like this Lombard should be led 
 away from the pursuit of learning by any amorous 
 fancy ! 
 
 The younger man watched him with a beating 
 heart. He was strongly attached to the librarian, 
 and he was afraid that his own confession, and the 
 discussion which might arise from it, would make an 
 irrevocable difference between them. 
 
 But he spoke the truth manfully. 
 
 * Yes,' he answered, ' Madamigella Beldia. Who 
 could be with her as you have allowed me to be and 
 not see in her the flower of womanhood, one beside 
 whom all other women are as nought ? I cannot 
 I dare not say to her what I feel ; therefore I 
 
 go-' 
 
 Ser Checchi stared at him, still astonished, and 
 unable to persuade himself of the truth. 
 
 ' I thought you came for the sake of these /' he 
 said sadly, and with severity of reproach, as he 
 included all the hundreds of volumes, bound and 
 unbound, which were around them in the circle of 
 his lifted feather-brush. 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 115 
 
 ' I care for them, indeed, but not as I care for her,' 
 murmured Odisio. 
 
 Ser Checchi gave a gesture of reproach and of 
 scorn. 
 
 He turned round to the shelves again, and re- 
 sumed his labour of love, flicking the dust off the 
 tops and sides of the books, and now and then 
 moving some stray volume back to its proper place, 
 or putting together some loose pamphlets which 
 had got into disorder. 
 
 There was no sound in the room, into which the 
 sunshine came mellowed through the yellow time- 
 dimmed casements behind their iron bars. 
 
 It seemed to him so sorrowful, so shameful, that 
 no one except himself loved learning as it should be 
 loved, as so far beyond, as so far above, all human 
 frailties and attachments. 
 
 ' I have offended and disappointed you ?' Odisio 
 said timidly, after a long silence. 
 
 ' No, no,' said the elder man gently, but with a 
 certain tone of chagrin and regret. ' You are young. 
 It was to be expected. Youth is always drawn to 
 youth, and filled with folly/ 
 
 'Folly!' said Odisio, with irrepressible indignation. 
 ' Methinks higher wisdom there cannot be than to 
 appreciate the perfections of a woman so noble and 
 so pure !' 
 
 Ser Checchi smiled faintly as one who looked 
 down upon a child at play. 
 
 ' You are an enthusiast,' he said, with a little irony. 
 ' My daughter is a good and industrious maiden, but 
 nothing more wonderful than that. Thank Heaven, 
 such are not rare ! If it be true that you regard her 
 
ii6 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 with tenderness, I know not why you should so 
 fear and hesitate to say so. Neither she nor I can 
 claim to be great or gentle people. She has had 
 many suitors but she favours them little. She is 
 wedded to her duties here. I cannot tell whether 
 she would favour you any more than those whom 
 she has dismissed ; but I see no reason why you 
 should not try your fate.' 
 
 Odisio heard with mingled bewilderment and joy 
 and pain. He was ashamed of himself and of his 
 poverty. Ser Checchi was so unworldly, that it was 
 evident the things of the world had no place in his 
 calculations. But the younger man could not forget 
 or ignore the miserable nudity of his own circum- 
 stances, the cruel fact that he in reality possessed 
 nothing except the clothes in his trunk, the instru- 
 ments and portfolios of his art, and such scanty 
 pittance as he could earn by daily work. 
 
 ' Ser Checchi,' he said with visible emotion, ' I 
 have been a foolish, graceless idler ; I have thrown 
 away my opportunities and the intelligence Nature 
 gave me ; I have no position, no home, no fixed 
 income, no fixed stipend even to depend on. I 
 have no right to speak as a suitor to any woman, 
 however poor; much less to one as favoured as your 
 daughter.' 
 
 Ser Checchi sighed impatiently, and his pale 
 cheek grew hot. 
 
 ' My daughter ' he began abruptly, and then 
 
 paused. ' My daughter,' he added, in another tone, 
 ' has an extravagant brother, and a father who has 
 never been wise in financial matters. Cease to 
 think of her as a maiden well dowered. She might 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 117 
 
 once have been so. Now she never can be so. It 
 matters not why, but she will never be so now. If 
 she care for you, and you for her, I would not oppose 
 the betrothal. But I would make one condition. 
 You must have some assured position, or have gained 
 some small capital, before I could sanction your 
 marriage. I should not be exacting, but she would 
 have to be guaranteed from want.' 
 
 He spoke with deep feeling and some pained em- 
 barrassment. 
 
 Odisio heard with an immense and unutterable 
 amazement ousting for the moment every other 
 sentiment from his mind. That he could be a wel- 
 come suitor to Beldia's father seemed to him such a 
 miraculous happiness that he was bewildered and 
 stunned. He could not even find consecutive words 
 to express his gratitude, and he did not even per- 
 ceive how strange it was that a man so reserved as 
 Francesco Ardiglione should thus confess his ne- 
 cessities, or one so apparently well situated be con- 
 scious of his own inability to keep his favourite child 
 from poverty. All the younger man was sensible of 
 was that a future suddenly opened out before him 
 like the very gates of heaven. 
 
 ' But, but ' he stammered, 'would it be possible, 
 could I comply with your conditions, that Madami- 
 gella Beldia ever would deign to think of me ? 
 Surely, oh, surely not !' 
 
 Ser Checchi dusted some books with a few im- 
 patient movements. 
 
 ' That is for you to judge,' he said. ' You are a 
 personable man, and should not be too modest. I 
 have no idea of my daughter's opinion of you : but 
 
ii8 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 I should not think it unfavourable. You have my 
 leave to try and please her. But remember she is 
 poor, poor, poor.' 
 
 He said the words with so strong an emphasis 
 and with so strange a manner, and such obvious 
 agitation, that a wild fancy struck the Lombard for 
 a moment : was Ser Checchi one of those harmless 
 monomaniacs who call themselves penniless when 
 their secret drawers and hidden boxes are full of 
 gold and silver ? 
 
 Was it possible to believe that a man who knew 
 that he must leave his daughter portionless would 
 keep unsold a * Divina Commedia ' worth a hundred 
 thousand francs ? 
 
 But this thought was secondary to him, and 
 almost unimportant, beside the marvellous rapture 
 of the fact that the old man authorized him to gain 
 the heart and hand of Beldia, if he could. 
 
 He could scarcely believe his senses. The sombre 
 walls of the book-room swam before him in a circle 
 of light. He saw the thin, pale hand of Ser Checchi 
 and the moving feather-duster in a dazzle of dancing 
 sun-rays. Then, in a rush of exquisite joy and 
 gratitude, while the tears gushed to his eyes, he 
 stayed that ivory-like hand in its wandering amongst 
 the volumes, and, bending very low, touched it with 
 his lips. 
 
 The elder man drew it quickly away, not unkindly, 
 but with embarrassment, as of one before a homage 
 undeserved. 
 
 * I am not worthy ; I am not worthy,' he said, 
 with a tinge of red coming on his pale, fine features. 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 119 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE morrow was the Feast of St. John, the time- 
 honoured popular feast of Florence. In other times 
 it used to be a day of rare pageantry, civic, military, 
 and ecclesiastical. In these times it is shorn of its 
 splendours, which are transferred to the democratic 
 celebration of the statute. 
 
 The heart of the Florentine populace, however, is 
 still closely attached to St. John's Day ; and from 
 break of dawn, when the great bells boom and swell 
 over the sleeping city, to midnight, when the fires 
 die one by one on the cupolas and domes and 
 belfries, the population is astir in joyous and harm- 
 less agitation. 
 
 Beldia was wont to see what she could see of the 
 illuminations from the tower platform, and avoid 
 the press and noise and trouble of the crowds. 
 
 From her terraced roof she could watch the fire- 
 works blaze upon the Carrara bridge, and the rockets 
 slide along the cords above the river, and the great 
 belfry of the Palazzo Vecchio glitter with its many 
 stars of light, while the communal banner streamed 
 upon the wind. Below her stretched the moonlit 
 and firelit river, the black masses of the gathered 
 crowds, the palaces, the bridges, the quays, and far 
 away the deep woods of the Cascine, and the hills, 
 lit here and there with bonfires. She liked better to 
 sit there in quietude by her father's side, amongst 
 her herbs and plants, in the intense silence of night, 
 to which no echo even from the rejoicing city below 
 
120 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 could reach them, than to descend into the crowded 
 streets, to be jostled and hustled and pushed from 
 side to side under the illumined dome of the 
 cathedral or the sparkling of the baptistery. 
 
 ' Will you not come down into the streets ?' asked 
 Odisio of her on that evening. ' There is music in 
 many places, and the illuminations are fine. I would 
 take care that no harm should come to you or to 
 your father.' 
 
 She thanked him, but declined. 
 
 1 1 am not afraid in any way. Our crowds are 
 always good-natured and orderly. But I dislike all 
 noise, and up here it is more mysterious, more ro- 
 mantic, more beautiful. One can believe that one 
 is still in the Renaissance. One sees the lights and 
 the fires, the sky and the water, the grand cupolas 
 and towers and spires ; and one does not see the 
 modern ugliness which, when one is in the streets, 
 spoils the illusion of it all.' 
 
 ' As you will,' said Odisio. ' May I stay here with 
 you ?' 
 
 ' Certainly.' 
 
 Ser Checchi had come up to the room, as it had 
 been his habit to do ever since he had been a little 
 boy in the years when the century had been young. 
 It was one of the things unchanged, wholly un- 
 changed, since his childhood. Down below there 
 were changes ; the people were no more the merry 
 and picturesque throngs of his youth, and the popu- 
 lace no more went with devout unanimity to the 
 noonday Mass in the duomo ; but, as he looked 
 down from his tower platform on St. John's Night, 
 nothing seemed altered in the city lying below. 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 121 
 
 The fireworks, the illuminations, the river alive 
 with light, the spires and domes outlined with fire, 
 the hills studded with bonfires, the quays and bridges 
 black with multitudes all these were the same as 
 they had been in the days of his childhood, and the 
 scene was precisely the same which stretched below, 
 radiant in moonlight and lamplight, and with the 
 same summer skies and the same shadowy land- 
 scape around it. 
 
 Ser Checchi felt as if he were a young child once 
 more, in his little nankeen vest and breeches, with 
 his ruffled shirt open at his throat, and his light hair 
 curling on his shoulders. 
 
 Ah, what good times those had been ! How 
 simple and honest and cheerful and full of goodwill 
 all life had been when his good father sacred be 
 his dust! had brought him up the wooden ladder- 
 like stair on his shoulders, and had set him by the 
 battlemented parapet to watch the night 1 There 
 was the same kind of flowers growing then as now 
 in their pots and boxes ; the same kind of pigeons 
 roosted then as now in their green wooden dovecot ; 
 and the same fires lighted water, and bridge, and 
 dome, and palace. At such moments Ser Checchi 
 almost wished that he had read less, and that he 
 had lived more. 
 
 ' How like you look to my grandmother !' he said 
 to Beldia this evening. 
 
 Perhaps it was only his imagination, but it seemed 
 to him as if Beldia grew more like her great-grand- 
 dame every year. She had the same calm carriage, 
 and the same serene, kind smile, the same clear skin 
 that no sun could tan or redden, the same grave fair 
 
122 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 brows, like those of a Madonna of Diirer or a maiden 
 of Mieris. 
 
 As he looked at her on this festal night, as the 
 light from the brilliant skies shone on her eyes and 
 breast, Ser Checchi thought for the first time that it 
 was natural that young men should find her fair, and 
 dream of her as a companion for their lives. 
 
 ' And it would be well if she had someone besides 
 myself to care for her,' he thought, with a pang. ' I 
 have been too selfish and too careless by far.' 
 
 The sun had sunk down behind the Carrara 
 mountains some half-hour before, but the skies were 
 still radiant when the fireworks began, and the 
 blending of moonlight and lamplight and sunset 
 reflection made a beautiful glory on the river and 
 the shores. 
 
 Up above, on the tower-roof, Beldia and her 
 father and Odisio watched it all ; the dog also, with 
 his forelegs resting on the parapet, and his excite- 
 ment finding vent in sharp, quick, smothered barks 
 like minute-guns. Folko had seen many an illu- 
 mination thus during his ten years of life, but the 
 sight never failed to agitate and puzzle him exceed- 
 ingly, as though it were something which he had 
 never beheld before. 
 
 It was a balmy and brilliant night : the air was 
 clear, though warm ; the scent of the carnations 
 and lemon verbena was sweet under the dew ; the 
 bats flew above their heads, startled by the fires 
 leaping and sparkling below, and the rushing and 
 roaring of the pyrotechnic showers. The spectacle 
 was soon over, the last girandola shot up from the 
 centre of the bridge, and the last reflection faded 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 123 
 
 off the water ; alone the illuminated cupolas and 
 towers across the river remained ablaze, and the 
 old iron cressets, filled with lighted oil, which were 
 hung round beneath the battlements of Taddeo's 
 tower, answered them as they had done with every 
 midsummer throughout six centuries. 
 
 The night of St. John was over for another year. 
 
 Ser Checchi turned away from the parapet, and 
 went noiselessly through the flowers, down the 
 wooden stair, leaving the Lombard alone with his 
 daughter ; for the woman-servant had already hur- 
 ried away to her kitchen to see that her saucepans 
 for the supper were not burning or cooling. 
 
 Folko remained with his forepaws upon the stone 
 ledge, his eyes gazing intently down on to the 
 crowded streets below, and Beldia stayed also, lost 
 in thought as she gazed at the flowing river, rip- 
 pling like molten silver underneath the stars. She, 
 too, had seen the illuminations of St. John's Night 
 for as many years as she could remember. 
 
 Odisio stood beside her silently, his heart beating 
 in tumult. 
 
 He understood that her father had left them on 
 purpose thus alone. But he seemed to himself 
 much too wretched, penniless, and friendless a 
 wanderer to dare to offer her his empty hand. 
 
 At last, as she turned slowly and reluctantly away 
 from gazing on the beauty of the night, he dared to 
 speak, his throat contracting as though his own voice 
 choked him. 
 
 ' Madamigella Beldia,' he said with great timidity, 
 ' I told your father yesterday that I must go away, 
 because I am a miserable idler with no home or 
 
124 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 fortune. But he gave me leave to tell you to tell 
 you what I think you must know well. You are 
 the only woman who lives on earth for me.' 
 
 She did not answer ; she looked away from him, 
 drawing one of the red carnations through her 
 fingers ; the moonlight fell on her white gown and 
 her bent head. 
 
 ' If you could pardon me give me any hope ?' he 
 murmured, gathering courage, ' I would try to make 
 some money, some place, worthy of you. Would it 
 be ever possible ?' 
 
 ' I could not leave my father,' she answered in a 
 low, soft voice, which thrilled him to the soul. 
 
 Folko came and thrust his nose in friendly fashion 
 against their hands, which in that moment touched 
 and clasped each other. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 ' THAT she should go and promise herself to a 
 foreigner, a Lombard, a Brescian !' said Veronica 
 with indignation to the boy Poldo. ' When she could 
 have had Pampilio Querci, who will die a town 
 councillor, or any good, sound-moneyed man who 
 comes about her, and would have kept her in silk 
 gowns and velvet mantles all her years ! Ay, I 
 know the Lombard is a fine-built man and a soft- 
 spoken and goodly to look at ; but good looks make 
 no bread, and gentle words butter no parsnips, and 
 he says himself he is as poor as a church rat ! What 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 125 
 
 use is that ? There will be waiting, waiting, waiting, 
 and what does that mean ? That a woman's bloom 
 goes like the bloom off the grapes which you shut 
 up in a closet to keep for Christmas. The grapes 
 are the same grapes as they were when you put 
 them away, but when you send them r up on your 
 dish they are wrinkled and faded, and the flavour 
 is gone. This is what waiting does for women. 
 The signorina is bonnier than most, and will be 
 well-looking when she is fifty ; but, all the same, it 
 will do her no good to wait till this stranger has 
 got the wherewithal to keep her. Querci is already 
 as round as an egg, and is a youngster who will die 
 Syndic of the city likely enough. Besides, there are 
 other reasons ' 
 
 She stopped short, for though grumbling and 
 garrulous, and sensible to the charm of the attor- 
 ney's five-franc pieces, she was a loyal soul, and 
 knew that she had no right to discuss her master's 
 and mistress's circumstances with a young lad like 
 Poldo. 
 
 All that was known to her or to the neighbours 
 was that the stranger from the North was affianced 
 to the daughter of Ser Checchi vaguely known, no 
 date, nor any kind of detail being added to the bare 
 fact. Much gossip was made about it set on foot 
 by the baker's wife, who had a piqued and jealous 
 fancy for the handsome Lombard herself; and when 
 anyone ventured to speak directly of it to Ser 
 Checchi, he replied in a reserved tone, that his 
 consent had been given conditionally, but that 
 there was no reason to believe that the marriage 
 would take place for years. 
 
126 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 ' There are many reasons to believe that it will 
 never take place at all,' said Vestuccio to himself 
 with a smile, whilst with a beaming countenance he 
 bowed before Ser Checchi, and said aloud, * Long 
 life and all joy and honour to the betrothed young 
 people, sir ! Surely an angel is in your dwelling, if 
 anywhere on earth.' 
 
 ' My daughter has been well brought up, and 
 resembles her mother and grandmother,' replied Ser 
 Checchi stiffly and distantly. 
 
 Beldia received her neighbours' felicitations with 
 her usual serenity of manner. 
 
 ' There is nothing fixed,' she answered to their 
 importunate inquiries. ' Of course I shall never leave 
 my father whilst he needs me.' 
 
 It was no one's business what had been decided 
 on between her father and her betrothed. She shrank 
 from comment and curiosity with the sensitiveness 
 of a refined and reserved nature. 
 
 Odisio was too happy to heed or weigh any 
 material questions. Ser Checchi had indeed said to 
 him : 
 
 ' You know my conditions. You must show me 
 that you can maintain her before I can give her to 
 you. Look for nothing from me,' he added more 
 harshly. ' I am ill off ill off and my son would 
 drain the purse of Plutus dry.' 
 
 But this was enough to fill the heart of the 
 younger man with rejoicing. He had her promise 
 to wait for him ; it seemed to him that it would 
 inspire the dullest clod into genius and ambition, 
 and give to a block of stone the impulse of vitality 
 and effort. He wrote to his mother the tenderest 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 127 
 
 and gayest letter he had ever penned ; and to his old 
 master in Milan he sent a pressing entreaty to find 
 him work, no matter how hard, but lucrative. His 
 idle, careless, whimsical life of accident and adventure 
 was at an end : he was sensible of powers and 
 learning in him beyond the common possession of 
 ordinary men, and he saw the future in radiant 
 colours like the fires of the girandola on that ever- 
 blessed night of St. John. 
 
 As he walked through the streets with his elastic 
 tread and his erect and martial carriage, a smile in 
 his eyes and a song on his lips, his rivals looked 
 after him with scowling glances, and Pampilio 
 Querci muttered an oath as his own small thin 
 shadow fell across the sunny path. 
 
 ' Never mind,' said Vestuccio consolingly to him. 
 ' Let the poor fools dream on as they like. Their 
 plans will never come to anything, you may be 
 sure.' 
 
 Meantime those midsummer days and eves were 
 full of sweetness to Beldia. She had not thought 
 the earth could hold so much happiness. The old 
 tower- roof in the starry evenings, with its odours of 
 thyme and sweet peas, seemed to her like the en- 
 chanted garden of Angelica. Her suitor loved to 
 converse of the future ; but to her the present was 
 fully enough. She did not care to look forward; 
 these quiet morning hours, which brought him to 
 his studies in the book-room, this balmy evening 
 time, when all the labours of the day were over, and 
 they were free to go up and sit against the old stone 
 battlements, and watch the stars in their courses, 
 were all she coveted. Odisio's mother had written 
 
128 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 with tenderness and gladness ; and his master had 
 also answered in kindest strain, promising his in- 
 fluence and efforts ; only Cirillo had replied not a 
 word to the tidings sent him. They supposed that 
 he had been absent from Rome when the news had 
 been written ; they never knew much of his move- 
 ments. 
 
 ' It does not matter whether he is well or ill- 
 pleased,' said her father angrily, when such silence 
 pained her. ' He is not your master nor mine, and 
 we have no need to consult his wishes.' 
 
 One night, when it was late, and no one but Beldia 
 was awake in the tower, there came a loud knocking 
 at the iron-barred door below, and Folko barked 
 loudly. Everyone in the place was asleep. Beldia 
 alone leaned against the parapet of the roof, whither 
 she had gone half an hour before to watch the tall 
 form of the Lombard pass down the narrow street. 
 Being wakeful, and allured by the sublimity of the 
 night, she had remained there looking, now up at 
 Saturn and Jupiter in the heavens, and now down on 
 the gliding Arno water and the blackness of the 
 bridge arches. 
 
 At the loud rapping below she leaned over the 
 machicolations and called loudly : 
 
 'V/ho is there?' 
 
 Far above as she was, her voice reached the street 
 below faintly in the perfect stillness of the night. 
 
 'It is I, Cirillo!' called her brother angrily, from 
 beneath the arch of the door. 
 
 Taking her lantern in her hand, she called the dog 
 and hurried down the dark shaft of the stairway. It 
 was long and steep, but she knew those winding steps 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 129 
 
 by heart and ran down them with quick, sure feet. 
 She set her lantern on the stone floor when she 
 reached the bottom, and began to pull aside the 
 rusty and massive bolts, and turn in its lock the huge 
 key, which had been made by a cunning locksmith 
 in the thirteenth century. 
 
 Slowly the great door yielded to her effort, and 
 she dragged it open, little by little, to the summer 
 night without. Her brother came in roughly, 
 scarcely returning her embrace. 
 
 * Who could suppose you were all abed at this 
 hour ?' he said impatiently. ' The train is only just 
 in from Rome.' 
 
 1 My father is always early to bed and early to rise, 
 as you know,' she said, in surprise at his negligent 
 and ill-tempered greeting. ' Please come upstairs 
 as quietly as you can, not to wake him. Your room 
 is always ready, and I will call up Veronica and 
 soon get you some supper.' 
 
 With muttered words of dissatisfaction Cirillo 
 climbed the stairs after her, pushing back, ill- 
 humouredly, the well-meant caresses of Folko. 
 
 * Bring me some wine,' he said, when he reached 
 the chamber in which their meals were served ; ' I 
 want no food. Do not call up the woman. I only 
 came to speak to you. The devil fetch me ! How 
 good-looking you have grown !' 
 
 Beldia looked at him in trouble and astonishment. 
 He was flushed, dusty, dishevelled ; he had a sullen 
 and coarse expression, and the natural beauty of his 
 face was inflamed and swollen. 
 
 ' Are you not well ?' she said with hesitation, as 
 she lighted a lamp and placed it on the table. 
 
 9 
 
130 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 1 Get the wine, the best wine you have : or, better 
 still, some brandy,' he replied, as he cast himself 
 heavily into his father's great arm-chair. 
 
 Greatly disquieted, she went and took a flask of 
 seven-year-old Chianti wine from a cupboard and 
 set it before him. 
 
 ' I will bring you cold meats and bread in a mo- 
 ment, if you wish,' she said ; ' or I will fry some eggs 
 and bacon.' 
 
 * I want no food,' said her brother ungraciously ; 
 and he poured himself out a big beaker of the wine 
 and drained it. ' Have you no brandy ?' he asked. 
 
 * No ; father never buys it.' 
 
 Cirillo drank again and again, then leaned his 
 elbows on the table, and his chin on his hands, and 
 looked up at her. 
 
 ' What cursed trash did you write me, that you 
 ate betrothed to a Lombard without a penny ?' 
 
 Her face flushed with anger. 
 
 ' I am promised to a man whom I love.' 
 
 Cirillo laughed unkindly. 
 
 ' Women do not marry men they love. They 
 marry men who help their families. I mean you to 
 wed with Pampilio Querci, and with no one else, my 
 fair one.' 
 
 ' I do not ask you what I shall do,' said Beldia 
 quietly. ' It is enough that my father and I are of 
 one mind.' 
 
 ' Who cares for your mind or your heart ? You 
 have a handsome person, and that you will give 
 where I tell you.' 
 
 ' You had better go to your chamber. We can 
 speak of these matters in the morning.' 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 131 
 
 ' I will speak of them now,' said Cirillo, taking 
 another draught of wine. ' Things are in a bad way 
 with me. I have no luck. I have played and lost. 
 I have fought the city guards, and there is a hue 
 and cry out against me, and I want to get to the 
 coast and out of the country.' 
 
 Beldia listened, with her face growing white and 
 set. 
 
 ' My father,' she said faintly, looking towards the 
 door of the room, as though she saw her father's 
 form there. 
 
 ' Oh, I do not want to see him, that you may be 
 sure,' said her brother, with a fierce, short laugh. 
 ' You must give me all the money you have, and I 
 will go to sleep in this chair for a few hours, and 
 then take the earliest train to Livorno ; there is one 
 at five in the morning, I think. How much money 
 can you get together ?' 
 
 ' I have no money/ she replied. ' I have a few 
 francs left of the house-allowance for the week. You 
 know that I have nothing of my own.', 
 
 ' And you would marry a penniless scholar ? you 
 fool! Querci would give you money if you asked 
 him ' 
 
 ' That is a shameful thing to say, Cirillo.' 
 
 ' A fig for your fancies ! Do you suppose a woman 
 like you cannot get money if she wants it ? Many 
 men have come and gone here who would have 
 asked nothing better than to open their purses to 
 you. But you were always a stiff-necked jade.' 
 
 ' For shame, Cirillo !' 
 
 He looked cunningly at her out of his swimming 
 and sleepy eyes. 
 
1 32 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 4 You are in love with your Lombard ?' 
 
 She said nothing, but a wave of colour passed 
 over her face and she turned away her head. It 
 hurt her inexpressibly to have this coarse, rude 
 touch laid on her tenderest and most sacred feel- 
 ings. 
 
 Cirillo laughed aloud. 
 
 ' Very well, my saint. Then if you do not bring 
 me out your pearls, I shall go and knock up this 
 Messer Odisio and tell him that I forbid the banns.' 
 
 1 My pearls ?' 
 
 The pearls had been her mother's, and they con- 
 stituted those vezzi or dowry -jewels without which 
 no Florentine maiden can be decently betrothed or 
 wedded. These necklaces vary in value from the 
 rare virgin pearls, large as cherries, of the young 
 princess, to the seed pearls, small as grains of rice, 
 of the girl of the populace or of the peasantry. 
 Those of Beldia were of medium excellence : three 
 strings of them, worth, on the whole, some three 
 thousand francs. Cirillo knew their value to a cen- 
 time, for they had often been in his hands. 
 
 ' I could not give you my pearls,' she said, stupe- 
 fied. ' You must be mad to ask it. Father would 
 never consent.' 
 
 ( No doubt he will never consent. If we were 
 fools enough to ask him !' said Cirillo, with an 
 ironical laugh in her face. ' But you will go and 
 get them, Madonna mine, or I will go and find your 
 betrothed and tell him you are to wed with Pampilio 
 Querci.' 
 
 ' You may tell him what you like. He will not 
 believe it.' 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 133 
 
 * I intend you to marry Querci.' 
 
 ' You may intend what you please. I shall not 
 do it/ 
 
 'We shall see. But first get me the pearls. I 
 must be out of the country as fast as I can, for I 
 may as well tell you the whole. There was a 
 quarrel, and the guards drew their swords, and I 
 shot one, and I believe he is dead. The affair may 
 be troublesome. The pater would not care to see 
 the carabineers come in here after me. Yet that 
 will be so if I be found at daybreak in Florence.' 
 
 Beldia said nothing. The callous carelessness of 
 the confession froze her blood. It was worse than 
 the crime itself to be thus indifferent in its narra- 
 tion. 
 
 ' Oh, my father ! my dear father !' she murmured, 
 with sobs strangling her breath. ' Such a long and 
 pure and honourable life disgraced by you, dis- 
 graced by his own son !' 
 
 She was not a woman who ever gave way to emo- 
 tion, but this horror overwhelmed her; she turned 
 her face to the wall, and her frame shook with the 
 force of her weeping. She had been so happy such 
 a little while before, dreaming her dreams under the 
 starry skies. 
 
 ' The old idiot is disgraced by himself/ said 
 Cirillo savagely. ' He has his signatures out by 
 the dozen. Querci could square all that ; you must 
 marry Querci. But for the moment get me your 
 pearls. I can sell them to the Jew goldsmiths in 
 Livorno, very well. If you had sent me money 
 when I wrote to you last, I should not now be in 
 this plight. It is all your fault. The men set on 
 
I 3 4 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 me because, when I lost, I had no money to pay, 
 and I defended myself, and there was noise and 
 fuss, and the guards came, and I shot one, I tell 
 you. It was all your fault. How can a man live 
 without money ?' 
 
 ' He lives by the work of his hands or his brain,' 
 said Beldia, thinking of Odisio, and in the trouble 
 and confusion of mind scarcely noticing what her 
 brother had said of their father's signatures. 
 
 Cirillo swore a bad oath. 
 
 * I do not choose to do either,' he said sullenly. 
 ' Whilst I am young I mean to enjoy. When one 
 is old one can labour. Does my father work, that 
 you honour him so ? All his substance goes in his 
 one craze for old books. It were a harmless luxury 
 in a rich old man, but in a tradesman it is a crime, 
 a bigger crime than mine. But come, go and get 
 me the pearls. I want to sleep while I can, and you 
 will give me something to eat at four, and then I 
 will get out of the house before anyone wakes. 
 Even the charcoal-men must not see me.' 
 
 Beldia did not speak ; the sobs in her throat were 
 stilled by a great effort, but she was bewildered and 
 full of horror. Her longing impulse was to send for 
 Odisio he was so manly, so courageous, so loyal ; 
 her heart yearned for the comfort and support of 
 his presence ; she had that entire confidence in him 
 which is the joy and strength of love. But for his 
 sake she did not dare to summon him. Her brother 
 was already set against him ; the two men might 
 quarrel if they met would almost surely do so, 
 and Cirillo might use his revolver on him as he had 
 done on the guard in Rome. ' No,' she said to her- 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 135 
 
 self; 'no, Odisio should not be brought into danger 
 by her. Sooner would she suffer anything than run 
 that risk.' 
 
 ' Listen to me,' she said, striving to steady her 
 voice and combat all weakness of emotion. 'There 
 is no testimony that your tale is true. You have a 
 strong imagination when you need money. What 
 guarantee have I that if I beggar myself at your 
 request, you will really leave this town and really 
 cease to trouble those I love ?' 
 
 ' None at all,' said her brother jeeringly. f I do 
 not offer you vows and proofs. You will bring me 
 out your pearls, because, if you do not, I shall 
 shake my father out of his sleep and get what I 
 want, and I shall then go and find out your 
 Brescian and pick a quarrel with him. There are 
 plenty of knives in Florence. Come, Madonna 
 mine. Do not provoke me. Patience is not one 
 of my many virtues.' 
 
 She was clear and firm in resolve when emergency 
 arose, and through the confusion of her mind be- 
 fore the confession and demands of her brother these 
 two necessities were beyond all imperative : her 
 father must not know of Cirillo's visit, and her 
 betrothed must not be brought into any peril from it. 
 Blood soon runs high, she knew, and blows are 
 given which often carry death with them, almost 
 before a word is said. She had not dwelt in a 
 populous riverain quarter without knowing how hot 
 and bitter men's unbridled passions can become. 
 
 No ; even in the painful stupor of her thoughts, 
 she resolved that Odisio and Cirillo must not meet, 
 nor must her father hear of his son's ill-doing. 
 
136 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 WHEN the first rosy warmth of the daybreak came 
 over the Apennines and smote the gray turrets of 
 the tower, arousing the pigeons from their wooden 
 cotes, and sending the bats to roost in the belfry of 
 Santo Spirito, Beldia sat alone in her own chamber, 
 and her brother was gone. She had not undressed, 
 nor had she slept a moment in the past night : she 
 sat still and sorely troubled, the empty case, in 
 which the pearls had been, kept lying on her lap. 
 
 Their loss oppressed her with the weight of a 
 deadly calamity. It was not because they were 
 jewels, or because she cared to wear them, but they 
 had been her mother's, and she had always felt a 
 kind of benediction in their cool, soft touch. And 
 how could she account to her father for their dis- 
 appearance ? How could she reconcile him to the 
 sight of her on saints' days and on Sundays, with- 
 out that three-stringed collar to which he was so 
 used, and which seemed a very part and parcel of 
 her own white throat ? 
 
 She sat motionless, with the old leather box lying 
 useless on her knees. 
 
 Cirillo had tossed it aside as clumsy and cumber- 
 some, and had folded the pearls up in a sheet of 
 paper and slipped them into his waistcoat pocket. 
 
 She sat and gazed at it as the cold roseate light 
 of the earliest morning came through the narrow 
 casement. 
 
 She had first worn them at her first communion. 
 Her father himself had clasped them about her 
 
THE TOWER OF T ADDED 13? 
 
 throat, and had said : ' Be your mother's spirit with 
 you ever.' 
 
 And now they were gone, the poor pure, pretty 
 things, to be weighed in the oily hands of dealers, 
 and might lie on the naked breasts of coarse, in- 
 decent women ! The tears fell from her eyes slowly 
 one by one, and rolled down on to the old black 
 empty jewel-case. 
 
 She could not keep a secret from her father. 
 Although she had long been in the habit of keeping 
 to herself all things which would have annoyed or 
 troubled him, in order to leave him to that intel- 
 lectual quiet which he prized and needed, she had 
 never hidden anything of importance from him, nor 
 answered any question of his untruly or disin- 
 genuously. 
 
 She resolved that she would tell him that she had 
 given her pearls to Cirillo to sell ; but that she 
 would spare him, if she could, the knowledge of his 
 son's offence against the law. 
 
 And when she met him in the forenoon she did 
 tell him this much ; and it seemed to her that her 
 father took the news in a strange manner. 
 
 ' You will not have even those, then ?' he mut- 
 tered in a sad and muffled voice. ' Why, oh, why 
 did you strip yourself for that leech, that knave, 
 that hound ? What use is it to give Cirillo aught ? 
 He is like the thirsty sea-sand, which ever drinks 
 and never has enough.' 
 
 He did not ask her how she had known of her 
 brother's demands, or how the pearls had been 
 transmitted to him. He asked no questions; he 
 was only pained and oppressed. 
 
138 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 1 Even your mother's necklace ! Even that !' he 
 repeated. It afflicted him keenly, but he did not 
 show any anger, as she had feared that he would do, 
 nor did he even blame her. 
 
 ' What right have I to find fault ?' she heard him 
 murmur to himself. Had he heard of his son's 
 advent, like that of a thief in the night, and did 
 he purposely avoid interrogation and explanation ? 
 She almost fancied that he did so, and that he knew 
 of Cirillo's secret visit : for he sent for a skilful 
 locksmith of the Fondaccio, and had the locks 
 altered of those drawers and chests in which the 
 Dante and the most precious of his manuscripts 
 were lying. 
 
 To Odisio she said nothing. She could not bring 
 herself to speak of her brother's evil conduct to one 
 who through poverty and temptation had always 
 kept his head so high, his hands so clean, his honour 
 so unsullied. 
 
 The days went on their quiet course, and the 
 summer came, and the city grew empty. Even the 
 little tradesfolk in turn shut up their shutters and 
 went out into the country hills or down to the sea- 
 shore. The lemon-sellers wandered through vacant 
 streets, and the barrows of melons and plums were 
 rolled underneath deserted houses, and there seemed 
 no living creatures left except the poor thirsty, 
 muzzled dogs, and the hot, tired cab-horses, and 
 the flowers which hung their drooping heads at all 
 the corners of the palaces, and found no buyers, 
 and died of heat and thirst unpitied. 
 
 At this season of the year they were always used 
 to go up to Antella, taking Veronica and Folko with 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 139 
 
 them, and leaving the care of the pigeons and plants 
 to the cobbler who lived below, and who fulfilled his 
 trust conscientiously, and was proud and elate when, 
 on her return, Beldia praised the healthy appearance 
 of his charges. 
 
 The fifteenth of July had never come and gone 
 without Ser Checchi saying, often with regret : 
 
 ' It grows too hot for the city : pack your clothes, 
 and we will take the diligence to-morrow or next 
 day.' 
 
 And Beldia was so used to the annual exodus that 
 by this date all her arrangements were always 
 already made, and there was nothing to do but to 
 hand over the pigeons' food and the gardening tools 
 to the cobbler for the rest of the summer. 
 
 ' My father will be sure to ask you to come with 
 us to Antella,' she had said more than once to 
 Odisio. 
 
 But the fifteenth of July came and went, and 
 there had been no mention of moving to the 
 country. 
 
 It became increasingly difficult, too, to obtain 
 from him the money necessary for the agricultural 
 outlay. On Tuscan lands the owner must purchase 
 cattle, tools, seeds, and all such necessaries, and 
 if the year be a bad one must maintain his peasantry 
 as well. This especial year had been unusually bad ; 
 the rains had been too long withheld, and then had 
 come out of season ; the corn had been ravaged by 
 storms, the vines were sickly, the show of olives 
 was meagre, the foot-and-mouth disease had visited 
 the district ; and her father, who was always wont 
 to take these caprices of nature with perfect philo- 
 
140 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 sophy, was now irritated and depressed by such 
 losses and troubles to a degree wholly unlike him- 
 self. Yet they were no more than are constantly to 
 be encountered and prepared for by those who have 
 anything to do with land and its cultivation ; and 
 the year, though not likely to be a fruitful one, was 
 not more disastrous than a similar one ten years 
 earlier, when she had seen her father's serene and 
 gentle humour scarcely stirred even by a passing 
 regret. 
 
 She waited a little while this day, hesitating to 
 worry him with those coarse, cruel needs ; and then, 
 as her father was about to return to his studies, she 
 said timidly : 
 
 ' Ruggiero was here at noon.' 
 
 Ruggiero was the contadino at their little country 
 place of Antella. 
 
 ' Well ?' asked Ser Checchi, pausing with some 
 annoyance, his thumb and forefinger between the 
 pages of the volume which he was longing to peruse. 
 ' What of that, my dear ?' 
 
 * The red cow is dead.' 
 
 ' Another cow ! Cows are always dying. They 
 are melancholy beasts.' 
 
 ' She drank at the river, and she swallowed a 
 small fish, and it stuck across her gullet and killed 
 her.' 
 
 ' He must get another,' said Ser Checchi, opening 
 his volume with some annoyance. 
 
 ' But the yield of the corn is so poor. There are 
 only fifty staie.' 
 
 * They are producing new wheat by artificial 
 fertilization, but I am not sure that what is so 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 141 
 
 produced will answer so well as the natural plant,' 
 replied her father. ' Do you not think the most 
 wonderful secret of all in nature is how that germ 
 lies hidden in the grain and sprouts when restored 
 to earth ? Those ears of wheat from the Pharaohs' 
 sepulchres which germinate after two thousand 
 years explain it scientifically how you will, the 
 miracle and the mystery of it still remain the same. 
 Man is dumfounded before it. I once saw an 
 Etruscan tomb opened away yonder by Volterra. 
 There were some small kernels of wheat in a stone 
 cippus. I planted them in a fresh-turned furrow, 
 and they grew and multiplied ! That I saw with 
 my own eyes. And in due time I ate bread from 
 the harvest of those grains. They had lain there 
 in the dark, in the bowels of the rock, for hundreds 
 upon hundreds of years ; they had been put there 
 in the stone cippus before the birth of Caesar, before 
 the rise of Rome ; yet life was still in them, dormant 
 life, which awoke when they once again felt the 
 moist, warm soil open to receive them felt the dew, 
 and the mould, and the showers. What is impos- 
 sible in any resurrection after that ? How should 
 the human mind follow or grasp the living spirit 
 which was at work within the dry husk ?' 
 
 She opened her lips to speak, but closed them 
 again without speaking. His thoughts were happily 
 far away with the impersonal ; she had not the heart 
 to call him back to the sordid circumstances of the 
 moment to the poor harvest, to the dead cow, to 
 the straitened purse. 
 
 On the morrow, Beldia, as she gave him his coffee, 
 ventured to say : 
 
142 THE TOWER OF TAD DEO 
 
 ' It is very warm. Are we not going to Antella 
 this year ?' 
 
 ' No/ said Ser Checchi harshly, looking away from 
 her as he spoke. ' We shall not go this year.' 
 
 Beldia controlled her disappointment with diffi- 
 culty from any outward expression. She occupied 
 herself with pouring water on the coffee grains and 
 cutting slices of bread for the boy Poldo's breakfast. 
 She longed intensely to ask who would enjoy the 
 summer beauty of her olive orchards and her pine 
 woods, but she restrained the impulse, and kept 
 respectful silence. 
 
 He pushed away his cup of excellent coffee 
 half-drunk, and sighed. He was a man of tender 
 heart, and it hurt him to deny or deprive anyone of 
 anything ; and he knew that, to Beldia, to pass the 
 hot months in the freedom and freshness of the hills 
 was a source of infinite rejoicing and benefit, and 
 she had gone to the Casentino with every summer 
 of her life. 
 
 ' We cannot afford it,' he added, in a tone of 
 apology. 
 
 ' It costs less than living in the town/ said Beldia, 
 in surprise, ' and the city heats weaken you, father ; 
 all the doctors say so.' 
 
 ' I am not weak,' said her father hastily. ' We 
 cannot go to Antella ; I have let I have lent the 
 house.' 
 
 ' And never told me !' she cried involuntarily, with 
 an unspoken reproach in the exclamation. 
 
 * Am I bound to ask your permission for my action ?' 
 said the old man, with a severity and haste wholly 
 unlike himself, and a flush on his face. 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 143 
 
 'No,' said Beldia meekly. 'But I thought, I 
 hoped, I had your confidence. I have always tried 
 to merit it.' 
 
 1 1 never said that you did not merit it,' replied 
 her father. ' But it is tiresome to be obliged to 
 explain.' 
 
 He was ashamed of his own silence and insincerity 
 to her, and it made him irritable and sullen, with that 
 ill-temper which is the result of suffering and con- 
 trition. 
 
 He beat impatiently on the table with his spoon, 
 and looked away from his daughter's inquiring 
 eyes, which he felt ever and again turned upon 
 him. 
 
 With a violent effort at self-control, she did not 
 even ask to whom he had let, or lent, their country 
 retreat. 
 
 'I shall know in time,' she said to herself; 'ill 
 news always travels apace. All the gossips of the 
 quarter will be screaming it out to each other soon 
 enough.' 
 
 The words of her brother, which had passed by 
 her scarcely noticed in the excitement of his visit, 
 came back on her memory ; he had spoken of their 
 father's signatures. Was it possible that he, so 
 prudent, so modest, so careful, so self-denying, so 
 all-wise, as she deemed him, could be in debt? 
 That his means were narrowed of late she knew, 
 but she had attributed it to Cirillo's extravagance, 
 never to any possible act or fault of their parent. All 
 that her father did was in her sight blameless, ad^ 
 mirable, never to be doubted. 
 
 He took his hat and stick and went out early, 
 
M4 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 saying something of a business engagement. Beldia 
 had already done her market and household work ; 
 she went, as was her wont in her father's absence, to 
 the library, to be in readiness if any customer or 
 inquirer might come thither. 
 
 Odisio was at his own labours * in the architect's 
 office where he was temporarily engaged ; he could 
 never come to the tower until after six o'clock on 
 week-days. She sat long alone, for the boy Poldo 
 was out on an errand, and Veronica busy in her 
 kitchen and scullery, and it was not the hour at 
 which the few frequenters of the library were used 
 to present themselves. 
 
 She had taken her work with her, and seated her- 
 self near the high-barred window ; the books in their 
 multitudes strewn around her, and the volumes and 
 pamphlets, which her father would not allow to 
 be disturbed, lying on the ground. Nine o'clock 
 struck, and then ten ; the boy Poldo returned, and 
 went to his desk, where, sitting all day with his 
 head buried in his shoulders, he occupied himself 
 unwillingly with the copying work allotted to him. 
 It was very warm weather, and even the thick stone 
 walls of Taddeo's tower could not keep out the strong, 
 heavy heats of mid July. 
 
 ' Aren't we going at all to the country, madami- 
 gella ?' Poldo asked wistfully once, whilst his fore- 
 finger pursued the erratic path of a blue-bottle across 
 his written page. 
 
 ' I am afraid not this year,' said Beldia ; and his 
 respect for his mistress was so great, that he did not 
 dare ask why or wherefore. Only the chagrin of his 
 heart spent itself in a loud groan, and found further 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 145 
 
 vent in fiercely striking at the fly with his flat wooden 
 ruler. 
 
 ' Finish your copying, Poldo, against my father 
 comes back,' said his mistress. 
 
 The boy applied himself to his uncongenial task 
 with unwilling compliance, and there was no sound 
 in the book-room except the scratching of his metal 
 pen and the buzzing of the escaped blue-bottle. 
 
 Now and then a cry came faintly from the street 
 below of ' Cenc-i-e !' (bring out your rags), ' Ov-a- 
 freschi!' (new-laid eggs), or ' Co-co-me-ro !' (water- 
 melons), but by eleven o'clock even these ceased. 
 The vendors had gone indoors, or sought some 
 shady corner under a wall or a church porch, out of 
 the blazing, cloudless noontide heat. 
 
 The lower door of the tower was always left open 
 in the hope that the open portals would invite passers- 
 by to enter and ascend the stairs, and the door of the 
 library also stood open, with a bell hung on to it by 
 a chain, which tinkled when anyone touched the 
 chain. On the silence of the forenoon now the 
 tinkle of this bell was heard, and a footstep sounded 
 on the stone-floor of the entrance. 
 
 Beldia looked up, expecting to see her father, 
 and half rose to welcome him and take his sun 
 umbrella. She saw instead a little sandy-haired, 
 thin man, with shabby clothes, who had a sheaf of 
 papers under his arm. 
 
 Without taking off his hat he said to her : 
 
 ' Is the Signor Ardiglione in ? No ? Who are 
 you then ? I will leave this paper with you.' 
 
 The boy Poldo turned round in his seat with a 
 scared inquisitive gaze. Beldia approached the 
 
 TO 
 
146 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 visitor, and said, with her habitual dignity and 
 grace : 
 
 * I am Signer Ardiglione's daughter. I can take 
 any message for him !' 
 
 The rude thin man fumbled in his breast-pocket, 
 and drew out an old-fashioned ink-horn and a new- 
 fashioned metal pen. He scribbled at the foot of 
 the document which he had brought, muttering half 
 aloud as he did so : 
 
 * In the absence of umph, umph ! this day of 
 grace sixteenth July umph humph speaking 
 with his daughter your name ? What is your 
 name ?' 
 
 ' Beldia Maria Beatrice.' 
 
 ' Beldia Maria Beatrice,' murmured the little scribe, 
 finishing his writing and restoring the ink-horn to 
 his pocket ; then he handed the paper to her and 
 bustled out of the room. 
 
 She stood looking blankly down upon the docu- 
 ment, with its ominous preamble, ' In the name of 
 His Majesty,' etc., etc. She had not known who the 
 man was, because he was a newcomer in the neigh- 
 bourhood ; but she knew the look of a law-paper, 
 and she perceived that this was one ; a precetto, or 
 sentence to pay money, under threat of distraint 
 from that division of the tribunal which judges the 
 affairs of the quarter of Santo Spirito. 
 
 For a precetto to be sent thus, it must have been 
 preceded by citation, interrogation, and announce- 
 ment of sentence. How was it that she had known 
 nothing of any of these ? 
 
 The boy Poldo had left off his copying, and was 
 staring at her blankly. 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 147 
 
 1 The master is in trouble?' he asked stupidly, but 
 good-naturedly. ' They have said so a good while in 
 the street.' 
 
 * No, no ; you should not think such things of 
 your employer,' said his young mistress, casting the 
 document into a drawer and turning the key on it. 
 ' It is some mere matter of business a summons 
 for some contravention, I suppose.' 
 
 Poldo looked incredulous. 
 
 ' The people round here all say that he is in debt, 
 head and ears over ; and that he has been called 
 up at the Pretura, everybody knows, except you, 
 madamigella.' 
 
 ' My good lad,' said Beldia with severity, ' never 
 speak of your master, I order you, nor let others 
 speak of him ; only be sure that he is the best and 
 wisest man of all men living.' 
 
 Poldo turned round to his writing, and, unseen by 
 her, put his tongue in his cheek and winked at the 
 big gray cat of the house. 
 
 He was much attached to Beldia, but for his 
 master he had no liking, and he thought the learned 
 scholar a poor fool. 
 
 ' Throwing away all his means on old paper and 
 musty books, when he might drink vin santa and eat 
 lamb and kid three times a day !' thought the young 
 Florentine. 
 
 With a great effort over herself and her over- 
 whelming anxiety, Beldia had taken the key out of 
 the drawer and had shut away the fatal document 
 without looking on more than those topmost words 
 which told her what its character and meaning 
 were. 
 
148 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 She would not allow herself to intrude on her 
 father's secrets in his absence. But the uncertainty 
 and the anxiety were torture to her. 
 
 A precetto, which is in reality a power to seize 
 goods within five days given to a creditor by the 
 tribunal, could mean nothing but trouble ; and all 
 the signs which she had seen in her father of late 
 years of preoccupation, of care, of economy came 
 back upon her mind with painful distinctness in 
 cruel confirmation of that she feared. She could 
 not go on working, though she made a pretence of 
 doing so to screen her agitation from the boy Poldo, 
 whose sharp, little black eyes she felt ever and again 
 upon her, as though they were gimlets, piercing her 
 very soul. 
 
 He was a good-natured boy, and not unfaithful ; 
 but he was curious, and had a vulgar tongue when 
 it was allowed to wag at its will. 
 
 It grieved her that he should have seen the advent 
 of the officer of the tribunal. She knew that he 
 would talk of nothing else when he should run out 
 for his hour of liberty and play at disc-throwing with 
 other lads in the Santo Spirito square, or loll on the 
 water-steps cf the Arno, by the Santa Trinita 
 bridge. 
 
 Her lips opened on an impulse to ask him to say 
 nothing, but she did not speak, for she knew that to 
 ask such a thing was useless, and that though he 
 would promise silence readily, it would be beyond 
 him to keep his promise. 
 
 Time went on, and the church clocks boomed out 
 the meridian hour. 
 
 As its last stroke sounded Ser Checchi entered : 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 149 
 
 he looked jaded and dusty and hot, and very pale, 
 paler even than was usual with him. 
 
 Beldia's heart ached at the thought that she must 
 give him the dreaded document. 
 
 She brought him his loose linen library coat, and 
 his slippers and a glass of water, with some slices 
 of fresh lemon cut into it. Then she let him sit 
 and rest a few moments whilst she sent Poldo out 
 on an errand which would occupy him some little 
 time. 
 
 He drank thirstily, and remained reclining in the 
 osier chair which she had placed for him : the light 
 fell across his face, and she was struck by the worn, 
 aged look which it wore. 
 
 It hurt her to the quick to tell him of the hated 
 paper which had come for him in his absence ; and 
 yet she dared not withhold the knowledge of it from 
 him, lest worse should ensue. She went and un- 
 locked the drawer and brought it to him. 
 
 'Dear father,' she said softly, 'this came when 
 you were away. I have not looked at it, but I see 
 it is the kind of paper which brings trouble with it. 
 Will you not let me know what sorrow hangs over 
 you ?' 
 
 He snatched the document from her with the 
 roughest movement which she had ever seen in 
 him ; the blue veins on his temples swelled and 
 throbbed ; he held it at arm's-length and stared 
 at it. 
 
 ' He has broken faith with me,' he said hoarsely. 
 1 He promised by all the saints to wait 
 
 Then he crumpled the act up in his hands, so that 
 his daughter should not see what was written on it, 
 
ISO THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 and thrust it into his coat-pocket, and muttered 
 some unintelligible words of which she could make 
 no sense. 
 
 ' May I not know ?' she said piteously. ' Oh, 
 father, do not mistrust me ; do not conceal anything 
 from me nor from Odisio ! He loves you he 
 would aid you.' 
 
 ' I want no aid,' said the old man sternly ; ' and 
 did you conceal nothing when you gave your pearls 
 to your worthless brother ? Go to, go to ! I do 
 not call strangers or women to my councils.' 
 
 They were the harshest words which he had ever 
 spoken to her, and the most unjust. 
 
 She measured his trouble by their injustice. 
 
 She did not press him further then, but went 
 away to her own chamber, leaving the doors wide 
 open, that she might hear at his slightest call. 
 
 He told her nothing all day. He was at home 
 throughout the afternoon, and two or three of his 
 old customers and friends carne thither, and she 
 could hear him discussing and conversing with them 
 as usual. But for the agitation and consternation 
 which the sight of the document had caused him, 
 she could have believed that it was a summons of 
 no importance. She tried to hope that it was so ; 
 he was so wise, so frugal, so philosophic, she could 
 not believe that he could have fallen into the 
 common, stupid, vulgar difficulties which dog the 
 steps of prodigals and spendthrifts. No one had 
 ever been in business so exact as he, or so careful 
 and moderate as he in private life. 
 
 At supper also Ser Checchi said nothing of the 
 document which had been left that morning, but he 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 151 
 
 ate little and took a little more wine than was his 
 wont, for he was usually over-abstemious in all 
 things. He hurried over the meal under pretext of 
 much business, and, after it, Beldia was left to 
 suppress her torturing anxiety as best she could. 
 
 She was thankful when she heard the quick, light 
 step of Odisio that evening on the stairs which led 
 to the roof. She had ascended thither at sunset, 
 partly from the habit of watering her plants at that 
 hour, and partly from a heated sense of disquietude 
 and restlessness and thirsty longing for the air. 
 
 She told her betrothed of what had so tormented 
 her, looking eagerly in his face to read there if he 
 had any knowledge of her father's liabilities. 
 
 Odisio's face grew overcast ; he did not answer 
 her immediately with his usual candour. 
 
 ' Do you know anything ? Have you heard any 
 rumour ?' she asked him with earnest entreaty ; and 
 he turned from her and walked a few paces up and 
 down the platform before he replied to her question- 
 ing eyes and anxious words. 
 
 ' I think/ he said at last, ' that is, I fear, that Ser 
 Checchi has some dilemmas which he does not con- 
 fide to us. It is, I believe, thought that he has 
 money troubles ; and I fear he has trusted some 
 dealers and money-lenders too much.' 
 
 * Vestuccio ?' asked Beldia eagerly. 
 
 ' I have heard no names,' replied Odisio. ' But it 
 may very well be that Vestuccio is one of them, or, 
 indeed, the prime mover in it all. The little I have 
 seen of him gives me the impression that he is a 
 cunning man. He was a poor lad sixteen years 
 ago, and now he has money and houses and land, 
 
152 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 as well as his acknowledged and unacknowledged 
 trades.' 
 
 Beldia sighed wearily. 
 
 ' I never liked Vestuccio myself; but I think 
 oh, I do think he is truly attached to my father.' 
 
 Odisio smiled sadly. 
 
 ' My dear and innocent one, Cicero said long ago 
 that the heart into which the love of gold has 
 entered is shut to every other feeling ; and it is as 
 true now as it was in his time. Messer Aurelio, 
 believe me, is attached to no one except to him- 
 self.' 
 
 Beldia sighed again. 
 
 ' But it would injure him, surely, to injure any- 
 one so good and so much respected as my father ?' 
 
 ' My love, nothing injures anyone by which they 
 gain. Men like Vestuccio do not care greatly about 
 a pure reputation ; they chiefly care about making 
 high percentage and buying cheap to sell dear.' 
 
 Beldia was silent ; her reason told her that he 
 was right. 
 
 ' We are not to go to the country,' she said, while 
 her eyes filled with tears. 
 
 ' Indeed ? That looks bad. What cause does 
 your father allege ?' 
 
 ' That he has let, or lent, the house.' 
 
 ' To Vestuccio, perhaps ?' 
 
 ' Perhaps. I never thought of that. I so longed 
 to be with you at Antella.' 
 
 ' My dearest, I am happy enough here.' 
 
 Beldia said nothing ; she employed herself water- 
 ing her flowers from the cans which he filled at the 
 spout on the roof. The fresh air, the evening 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 153 
 
 shadows, the solace and support of her suitor's 
 presence calmed her apprehensions and soothed 
 her nerves ; yet she was profoundly troubled by his 
 echo of her own apprehensions. 
 
 ' If I am to bring him, as a dower, only debt and 
 anxiety, he had better never have seen my face,' she 
 thought, as she stooped over her carnations. 
 
 As if he divined her thoughts, he kissed her hand 
 as he resigned to it the handle of the water-can. 
 
 ' Come weal, and come woe, my dear, we shall be 
 happy in each other's love ; and whatever a man 
 who is poor can do to save and serve another I will 
 do for Ser Checchi.' 
 
 ' I am sure that you will,' she said gratefully. 
 * But it is not difficulty and trouble that I wish to 
 bring you as my dower. What will your mother 
 say?' 
 
 ' My mother will say that I cannot ask a fairer 
 fate than leave to win and work for an angel,' said 
 Odisio with a tender smile. ' And we may distress 
 ourselves needlessly. Your father is, although a 
 scholar, a man of business ; and in business there 
 are often momentary embarrassments which a little 
 time and management can tide over; if it were 
 anything exceedingly grave, I do not think he 
 would keep you ignorant of it. At all events, 
 to-morrow I will make inquiries and tell you the 
 result.' 
 
 At that moment there came a rush and patter of 
 several feet up the wooden stair leading to the roof, 
 and Folko, with two little girls clinging to him, 
 scrambled up on to the platform, and rushed to his 
 mistress. 
 
154 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 The children were Gemma and Dina, the children 
 of Vestuccio. 
 
 ' Oh, Beldia,' cried the elder, her fair hair blow- 
 ing in the wind and her hands full of fern fronds 
 and field gladiolas, 'we have just come fromAntella; 
 and I brought you these because you are not going 
 there ever any more, you know ; and we shall be 
 there all the summer, and we shall ride the donkey 
 and eat the plums and the pears. Father said we 
 were not to tell you but I would come and tell 
 you, because you may come and stay with us if 
 you like, and we will take Folko for good and 
 all, and be very kind to him ; won't we, Folko ?' 
 and Gemma, voluble and important, eager in her 
 mingling of pity and patronage, of fondness and 
 condescension, pressed her corn and her flowers on 
 Beldia with one hand, and with the other clutched 
 caressingly the dog's white curls. 
 
 ' Not the dog, no ; he is mine !' said Beldia 
 quickly; and involuntarily she thrust the little girl, 
 and the flowers, and the ferns away from her, and 
 drew close to her the white form of her four-footed 
 friend. 'You see! 1 she murmured, in a low, startled 
 whisper to Odisio. 
 
 The children stared at her in astonishment ; they 
 had not meant to be unkind ; they were subdued 
 and frightened at the way in which their offer had 
 been received, and they knew that their father and 
 mother had bidden them not speak a syllable of 
 Antella. They began to whimper, dropping their 
 rural treasures on the floor. They were afraid of 
 Odisio and Beldia, standing tall and stern above 
 them. 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 155 
 
 ' We thought you would be glad for us to let 
 you come up there/ they whined between their 
 sobs ; ' and we would be so good to Folko, because 
 you are going to be so poor you won't be able to give 
 him anything to eat. He would be happier with us 
 than with you.' 
 
 ' Get you gone,' said Odisio sternly, laying his 
 hands on their shoulders. ' You are two pert, silly, 
 impertinent babies. Learn to hold your tongues as 
 your parents bade you. Folko will live and die 
 where he is, and Madamigella Beldia will not ask 
 your permission to go where she pleases. Be off 
 with you !' 
 
 He pushed them not gently towards the first step 
 of the wooden stair, and crestfallen and disappointed 
 they withdrew, leaving a litter of broken fronds and 
 red flowers on the stones behind them. 
 
 When they were out of sight and earshot, he came 
 back to Beldia, and taking her hands in his breast : 
 
 * I fear I fear the worst,' he said, in answer to 
 the mute appeal of her eyes. * Little pitchers have 
 long ears, and these children know that their parents 
 have taken Antella. Let us only hope that it is some 
 temporary arrangement which Ser Checchi has 
 deemed it prudent to make.' 
 
 ' Were it only that, he would have told me,' she 
 replied. ' It is Cirillo who has brought him to this 
 pass.' 
 
 ' May I speak to him and entreat him to confide 
 in me ?' 
 
 ' It would be of no use. It might offend him. 
 My father is obstinate, and would not readily admit 
 that he had mismanaged his affairs. We do not 
 
156 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 even know that he has mismanaged them. Misfor- 
 tunes come in flocks, like swallows.' 
 
 Odisio did not attempt to alter her loyalty and 
 unwillingness to see the truth. 
 
 ' I may need her divine indulgence some day 
 myself,' he thought. 
 
 But he was troubled more greatly than he liked 
 to show to her. 
 
 Rumours had reached him in the neighbourhood 
 which spoke of her father's liabilities as numerous, 
 and the reserve in which the elder man had wrapped 
 himself up made it difficult and dangerous to 
 attempt to force his confidence. 
 
 ' If he would sell his choicer manuscripts, espe- 
 cially the Dante ?' he suggested. 
 
 Beldia shook her head with a sigh. 
 
 ' He will never do that. They are the treasures 
 of his soul.' 
 
 ' Heaven send that the law do not take them from 
 him !'. thought Odisio, but he did not say so. 
 
 What use was it to add to her anxieties ? She 
 was powerless as powerless as though she were 
 bound by cords to the flagstaff on the roof. 
 
 She stooped for the fern leaves and gladiolas which 
 the children of Vestuccio had left behind them on 
 the stones. 
 
 ' They came from Antella,' she said, kissing them 
 with great emotion. 
 
 Perhaps, she thought, they were all that she would 
 ever see again of those breezy and fragrant fields, 
 where she had wandered with light childish feet, and 
 dreamed so many dreams of girlhood. 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 157 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 THE days went by, and Ser Checchi said nothing of 
 his affairs either to her or to Odisio. 
 
 He was still more serious than was his wont, and 
 passed many hours out of the house, ostensibly on 
 business ; but they could not tell from his demeanour 
 or conversation that anything was wrong with him. 
 
 His old friends and visitors were more loquacious. 
 Especially did the old ecclesiastic, Don Gervasio, 
 shake his head, and say to her when he found her 
 alone : 
 
 * Things are awry, sadly awry ; your good father 
 has too much bad paper out they do say even 
 Antella is no longer your own ; he is always in 
 notaries' offices, and whoever goes thither rues it.' 
 
 But they knew nothing for certain or in detail ; 
 they had, like her, only vague fears and imperfect 
 suggestions to go upon ; and like herself they dared 
 not intrude their anxieties on the only person who 
 could have satisfied them. Ser Checchi, despite his 
 gentleness and hospitality, had always kept his 
 friends and companions in a little awe of him. 
 
 His manner was so much more composed and 
 serene than the impassioned gesticulations of his 
 fellow-citizens, that its dignity imposed upon them, 
 and there was something about him which made all 
 men feel that he was not lightly to be meddled with 
 or interrogated. 
 
 Even his son, who jeered and mocked at him 
 behind his back, had never cared to meet the calm, 
 limpid, grave gaze of his large eyes. 
 
158 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 Of Cirillo, and of her pearls also, Beldia mean- 
 while heard nothing ; had it not been for the witness 
 of the empty jewel-case, she would have thought that 
 the events of his nocturnal visit had been a dream. 
 * I will write from Livorno,' he had said, as he had 
 slipped the necklace into the inside pocket of his 
 coat ; but no letter whatsoever had come from him 
 from anywhere. 
 
 The heat was now great, and she who had never 
 spent the leonine month in the city since her infancy, 
 felt the oppression and drowsiness of the long, dull, 
 scorching days, and the nights in which scarce a leaf 
 stirred or the faintest breeze arose. The smoke of 
 the furnaces and gasworks, by which the banks of 
 the Arno have been defiled, hung over the river from 
 the San Miniato hill on the east to the avenues of 
 poplars in the west, whilst the green water glistened 
 with the last rays of sunset or sunrise, or the efful- 
 gence of full moon. 
 
 To her apprehensive terrors and fretting dis- 
 quietude the burden of the canicular heat added a 
 feverish oppression which was very hard to bear ; 
 and even midnight scarcely seemed other than, at 
 this season, a less bright, but not less burning day. 
 To increase her sorrow also, the office at which 
 Odisio worked was closed for two months ; and he 
 and she both knew that, to fulfil the conditions 
 prescribed by her father, he must leave the city and 
 seek labour and its gains elsewhere. 
 
 ' Oh ! why have we not one thousandth part of 
 all that the gamblers in the clubs and the idlers in 
 the carriages throw away every evening?' said the 
 young man passionately one night. * To think that 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 159 
 
 we must be parted for want of a little of that wealth 
 which fools and knaves roll in, as crocodiles roll in 
 the yellow sand !' 
 
 ' We shall not be the happier for envying others,' 
 said Beldia gently. * Never, never did I wish for 
 anything more than what I had until the last few 
 weeks. Father always had enough for all real 
 wants, and of riches I never thought for a 
 moment.' 
 
 ' Nor I,' answered Odisio. * Nor would I wish 
 for them now. But what I fain would have is 
 enough to never leave your side, and to be able to 
 banish all trouble from your father's house. He 
 has forbidden me to think of you, until I can show 
 him that I can maintain you fairly well. I cannot 
 blame him. It is a just and fair demand. But 
 oh, my love, the weariness, the cruelty of waiting !' 
 
 ' I feel it too,' said Beldia softly, with a sigh which 
 pierced Odisio's heart. 
 
 They would have so greatly enjoyed this summer, 
 had they spent it together on the fragrant hills and 
 wind-swept woods of Antella : other summers might 
 be granted them by a kindly fate, but this one 
 summer was for ever lost, unenjoyed, and life is too 
 short for such an irrevocable loss not to be mourned 
 as sadly as the loss of dead Adonais. 
 
 When he went down the tower stairs and home- 
 ward that night, Odisio found lying in his attic 
 a letter which had come by the evening's post. 
 When he had read it, and one from his mother 
 which was enclosed in it, the news contained in 
 them startled him greatly, and caused him grave 
 and anxious thought : the communication was from 
 
160 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 his late master in Milan, and contained the offer to 
 him of an appointment as architect and surveyor in 
 Brazil. A Piedmontese banker who had gone out 
 there in his youth, and had made there a vast 
 fortune, desired to build himself a palace in Rio 
 Janeiro, and an entire new quarter also in the city 
 on a scale of great magnificence and elegance. He 
 had invited the Milan artist, who had been a friend 
 of his in youth, to go out and undertake the work, 
 which he wished should, as far as the exigencies of 
 climate permitted, recall the architecture of Lombard 
 Italy. 
 
 * But I am too old to seek a new world,' wrote 
 the old architect ; ' I wish to lay my bones in the 
 green valley by Biella where I was born, and if I 
 went on board ship to go Westward I should, I am 
 sure, beg to be put on shore again before she could 
 weigh anchor. You have heard of that poor Neapo- 
 litan contadino who saved up his little all for ten 
 years to emigrate, and when he had reached La Plata 
 was seized with such homesickness that he worked 
 his passage back at once, and died of joy on seeing 
 the Italian coast on the horizon. So would it be with 
 me. I am too old and too homely to bear transplant- 
 ing. But you are young, strong, adventurous, new 
 climes and new friends will amuse you, and in a few 
 years' time you will make money enough to return, 
 if you wish, and a reputation too, if you choose. I 
 have proposed you in my place to Don Ercole 
 Vassilva, and this day I received by telegraph his 
 willing consent to employ anyone whom I recom- 
 mend. He makes only one condition, that you shall 
 go out almost immediately. The monetary condi- 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 161 
 
 tions are written on the sheet enclosed with this. You 
 will find them generous, and as you will be at no 
 expense whatever whilst there, you can put by a great 
 deal. I have spoken of it to your mother, who, 
 though she would suffer much at having you go so 
 far away, yet sees that it is too good a chance to lose. 
 But she thinks there may be reasons of sentiment 
 why you will be especially loath to leave this country 
 now. Of course you yourself alone can decide this. 
 Be so good, however, as to telegraph me your 
 decision in one way or another within twenty-four 
 hours from your receipt of this letter ; it is a golden 
 opportunity, and you are growing too old to be 
 much longer a mere idle student. It is time that 
 your name were cut on some good work in stone.' 
 
 Odisio was overwhelmed by the intelligence ; he 
 felt as if a mountain had fallen on him and crushed 
 him under it. Before he had known Beldia the 
 proposal might have filled him with rapture : the 
 novelty and excitement promised by it might have 
 been delightful to his spirit of adventure, and he 
 would have seen in it an opening to fame and 
 fortune. But now the thought of wrenching himself 
 from the side of the woman he loved, at a time 
 when she was in sore trouble and difficulty, made 
 the idea of acceptance terrible to him. It would 
 enable him, indeed, to fulfil the condition which 
 her father had laid down to him, but at what a cost 
 of probation and separation ! The memory of the 
 wide rolling ocean which would sever them made 
 his heart grow sick. 
 
 A few months earlier he might have accepted 
 such a proposal with the ardour of a man young and 
 
 II 
 
1 62 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 full of courage, and of curiosity before the unknown, 
 although more probably he would have rejected it 
 even then in favour of liberty and the pleasures of a 
 wandering and careless life. But now the strings of 
 his heart tightened with an intense yearning over 
 his country, his mother, and the woman whom he 
 loved, while at the same time he felt that for the 
 sake of others he ought in duty to utilize this great 
 and fortuitous occasion. 
 
 ' It is for Beldia to decide,' he said to himself, as 
 he put the letter of his master in his coat pocket 
 and went to the tow r er of Taddeo, on the following 
 evening, when some designer's work which he had 
 obtained during the closing of the surveyor's office 
 was finished. 
 
 Before he went up on to the roof to find Beldia, 
 he first sought her father, and told him of his temp- 
 tation and his indecision. 
 
 In Italy he might spend all the years of his life, 
 as so many clever artists do, without recognition 
 or employment. Alone, however, he might, unre- 
 proached, have chosen sooner the poverty, obscurity, 
 and idleness which he had so long preferred ; but 
 since these would now for ever sever him from his 
 betrothed, he was tempted to accept a temporary 
 exile for the sake of ultimate happiness and union. 
 
 ' Do what is best for your future ; do not think of 
 me,' wrote his mother : and he felt that Beldia 
 would say the same. Many, even most, women are 
 monsters of selfishness ; but when a woman is 
 capable of unselfishness, she crushes her own wishes 
 into dust, and binds her own passions to follow her 
 meekly, as St. Margaret bound the dragon. 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 163 
 
 He laid the letter from Milan before Ser Checchi, 
 who read it carefully in silence twice over, and sat 
 in silence for some moments, when the younger man 
 had ceased to speak of all his hopes and fears, his 
 doubts and hesitations. At length he said gravely : 
 
 ' I would bid you go, if you ask my advice. If 
 you love my daughter, you will return with means 
 to pass your life beside her in peace, and to pursue 
 your aims and your art without sordid and harass- 
 ing anxieties checking you at every step. Go. 
 This is one of those golden occasions which fortune 
 occasionally opens out to a man, and of which he 
 never forgives the refusal. If you reject it, you will 
 regret the rejection all your life. Yes : I admit 
 that I have some troubles. I told you that my 
 daughter was poor. The times are unkind to men 
 who have not the faculty of business. I have it not. 
 I have always loved the impersonal. I live in an 
 age in which to do so is more costly than any crime. 
 But there is no immediate pressure on me, no peril 
 of the kind of which you think. And were there 
 any, what could you do ? You are a student ; you 
 have to work for your own bread. You would only 
 be the pained witness of sorrows which you could 
 not alleviate. Go and make your own career ; 
 Beldia will wait for you. She is constancy incar- 
 nated.' 
 
 The counsel was sound, the decision was wise ; 
 but they fell like stones on the heart of Odisio. He 
 would so willingly have her farther say, ' Nay, I need 
 you ; stay beside us.' 
 
 With a slow step and a sad spirit, he mounted 
 the wooden stairs of the tower which so often had 
 
1 64 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 seemed to him as a silver ladder to the stars, as a 
 golden pathway to celestial joys. Beldia was as 
 usual at that hour tending her herbs and plants, a 
 rough homespun apron tied over her gown, her 
 watering-can in her hand. She was pouring a 
 shower of rain-water over the thirsty geraniums and 
 pinks ; her face was colourless from the great heats, 
 and her actions were more languid than usual : the 
 sultry, heavy, windless air of August in the city 
 robbed her of her customary energy and force ; it 
 oppresses alike man and woman, child and animal, 
 humanity and nature ; only the swallows, and the 
 bats, and the clouds of evening moths are un- 
 touched by it, and whirl and dance and float 
 and circle with unflagging gaiety and unslackened 
 speed. 
 
 He went up to her, and without any words of 
 preamble put the letter of the Milan architect in her 
 hand : 
 
 'You rule my life,' he said simply. 'Judge for 
 me. What you wish I will do.' 
 
 She took the letter and read it through, sitting on 
 the stone coping of the parapet, with the swallows 
 and bats whirling above her head under that pale- 
 green and clear faint gold of the sunset's reflec- 
 tions. 
 
 The dangers of absence, the perils of ocean, were 
 a hundredfold more terrible to one who had never 
 left her native city than they can ever seem to the 
 travelled woman of the world. Imagination and 
 ignorance combined to swell their proportions, and 
 to Beldia a long voyage assumed the aspect that it 
 wore to the women who hung in horror over the 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 165 
 
 charts which served to show the mysterious zones 
 whither their lovers, and brothers, and sons had 
 gone with Cristofero Colombo, or with Marco 
 Polo. 
 
 She had lived and studied so much with the 
 classic and mediaeval writers of her father's book- 
 shelves, that she thought as they did, feared as they 
 did, measured the world as they did. But she re- 
 sisted her terrors. 
 
 ' You must go,' she said firmly. Her lips were 
 colourless, and her breath was sharply drawn and 
 uneven. 
 
 ' Are you so willing that I should leave you ?' said 
 Odisio, with reproach and chagrin. 
 
 ' Ah, no, God knows !' she answered quickly. 
 ' But I would not for worlds stand between you 
 and a fair occasion betw r een you and your future 
 welfare. 1 
 
 * If I go, it is only to make that certain provision 
 for you w 7 hich your father has imposed as his con- 
 dition that I shall obtain.' 
 
 ' I know, I know,' said Beldia softly. ' It is for 
 me that you seek an assured provision. But, once 
 there, you may forget, you may change, I may cease 
 to have any great place in your memory ; you will 
 grow more endeared to your ambition and your 
 art ; and to those you will never alter ; it is of those 
 which I would have you think first, it is this which 
 this offer will most surely serve.' 
 
 ' But at what a price ! Sooner would I be the 
 lowliest draughtsman in the meanest builder's office, 
 than I would buy the fame of great Taddeo who put 
 these stones together by a year's loss of you ! As 
 
1 66 THE TOWER OF T ADDED 
 
 for change,' he added in impassioned tones, ' full 
 well you know, my love, that I shall no more change 
 to you than will the moon cease from her course 
 about the earth. You have no right to say such 
 things, not even in pretence to try me. I am not 
 shallow or fickle or untrue. The first day I saw you 
 by the market-place you were standing looking 
 down upon the flowers at the palace corner I saw 
 in you all I had dreamed of, all I had desired, and I 
 said in my soul, " By the grace of God she shall be 
 mine, or never shall any woman enter in my life." 
 
 The tears rushed to her eyes and the colour to 
 her face. 
 
 * I know, I know ! I never doubted you, dear,' 
 she said, with deep emotion. ' But I would not 
 bring trouble upon you, and things are not as I 
 thought they were when first we met : for my father 
 is poor very poor/ 
 
 * So am I.' 
 
 ' Yes. But you are young and he is old. You 
 must not overshadow your fate with ours.' 
 ' I will work for you both.' 
 
 * You have your mother to support.' 
 
 * Nay ; she maintains herself. I am free to do 
 what I will. If you bid me go, I go ; if you bid me 
 stay, I stay.' 
 
 Beldia leaned her head upon her hands, and 
 covered her face from his gaze. 
 
 Above, the evening clouds floated in pomp and 
 splendour ; the golden light quivered in the water 
 below; the night-moths drifted heavily above the 
 heads of the late carnations ; the bats circled from 
 steeple to belfry, from flagstaff to weather-vane; the 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 167 
 
 deep toll of the Santo Spirito church chimed the 
 hour. In that sweetness and stillness and solitude 
 the cruelty of such a choice seemed to her greater 
 than it would have done in the glare and business of 
 the noon. She cared nothing for money; she cared 
 nothing for success ; she cared only for the humble, 
 peaceful, simple ways of life, fragrant with innocence 
 and imagination and learning, as a garden path 
 which runs through shrubs of gray lavender and 
 bushes of odorous southernwood. 
 
 She only wished for such a home as she had 
 hitherto had ; for such a homely and lowly happi- 
 ness as had been that of women of her class in the 
 days of old ; such a life as had led the mother of 
 Albrecht Dtirer, or the elder daughter of Galileo. 
 For herself, she would have asked nothing better of 
 fate than to dwell where she was until death took her; 
 with Odisio earning his daily bread beside her in 
 honesty and dignity all their days. 
 
 But she believed that he had rare talents and fine 
 learning, and that it was in him to make his name 
 known by men. She knew that harder and darker, 
 as every week rolled on, would grow the wants and 
 the woes of her own family. Had she a right to 
 chain him here by her side, only to suffer with her, 
 only to witness what he would be powerless to alle- 
 viate only to share what might lie on him like a 
 stone, crush down his vital powers, and his buoyant 
 aspirations, under the dead weight of a wearing 
 poverty ? 
 
 She knew how men quickly lose hope and grace 
 beneath the burden of poverty; she knew how all 
 the vigour and zest of manhood are crushed into a 
 
168 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 withering atrophy, by continual struggle beneath the 
 pressure of debt. She knew it ; and she would not, 
 for the sake of her and hers, bind him to such a fate. 
 She lifted her face and looked at him by the warm, 
 shadowy light of the summer evening. 
 
 'Go, dear, go,' she said once more. ' I love you 
 too well to keep you here.' 
 
 Then she rose, and of her own will, for the first 
 time, she kissed him. 
 
 A week later he sailed for the south-western 
 coast. 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 THE Borgo San Jacopo was startled one forenoon, 
 soon after the departure of Odisio, by the passage 
 through it of three figures, familiar indeed, but 
 terrible to its sight as the incarnated shapes of 
 an inexorable fate. Often and often were these 
 three figures beheld in this poor quarter of Oltrarno, 
 and where they passed the sun seemed blotted out, 
 the maidens and the children ceased to laugh, the 
 hard-working householders held their breath : they 
 were the modern substitutes for the Parcae. 
 
 The usher, as the sheriffs officer or process-server 
 is termed in Italy, was a small, thin, ferret-faced man 
 with sandy hair and a sharp voice, by name Luigi 
 Fanno, and by nickname Gigi ; the custode, or 
 bailiff, who was called Giuseppe Dessi, and was 
 known as Beppe, was short and fat, and red and 
 jovial, making plenty of money out of his wretched 
 trade, and as quick to take a bribe as a swallow to 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 169 
 
 catch gnats. This admirable pair were accompanied 
 by the clerk of the tribunal of the section, a youth 
 of twenty, dark, dirty, pert, and rude, with paste 
 rings on filthy fingers, and a tone intended to awe 
 all hapless debtors into the belief that he held the 
 scales of fate in his unwashed paw. These three 
 persons, with a sheaf of papers, an inkhorn and a 
 Dogberry and Pistol swagger, pushed their way 
 down the narrow street, past the bronze Bacchus, 
 scowling at a little dog, which, in open defiance of 
 law, was skipping and jumping about in play with 
 a bit of string, having no medal on its throat to 
 show that it discharged the tax demanded for its 
 existence. 
 
 ' Mem. : Little curly dog, brown and white, seen 
 playing on doorstep of No. 12,' the usher wrote down 
 in his note-book, as a matter of contravention to be 
 duly notified to the city-guards, and punished when 
 he should have leisure for minor matters. Then he 
 went onward with his satellites, all three dirty, ill- 
 smelling, and ugly to look at, as they jarred on the 
 radiant sunshine, the masses of flowers, the bright 
 fruits on the barrows, and the laughing faces of the 
 people, which grew grave as they passed. At last, 
 they approached the huge arched door of the tower 
 of Taddeo, and began to mount the stairs ; it was 
 not more than ten minutes earlier that Beldia had 
 come down those stairs, and set forth on an errand 
 for her father to his notary Reggiano, whose office 
 was far-off by the Porta Pinta. 
 
 ' Good-morning, gentlemen,' said the charcoal- 
 seller in the entrance : obsequiously removing his 
 grimy hat, whilst honester Lillo barked, straining at 
 
1 70 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 the rope which tied him to his barrel. There is a 
 general subserviency and servility to all minions of 
 the law throughout Italy, bred in the bone and blood 
 of the people by many centuries of tyranny, political, 
 ecclesiastical, and financial. 
 
 ' Good-morning, gentlemen,' echoed the cobbler 
 and the tailor and the cabinet-maker in the mezza- 
 nino, all with a thrill of fear ; for times were bad, 
 and any one of them knew that it might be his turn 
 any day to receive undesired visits from these 
 guardians of finance and order. 
 
 ' Ser Checchi in ?' asked the bailiff Beppe Dessi, 
 with his ample paunch thrust out. He was a man 
 who loved to talk when no speech was needed : the 
 bailiff in this country is an amateur, created into an 
 official pro tempo, being any householder or citizen 
 whom the sheriff's officer may like to select for the 
 enjoyment of this function and the receipt of the 
 daily dole of money the law awards to him. out of 
 the pocket of the debtor, however empty that 
 pocket may be. 
 
 * Yes, gentlemen, yes,' said the cobbler hurriedly, 
 as he bent over his old boot and crossed himself 
 with his awl in his hand, and muttered, * The Lord 
 save him, poor creature ! saved of mortal man he 
 cannot be.' 
 
 The trio tramped on noisily up the dark stone 
 shaft of the stair under the lamp which always 
 burned there all the day, while the barking of 
 Folko above responded to the barking of Lillo 
 below. 
 
 When they reached the doorway of the library, 
 they took off their felt hats, and wiped their fore- 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 171 
 
 heads, and put their hats on again, and said to one 
 another that it was much harder work getting up 
 here than to climb up to the lantern of the Duomo, 
 and bid a good morrow to a milkman who, by their 
 bidding, had joined them there to be the witness 
 which the law exacts. 
 
 Then they pushed the door open pompously, 
 making the bell ring with a violent clatter, and 
 walked into the first book-room, Gigi Fanno leading, 
 by virtue of his superior office. 
 
 Ser Checchi was as usual seated in his large 
 leathern chair, turning over some manuscript ; the 
 boy Poldo was dusting in the inner room ; Veronica, 
 above in her kitchen, was making a great clangour 
 with her copper pans and brass pipkins ; Beldia was 
 absent on her errand. 
 
 The old man started, as the shadows of unbidden 
 visitors appeared between him and the sunlight of 
 the open doorway. 
 
 He knew what their approach indicated. They 
 never appeared together thus but on one mission 
 alone. 
 
 He did not rise, he did not greet them ; he sat 
 looking at them in silence, very pale, very grave. 
 
 Gigi Fanno advanced into the middle of the room, 
 and opened one of the long stamped papers which 
 he had brought with him. 
 
 He began to read aloud the usual formula : 
 ' Ardiglione, Francesco, of the late Piero, domiciled 
 in the dwelling-place known as the tower of the 
 Brancaleone, but belonging to the most respected 
 Tomaso Saetta, is now at the demand of hum 
 hum hum ' But before he could read 
 
172 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 more than this Ser Checchi stayed him with a 
 gesture. 
 
 ' I understand/ he said calmly, ' you are come to 
 levy execution on my goo'ds ?' 
 
 ' Precisely,' said the usher, offended at the inter- 
 ruption to his majestic eloquency, while Beppe Dessi 
 added volubly : 
 
 ' Unless you are prepared to pay principal, 
 interest, and costs down on the nail this morning ;' 
 and the milkman laughed a little nervously, and the 
 young clerk spat on the clean floor, and winked at 
 Poldo, who was standing on the threshold of the 
 inner room, with his round eyes wide open and his 
 mouth still more widely agape. 
 
 ' I cannot meet your demand,' said Ser Checchi 
 firmly, though his ivory white hands trembled as 
 they held the edge of the table. Then he turned 
 his head to the boy Poldo. ' You may go down- 
 stairs,' he said to him ; but the usher interposed. 
 
 ' Pardon me, let the good youth remain ; he may 
 be needed as an additional witness.' 
 
 The presence or absence of the boy was wholly 
 indifferent to him, but he liked to make a debtor 
 feel that a man who owed money could not be 
 master any more in his own house. 
 
 Poldo stayed, curious and breathless, leaning 
 against the doorpost, and thinking what a fine 
 thing it was to be a tribunal clerk, with fine glass 
 rings on your fingers, and nobody to order you to 
 wash your hands. 
 
 The men wasted no more words on the insolvent 
 and, in their eyes, contemptible graybeard leaning 
 back in his old leathern chair, and they began their 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 173 
 
 business ; the first spot to which they betook them- 
 selves was the carved oak box in which the Dante 
 was hidden, enshrined under lock and key. 
 
 * Not that, 'not that!' cried the old man, as he 
 involuntarily threw himself between his treasure 
 and the coarse, clutching hands of Gigi Fanno and 
 of Dessi, as he would have thrown himself between 
 his daughter and a violating touch. 'Take the rest 
 first,' muttered Ser Checchi faintly to his tor- 
 mentors. 
 
 The usher swore a filthy oath. 
 
 ' We are masters here, my old fellow,' he answered. 
 ' Beppe says aright. We do not pick and choose at 
 your bidding. We take all as the law hath a right 
 to take it. Give me the key, quick, or I call the 
 carabineers to force you. I suppose you have some 
 specie or drafts hidden here ?' 
 
 Ser Checchi did not reply. His face was livid, 
 the blue veins stood out like cords. He heard the 
 lad Poldo laugh ; the young clerk laughed in 
 answer. 
 
 ' It is a Codice ; you do not understand,' said the 
 librarian with a cruel tremor in all his spare slight 
 form. 
 
 ' You have no power of objection or selection,' 
 said Gigi Fanno contemptuously ; ' all your goods 
 are forfeit to the law. Quick ! give me the key of 
 the box.' 
 
 ' Come, out with the key,' said Beppe Dessi 
 pompously. ' We are the masters here, good man. 
 A debtor is a cipher in his own house.' 
 
 Ser Checchi, without a word, took a small antique 
 key off his watch-chain, and gave it to them. 
 
174 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 The usher took no more notice of him than if he 
 had not moved or spoken, but seized the key, pushed 
 him rudely aside, and pulled the great folio out of 
 its hiding-place in the oak brass-bound box, where 
 Ser Checchi had laid it as tenderly as though it 
 were the embalmed body of a king. 
 
 ' Vellum, eh ?' said Gigi Fanno, whilst he wetted 
 his thumb and forefinger, and turned its leaves 
 over one by one with a contemptuous gesture, as he 
 licked his thumb afresh and dog-eared one of the 
 beautiful fairly-written pages. 
 
 ' Look for an old manuscript of the " Divina 
 Commedia," which lies locked up in an oak box : it 
 does not look like manuscript, but that is what they 
 say it is ; it is rotten old rubbish, but a gentleman 
 has a fancy for it whom I know/ Aurelio Vestuccio 
 had whispered the night before, slipping a hundred- 
 franc note in the usher's ready palm : they had been 
 friends for years. Explanation is not needed be- 
 tween kindred spirits and bright intelligences. 
 Many had been the object, curious or valuable, 
 which the man of law had thus been able to seize at 
 a low valuation, and pass on to the auction room 
 where Messer Aurelio knew so well how to have any 
 precious thing knocked down, for little, to his con- 
 federates or representatives. Good-fellowship is a 
 most useful factor in business. 
 
 ' Worth five shillings, eh ? Or five pence ?' said 
 Beppe Dessi, leaning over the noble folio with a 
 grin, and rubbing the cabuchon carnelians with his 
 cotton handkerchief. 
 
 * Put ten francs,' said the usher to the boy who 
 wrote. ' It's big and will sell by weight ; they boil 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 17$ 
 
 up these old parchments, and make new writing 
 papers out of them, all nice and clean.' 
 
 He did not want his associates to know the 
 value which Ser Aurelio had attached to the musty 
 folio. 
 
 Ser Checchi stood near, the veins in his pale 
 brow swollen like blue cords ; his breast heaving, 
 his hands clenched ; he suffered as a high priest who 
 beholds his golden gods shattered, and his altar 
 vessels defiled. 
 
 ' Old " Divina Commedia " leather value ten 
 francs/ wrote the young clerk at the table. ' What 
 comes next ?' 
 
 Ser Checchi's eyes flamed under their hollow 
 brows, with difficulty he restrained himself from 
 violence, and, with a gesture of infinite tenderness 
 and reverence, he lifted the volume up from where 
 they had cast it, dusted it with his handkerchief, as 
 though to wipe off from it their polluting touch, and 
 laid it back in its little chest. 
 
 The two men and the boy gave a loud guffaw of 
 derision, and went on with their work : it was too 
 much trouble to enumerate the volumes and the 
 rolls of manuscript and the unbound books one by 
 one ; they contented themselves with writing them 
 down by the score and the hundred, as Lot i, Lot 
 2, Lot 3, dragging down the pamphlets and manu- 
 scripts from the well-ordered shelves, until all the 
 contents of the book-shelves were thus entered 
 on the sheets of stamped paper on which the youth 
 wrote. 
 
 They dawdled over their work, they smoked, they 
 cracked jokes, they spat on the floor, they splashed 
 
176 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 the ink and the sand about on the table, they tossed 
 the volumes to one another as if they were brick- 
 bats ; they took no more heed of the master of 
 them than if he had been a log of wood. 
 
 He had dropped into his chair again, and watched 
 them silently, his nails dug into the palms of his 
 hands in the effort which he made to restrain him- 
 self from very violence or opposition. All the order, 
 chronological and archaeological, in which the 
 volumes had been with such loving exactitude 
 arranged by him, was destroyed at a stroke, as the 
 men threw them roughly on the floor, piled them 
 together in bundles, and tied them up with string 
 architecture with ecclesiastical history, archaeology 
 with astrology, Benedetto of Imola with Boccaccio, 
 the Fathers of the Church with the Songsters of the 
 Renaissance, Poliziano with St. Gregory, a Giolito 
 Ariosto with the ' Nuova Antologia,' treasures from 
 the Medicean printing press with essays of Emile 
 Lavellye, old chap-books of the Ciompi time with 
 pamphlets of Bonghi's and of Sella's, classics of 
 Bernardo Cennini with the modern Cennini publica- 
 tions all pell-mell, as they happened to come to 
 their hand from the heaps into which they had 
 thrown them. 
 
 When they had finished their labours, they 
 dragged the Dante towards them once more, pulled 
 it out of its box malignantly, and bound it in a 
 packet with some newspapers, then threw it with a 
 loud bang on the top of the parcels of the books, 
 which strewed the ground knee-high, and filled the 
 whole intervening space from wall to wall. 
 
 Then the usher called to Ser Checchi ; 
 
THE TOWER OF T ADDED i?7 
 
 ' Show us the other rooms. We shall lock up 
 these.' 
 
 And he took out the keys from the locks. 
 
 Ser Checchi then arose ; his hands were tremb- 
 ling, and his lips were ashen pale ; but he controlled 
 his emotion with a mighty effort, and spoke with 
 courtesy and mildness. 
 
 ' Gentlemen, you have done what you deemed 
 right, no doubt, and no more than the law allows 
 you ; but you have undone all the labours of my life, 
 and I perceive that of books you have no knowledge 
 whatever. If you must, to appease my creditors, 
 sell these volumes, I would not oppose a just sale, 
 but there should be previously judgment of them by 
 those competent in such matters. Volumes full of 
 learning and of antiquity must not be dealt with as 
 though they were the common rubbish of a railway 
 bookstall. There are here specimens of the earliest 
 typographers of the city, which possess claims on all 
 scholars which you cannot comprehend, and would 
 bring high prices from all humanists. These 
 volumes are my all. They are some of them unique, 
 and many of them rare ; all all all of some value. 
 And you rob me of the last thing I have, when you 
 propose to barter them as mere waste paper. Nay, 
 you rob not me alone, but all true scholars. There 
 are works here of priceless import to all educated 
 men.' 
 
 He spoke firmly, though in a faint, low voice, 
 leaning his hand upon the table to hold himself 
 erect. Gigi Fanno listened, jingling the keys im- 
 patiently ; Beppe Dessi as he drained a flask of 
 wine ; the young clerk with his pen behind his ear 
 
 12 
 
i;8 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 and a grin upon his mouth. When he had ceased 
 they moved towards the door. 
 
 'Go out, sir,' said Fanno roughly to him. 'We 
 lock up the room, as you know.' 
 
 That was the only answer they gave to him. 
 
 ' Lock up my books ! Lock me away from my 
 books!' 
 
 ' Lock you out, certainly,' said Dessi, with a 
 jovial laugh. * They are yours no longer, good Ser 
 Checchi, and I am responsible for them to your 
 creditors and the tribunal.' 
 
 Ser Checchi looked at him, and from him to the 
 ferret-face of the usher, and to the broad, grinning 
 countenance of the clerk. He saw no mercy, no 
 pity, no respect, in any one of them. He was in 
 their eyes only an insolvent debtor, and a mad- 
 man likewise a poor aged fool, old and daft, like 
 Lear. 
 
 He understood that he was this, and no more 
 than this, in their eyes, and that help from them he 
 would get none. 
 
 He turned from the door, and seated himself in 
 his own large leathern chair. 
 
 * I remain amongst what hath long been my own, 
 if it be mine no more. Go you and do what you 
 deem your duty. You will find naught missing 
 when you return.' 
 
 The men ceased to laugh, and stood irresolute 
 about the doorway of the room. There was that in 
 his tone which awed them. 
 
 He had raised the Dante from the floor and un- 
 done its cords, and laid it on his knee. 
 
 No fallen monarch, seated amidst the ashes of 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 179 
 
 his burned palace, could have had more dignity 
 than he, as he sat thus, mute and still amongst the 
 havoc of his books. 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 ' WILL you trust him T whispered Gigi Fanno to 
 Beppe Dessi. 
 
 Dessi pursed up his mouth dubiously. 
 
 ' Eh ? well yes. He can't eat them, and he 
 can't drink them, and if he make away with one of 
 them we can clap him in gaol. Yes ; we will 
 chance it. I can come every day, and 'tis but for 
 fifteen days, all told.' 
 
 * Well, it is your right that you waive, and your 
 risk that you run, not mine. So be it,' said Fanno, 
 and the three men went out, and down the staircase, 
 to refresh their bodies with fried meats and arti- 
 chokes at an eating-house near, intending to return 
 in the afternoon to continue their good work. 
 
 But at the threshold of the great entrance-door 
 they met Beldia returning from her errand to the 
 notary, and her purchase of such plain, poor food as 
 she could now afford to buy. She recognised them 
 in terror. 
 
 * You came hither in my absence ?' 
 
 * To seize his books in execution of the sentence 
 promulgated by the most worshipful the Pretore of 
 the section of Santo Spirito ' began the usher. 
 
 But Beldia stopped him with a cry of horror. 
 
 * His books ! Even his books are not sacred ? 
 
i8o THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 Oh, it is monstrous, it is infamous ! Are you 
 Christian men ? Have you human hearts in your 
 breasts ? Take his books from him ! and in my 
 absence ?' 
 
 * The law does not wait for the absence or pre- 
 sence of anybody,' answered Gigi Fanno with im- 
 portance. 
 
 ' Not even for yours, madamigella !' added Dessi 
 with a leer. * But we are coming back in the 
 afternoon to finish the inventory, and if you like to 
 be with us, I for one shall be mighty pleased, for a 
 handsome woman ' 
 
 'What inventory?' asked Beldia. 
 
 ' We are not bound to give explanations,' said the 
 usher impatiently. ' Nevertheless, since perhaps 
 you can persuade your father to recognise the straits 
 in which he puts himself, I will read you the terms 
 of the Precetto.' 
 
 He took out of his pocket a copy of the document 
 which he had left with Ser Checchi. 
 
 ' At the demand of,' etc., etc., etc., he began, 
 reading aloud the preamble in pompous, stentorian 
 tones, bringing about them the idlers in the street, 
 and the grinning children who were playing near 
 with a wooden disc. 
 
 * Enough, enough, I understand,' she said hur- 
 riedly. 'The names are the names of others, but 
 the real mover herein is Vestuccio.' 
 
 'Signor Vestuccio? Ser' Rello!' repeated the 
 man in apparently scandalized amazement. ' There 
 is not the very smallest shadow of right to bring 
 that most worthy and excellent citizen into this 
 matter. His claims do not appear here. He de- 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 181 
 
 sires in his own matter to use the uttermost leniency 
 and patience.' 
 
 ' He hides his wickedness behind the masks of 
 others.' 
 
 ' Oh, signorina, pardon me, that is a shameful 
 charge!' said Gigi Fanno, putting back the docu- 
 ment into his coat pocket. ' Much may be excused 
 to your distress, but calumnious inventions are 
 always punishable by the law. Of that I warn you, 
 and I can tell you farther that there is not in 
 the whole city a citizen so intelligent, so upright, 
 and so admirable in all his relations as is Signor 
 Vestuccio.' 
 
 'Your old man upstairs is only fit for a mad- 
 house/ said Beppe Dessi in his turn. 'But we have 
 strained a point to do him a kindness. We have 
 left him amongst his books ; though, had we done 
 our duty, we should have brought the keys away 
 and shut him on the wrong side of the door.' 
 
 Impatient of more delay, Gigi Fanno elbowed her 
 off the doorstep, and, cocking his hat on one side of 
 his head, he went away to his fry and his arti- 
 chokes. 
 
 'Never mind, my pretty; I'll show you a way to 
 get over it,' whispered Dessi, thrusting his red 
 round face close to hers. She drew back with such 
 undisguised disgust and repulsion that even his slow 
 and coarse mind could not mistake them. 
 
 'Damn your pride, my penniless madam!' he 
 muttered as he joined his colleague. ' You'll come 
 cringing to us on your bare bones before we've done 
 with you.' 
 
 She went upstairs to her father, and sat on the 
 
1 82 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 stone floor at his feet, and embraced his knees 
 silently in a passion of sympathy, to which she could 
 give no adequate expression. 
 
 He said nothing. He held the Dante folio in his 
 hands, and gazed down on it with a vacant look in 
 his fine luminous eyes, always until now so radiantly 
 lighted with the lambent flame of high intelligence. 
 
 ' Father,' she said timidly after awhile, and with 
 great deference and tenderness, ' pray do not shut 
 me out of your confidence. I am not a child, nor 
 am I a woman of voluble tongue, that you should 
 fear to trust me. I see these terrible papers from 
 the tribunal come every week : I know what they 
 must mean, although I have not read any one of 
 them. There are rumours that Antella is sold, and 
 I know nothing. Yet I hear that the books even 
 may soon be sold, and that they are already seized. 
 I ask you, is it true ? Give me at least the right to 
 deny these calumnies in your name, or tell me the 
 truth, and spare me the indignity of hearing it from 
 the mouths of gossips, and being compelled to con- 
 fess to them that I am an exile from my father's 
 heart, and less acquainted with his position than 
 the very sweepers in the streets. Time and again, 
 in your absence, those law-papers have been brought 
 to me, and I could have read them and learned all 
 their meaning, whether you willed it or no ; but I 
 did not do so. I deserve some pity and some trust.' 
 
 She spoke with great emotion, but with great 
 dignity and simplicity. The tone of her words, 
 rather than the words themselves, carried conviction 
 of their justice to her father's mind, and filled him 
 with repentance and relenting. 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 183 
 
 Slow tears rose to his eyes and fell down his pale 
 cheeks. He stretched his hand out to her, and drew 
 her to his chair. 
 
 1 You have deserved all good from me, and you 
 get but ill/ he said in a broken voice. ' I will tell you 
 of my misery if it will make it to you, who will be 
 forced to share it, less bitter. I have been a blind, 
 weak, credulous fool. I am ruined. And and 
 yea, the cup is draining to the dregs ! the books 
 must go !' 
 
 Then, for the first time in his life he leaned his 
 forehead on his hands and wept. 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 IN the early afternoon the trio of the tribunal re- 
 turned, and pursued their work. They were more 
 rough, more rude, more hasty, and more sullen, for 
 they had in the interval drunk a good deal of wine, 
 and wine makes most men ill-tempered rather than 
 jovial ; they came into the chambers with noise and 
 pomp, and called coarsely to Beldia to aid them, 
 and show them where the linen was kept, and the 
 china and the hardware. She did not move. 
 
 ' There is nothing hidden,' she replied calmly. 
 ' You have eyes ; use them/ 
 
 ' You are bound to assist the law !' screamed the 
 usher, thumping his hand down on an old brass- 
 bound escritoire. ' Bring out all your keys, or I 
 summon the carabineers to enforce my right.' 
 
 She rose, knowing that her father would not be 
 
1 84 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 benefited by any brawl or disturbance, and fetched 
 the keys and laid them down beside Gigi Fanno. 
 
 He took them up savagely, and tossed them to 
 his colleague Dessi. 
 
 ' Make her show you which is which,' he said to 
 his coadjutor, ' or we shall never get through all this 
 work by nightfall.' 
 
 ' Come, my girl,' said Beppe Dessi insolently, 
 ' get up and show us which is which of all these 
 keys, and maybe, if you are pretty behaved, we will 
 let you take out some finery and trinket of your 
 own and hide it.' 
 
 But she did not stir. She might have been deaf 
 and dumb for any reply which they could obtain 
 from her. They tried the keys, one after another, 
 for themselves, and set the doors and drawers of 
 every bureau and chest and cupboard and closet in 
 the rooms wide open. 
 
 Then began a havoc, such as to an orderly and 
 careful housekeeper like herself would have been at 
 any time torture, even without the shame which it 
 now brought with it to her. 
 
 They ransacked the place, as soldiers do in a 
 sacked city in search of plunder. They dragged 
 everything out from its resting-place, and held 
 everything up to the light, and chuckled and 
 grumbled, and scoffed and swore ; appraising all the 
 objects at miserable prices, and setting the young 
 clerk to catalogue them at their estimate. All the 
 fair linen, made and marked by her mother's hands, 
 with its odour of dried lavender and ground orris- 
 root, was held up and pulled about by their dirty 
 fingers. The old solid silver plate, with its date of 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 185 
 
 1620, was weighed and rubbed, and jeered at and 
 thrown together in a drawer. The old pottery 
 some of Gubbio and Casteldurante was grinned 
 at, and pushed together on shelves, and written 
 down as common earthenware. The flowered pot 
 which Vestuccio had eyed on the dinner-table, 
 enviously, months before, was first of all secured 
 and shut up in a wardrobe. The iris-root and 
 orange petals, laid up with the wearing apparel to 
 keep out moths, were shaken out upon the floors, 
 and every article made the object of coarse gibe and 
 jest. 
 
 They dawdled their errand out over four long 
 hours ; and lighted candles, and poked them into 
 dark corners and empty closets, to see that there 
 was nothing hidden there. Then, leaving some 
 places vacant and others over-filled, they locked up 
 the latter and pocketed the keys, and sat all three at 
 a table conning over the lists which they had made. 
 
 ' Verify and sign them,' they said to Beldia. 
 
 She did not answer. 
 
 They went into the inner book-room, and bade 
 her father rise and come and sign. He took no 
 notice of them. Made furious by such disobedience, 
 they ordered the boy Poldo to do so, and Poldo, 
 shamefaced and frightened, yet very important, 
 exchanging grins and winks with the young tribunal 
 clerk, came up to the table and scrawled his name, 
 in witness to the inventories and acts of seizure, as 
 the law in its sapience required that someone present 
 in the house should do. 
 
 All was disorder, nakedness, and discomfort : their 
 tobacco was spilled upon the floor, their ink upon the 
 
1 86 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 table ; the old familiar household things were locked 
 away from their owners, two or three necessary 
 objects were alone left out for daily use, and the 
 empty cupboards of which the doors stood open 
 looked like graves ; they were indeed the graves of 
 peace, of credit, of all simple peace, and of all honest 
 joys. 
 
 ? She roused herself to make a cup of coffee for her 
 father, and poured a little brandy in it, and took it 
 to him with a roll. To please her he tried to take it, 
 but his throat refused to swallow ; the slow, salt tears 
 of age were rolling down his cheeks ; he was cold, and 
 trembled with the nervous shiver of intense emotion 
 long repressed. 
 
 Folko came and laid his head on his master's 
 feet. 
 
 The candles which the men had lighted shed a 
 faint flickering light over the room. 
 
 The boy Poldo, seeing that he was unwatched, 
 slipped down the stairs and into the street, and 
 narrated to his comrades a wonderful tale of how 
 the officers of the tribunal had selected him as 
 witness to their verbale a tale told with many in- 
 ventions to the glorification of himself. 
 
 ' I can be a writer at the tribunal to-morrow, if I 
 wish,' said Poldo, very vain - glorious and self- 
 admiring, whilst he chucked a halfpenny in the air, 
 to see whether he or his friends should stand a treat 
 of vermuth at the drinking shop opposite with the 
 green bough above its door. 
 
 At last she knew as much as her father knew him- 
 self of his losses, of his liabilities, of his utter and 
 irretrievable ruin. 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 187 
 
 Although her own fears and the words of others 
 had in so large a measure prepared her for the 
 worst, yet the truth came to her with a terrible 
 shock as of some disgrace wholly incredible and un- 
 suspected. Although she had perceived that much 
 was wrong and much was ominous, yet the profound 
 faith which she had always had from infancy in his 
 wisdom, and the habit ingrained in her of never per- 
 mitting herself to judge or criticise him, had made 
 her persuade herself that it could be only some 
 mere passing embarrassment which had been 
 brought about by her brother's extravagance. But 
 now that she realized the full extent, the irreparable 
 nature, of these calamities, she could no longer 
 strive to think that her parent was blameless, or 
 their situation easy to mend. 
 
 Their resources were stopped short, their revenue 
 from their farm was cut off; the slight trade ever 
 done in the book rooms had ceased entirely, for 
 customers will not go where the demon of liquida- 
 tion has shown its grim and grinning head ; the 
 cupboards and desks and bureaus were all locked 
 up, and the keys borne away by the bailiff. 
 
 She saw quite well how he had been brought to 
 his plight by carelessness, by over-confidence in 
 himself and others, by that absence of mind which 
 is so often the accompaniment of intellectual devo- 
 tion to an ideal or an art, and by that habit of 
 reserve which, whilst admirable in its origin, is so 
 frequently fatal in its results, shutting out those 
 whom it isolates from the counsel and from the 
 guidance of others. An immense pity for him took 
 the vacated place of her perished trust, and she was 
 
1 88 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 almost insensible of the material losses and injuries 
 to herself brought on her by his weakness, so 
 entirely was she absorbed in her unselfish sorrow 
 for him and in compassion for his poignant self- 
 reproach. 
 
 'Oh, the cruelty of Cirillo !' she thought: had 
 only Cirillo been that which he should have been, 
 all these calamities would never have befallen them. 
 He would have had ways, and means, and knowledge, 
 which to her, a woman, obedient and ignorant, it 
 had been impossible to possess ; or, possessing, it 
 would have been impossible to use. 
 
 For the first time since Odisio's departure she 
 rejoiced that he was gone : he could have done no 
 good, and it would have wrung his soul to have wit- 
 nessed what it would have been out of his power to 
 alter. For the ruin of her father seemed to her 
 complete beyond any possibility of help. 
 
 Nothing which she could do to save her father 
 was of any avail. Without money, and much 
 money, there was no means of obtaining release or 
 delay. There was the feeling abroad that the 
 sooner the sales took place the better w r ould it be 
 for the creditors ; and when such an impression as 
 this is created, it were easier to stop the incoming 
 tides of the sea than the insistence of those who 
 have the power to insist. 
 
 She had at intervals tender and grave letters 
 from Odisio's old mother in Brescia ; and she 
 answered them with gratitude and humility, but she 
 feared that her replies might seem constrained and 
 reserved to their recipient ; for she could not bring 
 herself to tell of her father's afflictions, and the 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 189 
 
 reticence involved weighed on her frank and candid 
 spirit. 
 
 Yet how could she reveal these sordid and vulgar 
 calamities ? They seemed to taint her with their 
 own coarseness ; how could she say to Odisio's 
 mother, ' We are in misery, and soon shall starve,' 
 without seeming to beg from her, without seeming 
 to be a mere common scheming supplicant, un- 
 worthy of her son's troth ? No, never, never, she 
 thought, would she hint a word of their necessities 
 to this unknown woman in Lombardy ; sooner 
 would she die for want of bread. Moreover, Odisio 
 had often said that his mother had nothing but the 
 little annuity which he had purchased for her, and 
 her small house beside the Broletto. 
 
 It would but add to the distress and anxiety 
 caused her by his absence, were she to know that 
 the maiden to whom he was betrothed was travail- 
 ing under the coarse and foul cares of indigence and 
 debt. 'We may never meet in life,' thought Beldia ; 
 ' but, at least, she shall always think of me as what 
 he has portrayed.' 
 
 She suffered keenly from the absence and the 
 silence of her betrothed ; and the material troubles 
 which beset her were almost, in a sense, of service 
 to her by distracting her from the visions and appre- 
 hensions which were for ever in her mind with 
 regard to his fate. 
 
 Creditors are only patient if patience seems to 
 them to be in their own interests, and it was not 
 their interest here. Behind the scenes, Querci, and 
 the other lawyers who served Vestuccio, were daily 
 pressing for immediate sale, and setting afloat the 
 
190 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 rumour that only those who acted quickly would get 
 any share of the proceeds. 
 
 Italian law is sharp and sudden when it deals 
 with debtors ; for assassins and other criminals it 
 will creep gently and considerately by devious ways 
 which leave the offender many a loophole of escape, 
 but the debtor is a more abhorred and intolerable 
 culprit ; he is dealt with in a summary fashion, and 
 has no escape, unless, indeed, he be indebted on a 
 fine large scale, and has ruined a million or so of 
 people, when the law will extend to him the indul- 
 gence it shows to the murderer. 
 
 With a protested bill, judgment against the 
 acceptor is immediate ; in five days execution is put 
 in, and in ten more the sale takes place, unless the 
 full amount, with heavy costs, be paid. 
 
 Ser Checchi, as a tradesman, had, of course, 
 always known the state of the law and the penalty 
 attached to dishonoured paper ; but he was absent 
 of mind, sanguine and yet timid, and had been too 
 much inclined to trust all things to chance. 
 
 The sentences and the seizures had followed one 
 on another with lightning-like rapidity, and had 
 found him wholly unprepared to meet them. On 
 legal grounds there was no resistance possible ; his 
 signatures were there, and he acknowledged them : 
 there was no plea of opposition which he could lay 
 before a lawyer ; there was nothing to be done but 
 to submit to execution, or pay the amounts. 
 
 He could no more pay them than he could have 
 paid the vast deficit in the National Treasury. An 
 old comrade, the Notary Reggiani, shook his head 
 and groaned when he saw the documents. 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 191 
 
 1 1 cannot take up your case, because there is no 
 ground in it to go upon,' he said; 'you have not 
 honoured your signature to these bills, and your 
 mortgagees were allowed to foreclose. What is 
 there to say ? Your pursuants, indeed, may be 
 brutal and cunning, but they are wholly within the 
 law. The law will not accept as an excuse that 
 your wits were wool-gathering over commentaries 
 and early editions, and so did not remember or per- 
 ceive your liabilities.' 
 
 Other than this no lawyer would say ; and there 
 was reluctance in all the legal offices to accept the 
 affairs of a man who admitted that he had no capital 
 left, and showed that, as they considered, he had no 
 capacity either. All the young advocates, who had 
 come to the library so often on literary errands, 
 shook their heads, and shut their office doors. 
 
 As for Pampilio Querci, he had accepted the land- 
 lord Saetta's affairs, and acted as that worthy's 
 representative. A fledgling lawyer, who intends to 
 be a counsellor and a deputy in due time, is not to 
 be rejected in his suit by a maiden, without making 
 her suffer for such want of appreciation. Querci 
 was hand-in-glove with Vestuccio, and gave him 
 much adroit assistance and advice, both officially 
 and ex cathedra. 
 
 Rising men have a bond of sympathy between 
 them ; they climb in turn upon each other's 
 shoulders. Old men, who are disappearing and 
 decaying are only in their sight as sapless and 
 leafless trees, which cumber the ground, and are 
 best cut down ere they fall of themselves. 
 
 Uselessly, and with touching dignity in his humi- 
 
192 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 Hating martyrdom, Ser Checchi went to office after 
 office, and spoke to this man and the other, whom 
 he had benefited with his learning and the loan of his 
 books. One and all turned their backs on him 
 some with a show of courtesy and regret ; some not 
 even caring to assume so much decency as that ; 
 some bidding him bluntly not take up their time. 
 
 He knew what his beloved Dante had known, 
 how bitter it is to climb the stairs of others, to beg 
 in vain for redress and justice ; and, if he had not 
 yet known how hard it is to eat the bread of 
 others, he felt that it would not be long before he 
 did so. 
 
 For actual want was close at his door. 
 
 Had they been willing to sell or pawn anything, 
 they could not have done so without being treated 
 as criminals ; they had lost all right over their own 
 possessions. Every other day the bailiff looked in, 
 and walked about, and lit his pipe, and patted this 
 object, and peered at this article and that, by way of 
 earning the liberal fees with which his procreator, 
 the law, endowed him. He wanted to be bribed 
 into staying away, but this Beldia did not know, 
 and, had she known it, had no means wherewith to 
 bribe him ; and he, in vengeance, annoyed her as 
 much as his position permitted spat on her clean 
 floors, sat and smoked on the edge of her bed, cut 
 coarse jokes at her distress, and went to sleep in 
 her father's own chair. Human nature, when it is 
 hungry for a bribe and gets it not ; is as a froward 
 suckling denied its nurse's breast. 
 
 The serenity and self-restraint which were her 
 habit only made her suffer more ; if she could have 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 193 
 
 screamed and raved and torn her hair, as the women 
 of her quarter would have done in similar circum- 
 stances, she would have suffered far less than she 
 suffered silently in beholding the coarse and dirty 
 figure of old Dessi pattering amongst her lavender- 
 scented linen, or standing against the light amongst 
 the neglected herbs and flowers of her garden on 
 the roof. 
 
 'A proud-stomached hussy!' said Dessi to him- 
 self. ' How dare anybody be proud,' he thought, 
 ' when he had the keys of their chests in his own 
 desk at home ?' 
 
 The world was divided into two races, in his 
 opinion. There were the people who seized goods, 
 and there were the people whose goods were seized. 
 All his homage was given to the former ; the latter 
 he regarded as the ferret regards the rabbit. The 
 ferret lives by the rabbit, indeed, but its scorn for 
 the rabbit is boundless. 
 
 ' We are human, if we are ruined,' a poor woman, 
 whose bed had been sold from under her, had said 
 once to him and his colleagues ; and Dessi had 
 cocked up his snub nose in the air. 
 
 'Ay, ay, ye're human,' he had answered, 'as a 
 skinned eel in the frying-pan is still an eel.' 
 
 And the hard-hearted joke had wounded the poor 
 woman more than the cold brick-floor on which her 
 ill-covered bones were forced to lie. 
 
 Beppe Dessi had it in his power, by his mere 
 presence, his mere interference, his mere legalized 
 espionage, to torture the spirit of Beldia, as St. 
 Agnes was tortured by the eyes and hands of the 
 gaoler who bared her virgin breasts for the steel of 
 
 13 
 
i 9 4 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 the shears. Everything about her seemed sullied 
 and profaned. Nothing seemed her own any more. 
 The privacy of life was ended ; her home was as 
 public as the street. 
 
 Her father scarcely seemed to notice what was 
 done. He had sunk into an apathy from which he 
 was only roused at rare intervals. 
 
 The scholar, with his mind far away amongst the 
 beauties and mysteries of the past, and lost in the 
 impersonal and delightful meditations with which 
 an old chronicle or a new reading of an obscure text 
 filled him, had heeded too little the things of daily 
 life, been too thankful to escape from their sordid 
 cares and wearing pressure, and had fallen an easy 
 prey to the sophisms and temptations of a shrewd 
 and soft-spoken man of business. 
 
 ' Antella must go,' Ser Checchi had thought often, 
 with a cruel pang ; but he had never dreamed that, 
 Antella wholly lost to him, he would remain still in 
 the same sad plight, still abandoned face to face 
 with debts incurred he could not have said how. 
 
 Ever since he had yielded to Vestuccio in accept- 
 ing aid for the purchase of the rare Codex of Giogoli, 
 he had pursued a downward path, and he had never 
 known in plain figures what he was engaged to pay. 
 A bill, in skilful hands, with its renewals, interest, 
 compound interest, and all its attendant obligations, 
 grows like the beanstalk of fable, and fastens its 
 suckers as securely as the cuttlefish. Ser Checchi, 
 besides great absence of mind, had a tender and 
 proud heart ; he had shrunk from telling his troubles 
 to his daughter and his friends, and it had been insup- 
 portable to him to make his household feel pecuniary 
 strain or suffer the harshness of personal want, 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 195 
 
 He would now have sold his library by private 
 contract or by voluntary auction had his creditors 
 allowed him to do so, but they would not consent. 
 In vain he strove to persuade them and their 
 attorneys that such a course, by enabling the books 
 to be sold at their proper value, would bring in 
 twice, thrice, probably ten or twenty times as much 
 money as if they were sold by the order of the 
 tribunal. He knew well how the latter sales w r ere 
 controlled by the official and habitual frequenters of 
 them, so that the finest work of art or literature can 
 be knocked down as so much mere canvas or paper. 
 
 Sold to amateurs and experts, his library, which 
 was in many ways quaint and rare, would almost 
 certainly have brought in much more than he owed. 
 With the salt tears in his eyes, he besought his 
 persecutors to agree together and let him do this ; 
 his heart would be wrung to part from his treasures, 
 but, at least, when dispersed, they would thus find 
 asylum on the shelves of those who could appreciate 
 and care for them, whilst, if they went by auction 
 by order of the sheriff's officer, they would in all 
 likelihood be bought by weight, and in bundles to 
 line butter-tubs or travellers' trunks. 
 
 Oftentimes at such law-enforced sales, in lonely 
 villages or on secluded hillsides, he had seen ancient 
 objects of rare workmanship, chairs, settles, chests, 
 copper vessels, iron work, pottery, porcelain, knocked 
 down at the sound of the horn for a few copper 
 pieces or a single silver bit. Thus, in early days, he 
 had himself bought several of his volumes at such 
 sales ; though he had always, in pity and in honour, 
 sought out the poor owner thus sacrificed to the 
 teeth and claws of the law, and paid to him secretly 
 
196 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 the balance of what he had considered the due 
 value of such purchases. But the measure which 
 Ser Checchi gave, no one gave to him. 
 
 His entreaties were of no avail ; he had waited 
 too long. He had, in the innocent egotism of the 
 bibliophile, shrunk from the mere thought of such 
 a voluntary sale when he had been still at liberty to 
 make it. Now he was no longer free to do so. 
 The Codice and all the other valuable works were 
 seized promiscuously, amongst the worthless ones, 
 by distraint. And his creditors were too jealous of 
 one another to consent to what might have been of 
 profit to them all. True, had Vestuccio advised 
 such a conciliatory course, and one so advantageous 
 to the debtor, they might have been persuaded to 
 unite and permit it to be followed. But Vestuccio 
 publicly said, with frank surprise, * Nay, I am not 
 in this matter; I have nothing to do with it, thank 
 God I have not ; my heart would be too tender to 
 rob the poor old silly scholar of his all.' And 
 privately to those persons, his instruments, to whom 
 he had passed on Ser Checchi's signatures, he 
 whispered : ' It would not be prudent to allow a 
 voluntary sale ; to do so, all the acts must be 
 dropped, all the sentences annulled. Personally, I 
 would do anything in my power to help the old 
 gentleman, but I could not, in conscience and honour, 
 counsel you to throw away all the advantage you 
 have gained by the verdicts of the Pretura; his 
 books alone might sell for much, or they might sell 
 for nothing, whereas, if all the goods are sold as 
 well, it is impossible that there should not be 
 realized at least some fifty per cent, of what he 
 owes. Besides, to agree to what he wishes, you 
 
TOWER OF TADDEO 197 
 
 must all be of accord, and when are a group of 
 creditors ever all of accord ? Were his affairs in 
 my hands alone, I could have arranged, I could still 
 arrange them ; but where there are many opposing 
 creditors, a charitable combination is impossible.' 
 
 ' Impossible,' added Pampilio Querci. 
 
 How was it that there were so many creditors ? 
 Ser Checchi could not understand this ; he had 
 thought that he had dealt solely with Vestuccio, and 
 although he had put his signature to drafts drawn 
 up in other persons' names, he had been assured 
 that these bills would lie safely and unseen in Ves- 
 tuccio's desk, and had imagined in his innocence 
 that the mortgage given by him on the land of 
 Antella would cover all these loans. After all, the 
 sums were very small, and had he earlier had the 
 courage to sell his rarer folios and earlier editions 
 to foreign buyers with some little sacrifice, they 
 could have been met and covered. But it had been 
 no part of Vestuccio's interests to allow his victim 
 to clearly comprehend his own position, and he had 
 let him float on in uncertainty and indecision until 
 it had become too late to take any decided step to 
 struggle out of the meshes into which he had sunk. 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 ' WILL you come to supper, madamigella ? It grows 
 late,' cried the rough voice of Veronica from the inner 
 chamber, where their frugal table was spread. 
 
 She was a good - hearted woman, but in her 
 manner she permitted herself to be rougher, ruder, 
 more boisterous of late ; she did not see why she 
 
198 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 should not add violence to her nature, why she 
 should trouble herself to speak softly, and stir 
 noiselessly, to please folks who had the sheriff's 
 officer coming to their doors every day. 
 
 ' Madamigella has always wanted as much ob- 
 servance as if she were a queen. Eh ! much she 
 will get of it now,' said the serving-woman, with 
 her arms akimbo, and a frown and a laugh together 
 on her face, to her devoted listener, the boy Poldo. 
 She was angered that the evening meal was thus 
 delayed, and her own work thus prolonged. 
 
 ' Nobody lets you be proud if you are poor/ added 
 Veronica, with accurate knowledge of human nature. 
 
 ' The signorina is not proud, not a bit proud,' 
 said Poldo ; ' but she has a way with her which 
 makes you feel small, and when she looks at you 
 she cows you, though she is kind.' 
 
 ' Ay, ay, and won't they pay her off for all that 
 now ?' said Veronica, who was vexed and pained by 
 the woes of her employers, yet found a certain relish 
 in them. It fretted her to think that the whole 
 quarter would see the hateful Banda swinging under 
 the majolica angels and amorini ; and yet it brought 
 her importance and excitement to gossip about it all 
 at the greengrocer's and the cheesemonger's, the 
 butcher's and the tinman's, and to say with satis- 
 faction : ' It does not matter to me no, no I have 
 a line nest-egg of my own in the savings bank, and 
 I am torn in two with people who want me to go to 
 them. I want nobody's bed or board; it would be 
 well for them if they could say as much, poor souls ! 
 but the master was always up in the clouds, and 
 never saw the dirt which lay in his path, or the 
 stones that he stumbled over. Leave? oh yes, I 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 199 
 
 shall leave, of course ; the saints befriend them when 
 I am gone ! They will want help sorely.' 
 
 Between her humiliation at such disasters befall- 
 ing a family which she served, and her importance 
 at being the bearer of such dreadful news to the 
 gossips of Santo Spirito and San Jacopo, she did 
 not know whether she was the more glad or the 
 more grieved, at the events which had cast such 
 a gloom over the peaceful life in the tower. The 
 boy was wholly sorrowful. Nowhere would he find 
 another mistress so thoughtful for his creature com- 
 forts as Madama Beldia. 
 
 It was dull work, indeed, copying and yawning 
 amongst those musty old volumes, where never a 
 laugh was heard or a joke was made. But then, in 
 compensation, what abundance of good wheaten 
 bread, of sound red wine, of fritters, of pickles, of 
 macaroni, of polenta, and of summer and winter 
 fruits ! The Vestuccio children would henceforth 
 devour those grapes and figs, those nuts and walnuts 
 of Antella, which had been his summer and autumn 
 joys ; and he had heard the chandler say to the 
 charcoal-seller : ' I shall give the tower folks no 
 more of anything unless they pay ready-money; they 
 have not a penny, they say, so down on the nail they 
 shall pay before a grain of rice or a stick of paste 
 goes out to them.' 
 
 And the heart of the lad had been heavy, as he 
 had heard, because what he heard meant short 
 commons and an empty stomach for himself. No 
 one had ever understood, as Madama Beldia had 
 done, that a growing boy's hunger is bottomless, 
 and restless as the sounding sea. Poldo would will- 
 ingly have struck down the chandler amongst his 
 
203 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 tubs of beans and seeds, his little round cheeses, his 
 savoury brown sausages, his smoked tongues, and 
 his flasks of olive oil. No credit to Madamigella 
 Beldia, who had paid, every Saturday morning, her 
 little weekly accounts at the shops as regularly and 
 as surely as the strokes of the old Dutch house- 
 clock tolled out the hours ! 
 
 ' It is a shame, a crying shame !' said Poldo, with 
 red eyes and burning cheeks. 
 
 ' It is the way of the world,' said Veronica. ' If 
 you can drive a coach and six when you choose, 
 everybody you meet on the road offers you a lift ; 
 everybody, from the Archbishop in his chariot to the 
 dustman in his donkey-cart ; but if you are a poor 
 devil limping along the highway with a sore foot 
 and a ragged jacket, why, then, nobody ever sees you 
 on the path, neither his Grace nor the sweeper !' 
 
 ' It is an infamous shame !' repeated the boy with 
 fury. 
 
 Veronica was less touched to wrath : she saw 
 matters as the small traders saw them. 
 
 * They will send nothing, nothing, unless you pay 
 for it ; there are no weekly credits now,' she said to 
 Beldia, with the sort of triumph which a coarse 
 nature always feels in hurting the dignity of a 
 delicate temper. 
 
 Beldia shrank as from the touch of a hot iron, but 
 she soon recovered her self-command. 
 
 ' It is very natural that they should feel afraid to 
 trust us,' she answered. ' I will give you the ready- 
 money every morning.' 
 
 ' For how long ?' said Veronica. ' If you have 
 got ready-money, madamigella, you had best hide it 
 upon your person when Gigi and Beppe come round 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 201 
 
 next. They poke into every hole and corner, nothing 
 escapes them, and if they see any money they will 
 take it.' 
 
 Beldia looked at her with the bewildered, harassed 
 look of the tracked hare. 
 
 ' They cannot deny us a little money for food,' 
 she said stupidly. ' Even the galley-slaves are fed.' 
 
 'The galley-slaves? ay, ay!' said the woman 
 roughly. ' But they have the wit to break the law 
 and make the nation maintain them. Poor master 
 has only made away with his own, you see ; so he 
 may go and starve, and it is nobody's business if he 
 starve to death. If you have any money, hide it, or 
 give it to me, and I will keep it about me.' 
 
 ' I will hide nothing/ said Beldia firmly ; but her 
 eyes did not lose their strained and hunted expres- 
 sion. The woman's words had brought home to 
 her with startling distinctness the fact that all her 
 father possessed had been seized in the name of his 
 creditors ; and that nothing, not even the sheets 
 they slept in, or the platter on which they cut their 
 loaf, was their own any more. 
 
 ' You have jewels and pretty things, madama,' 
 said Veronica ; ' they can't touch them, they are 
 yours ; you can pawn or sell them.' 
 
 Beldia was silent. 
 
 All her little personal treasures had gone, one by 
 one, to satisfy the leechlike craving of her brother, 
 and at the last the pearls had gone. She had nothing 
 left, except her body-linen and her wearing apparel. 
 
 Everything in the tower was her father's, and 
 thus, now, belonged to his creditors. 
 
 ' If the master had had a grain of sense,' said 
 Veronica, * knowing the plight he was in, he would 
 
202 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 have made a deed of gift of it all to you, or a deed 
 of sale to Messer Odisio ; and Messer Odisio would 
 have stayed at home, and wedded you, and all 
 would have gone well/ 
 
 ' My father would never do a dishonourable thing,' 
 said Beldia quickly, with a sigh. ' That would have 
 been dishonourable/ 
 
 ' Ah !' said the serving- woman, with brusque con- 
 tempt. ' Fine words fry no fish, and mend no holes. 
 Is it honourable, think you, to write away his chil- 
 dren's patrimony, and bring a maiden like you face 
 to face with a vulgar shame and contumely like this, 
 because he never had courage or strength to look 
 his affairs in the face, and leave off buying mouldy 
 parchments and mice-gnawed books ? Honour 
 honour ! 'tis a mighty big word ; but it seems to me 
 as how Ser Checchi, who is so rare and fond of it, 
 has read its reading upside down !' 
 
 ' Be silent !' said Beldia sternly. * Cannot you 
 respect my father's name? You have eaten his 
 bread and known his goodness twenty years and 
 more. Is it not infamy enough that his old age is 
 betrayed and tormented by strangers, without the 
 foulness of his servants' tongues daring to soil his 
 stainless name ?' 
 
 'What I say is true, signorina,' said Veronica 
 doggedly, yet abashed. 
 
 ' Yes, it is quite true,' said the voice of Ser 
 Checchi behind them. 
 
 Veronica screamed, and let fall the knife and the 
 carrot which her hands held. 
 
 ' I thought you were out of the house, sir/ she 
 stammered, confused and terrified. 
 
 ' I am no eavesdropper,' said Checchi, with a 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 203 
 
 faint, sad smile. ' But you spoke so loudly, 
 Veronica, that I heard you on the stairs. You are 
 quite right ; I have dishonoured myself and robbed 
 my daughter. Believe me, you cannot censure me 
 as doth my conscience by day and night.' 
 
 He spoke gently and humbly, with the meekness 
 of a chidden child, yet with the dignity of a dis- 
 crowned king. 
 
 Veronica stood and stared at him in irresolute 
 amaze ; then, with a gasp, she threw her rough 
 apron over her head, turned her shoulder to the 
 wall, and sobbed aloud. 
 
 ' I was a beast to say it/ she muttered between 
 her sobs. ' And I never meant it I never thought 
 it, dear master !' 
 
 ' I have told you that you were right,' said Ser 
 Checchi. ' Yet I cannot let such things be said in 
 my house, so long as I have a house at all. There 
 is your wage for a month. Let this be the last 
 night that you sleep here.' 
 
 And he laid on the table beside her the amount 
 of her wage; it was the last money that he possessed. 
 
 ' No, no, master, no, no !' she cried, her voice 
 choked by her sobs. * I have an ill tongue, but I 
 have not a base heart. I have eaten your bread in 
 your prosperity; I will not leave you in your misery. 
 I have laid by six hundred francs in your service ; I 
 will lend them to you, if you will take them. No, 
 no, I will not go. Madamigella Beldia, speak for 
 me ! I will not go. I will not touch that money. 
 He says that what I said was true. Then, why 
 turn me from the door because I said it ?' 
 
 Ser Checchi put the money into her unwilling hand. 
 
 * The truth is truth, by whomsoever spoken/ he 
 
204 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 said briefly ; ' but we love not those who chasten 
 us. Go ; and leave us to our fate. You are a strong 
 woman and a capable servant ; you will find service 
 elsewhere. We can keep none to serve us now.' 
 
 And he put the weeping woman gently but firmly 
 out from the chamber, and closed the door upon 
 her. Then his firmness deserted him, and his age 
 and his sorrows overcame him. He sank, broken and 
 tremulous, upon the nearest seat. 
 
 ' She was right,' he said hoarsely. ' I am dis- 
 honoured. My daughter my dear daughter ! for- 
 give me all I bring upon you !' 
 
 Beldia kissed his hands. 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 LIFE in the tower of Taddeo had been hitherto 
 always so peaceful, orderly, and regular, with an 
 almost puritanic method 'in all its ways and habits, 
 that the disorder of poverty, and the irregularity 
 entailed by it, were the most cruel tortures and trials 
 which could have befallen Beldia. Never in her life 
 had she left a small or large payment over-due, a 
 household bill neglected ; their living had been 
 simple, but generous and unstrained ; she had never 
 thought twice before giving an alms or offering a 
 meal, and the utmost exactitude had been observed 
 in the discharge of all obligations which came before 
 her in the daily routine of her management. 
 
 The difficulties, the embarrassments, the small, 
 mean, trivial troubles which go with need of money, 
 now harassed and embarrassed her at every step. 
 She felt lowered by them and defiled by them. 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 205 
 
 Every morning since she had been a child of fifteen 
 she had set the house in order as soon as she had 
 risen for the day ; and, although her father had 
 bade her avoid extravagance, she had always had 
 plenty for the homely and comfortable needs of life, 
 and had never been forced to deny herself the 
 pleasure of getting a flask of superior wine for a 
 guest, a dish of fruit for the table, or a bunch of 
 market flowers for herself. To be obliged to pause 
 before she bought a few eggs or a little rice, to have 
 to divide a few copper pieces anxiously between 
 bread for to-day and bread for to-morrow, was a 
 trial so new, so unimagined, that she felt herself the 
 prey of some oppressive nightmare ; sunk by it to 
 the level of the beggars at the street corners, the 
 poor begars for whose improvidence her pity alone 
 had prevented her disdain. All the heavy manual 
 work also of the house fell upon herself alone. True, 
 Veronica was not far off indeed, and was constantly 
 offering her assistance, as did some of the neighbours 
 out of curiosity rather than pity ; but Beldia did not 
 accept these offers, and all the household work fell 
 on herself. She had to sweep, to dust, to make the 
 beds, to cook, to fetch water, to do everything which 
 there was to do, and which the strong woman servant 
 and the boy had done before for her ; and the hard 
 manual labours were almost a relief to the torturing 
 mental anxiety which was upon her night and day. 
 They fatigued her physically so intensely that, when 
 she lay down at night, some hours of heavy sleep 
 came to her. 
 
 ' Oh, my love, that ever you should, through me, 
 be brought to such degradation !' said her father 
 once, as he saw her pass with a pan of charcoal, a 
 
206 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 coarse apron wound about her skirt, and her hair 
 covered with a linen kerchief. 
 
 She smiled faintly. 
 
 ' It is no degradation, father. The women of old 
 Greece thought it none. Did not Penelope spin, 
 and Nausicaa wash clothes ?' 
 
 ' You are a brave child, and merit a better fate 
 than I have given you,' he said in a broken voice. 
 
 But even in his grief for her he did not realize how 
 difficult it was to even obtain that pan of charcoal, 
 and the frugal food which she cooked upon it. No 
 one would give her credit even for so much as these, 
 and her little personal trinkets and trifles, such as 
 even so serious a maiden as she cherished, had all 
 gone one by one in other years under Cirillo's drain- 
 ing exigencies. 
 
 One day when she saw him look more careworn, 
 ill, more heartbroken than ever, a sudden idea sprang 
 up within her breast. She said nothing to her father, 
 but wrapped a black shawl round her head and 
 shoulders, and went out into the street. It was 
 growing dark and Vestuccio's shop would be closed, 
 she knew; she took her way to his private house. 
 The lamps were lighted, and their reflections were 
 trembling in the river, which was full from a storm 
 in the previous night. 
 
 There are few things in nature and art more 
 beautiful than is the Arno, lighted thus, when above 
 head there is a starry and moon-illumined sky. 
 Even in the distraction and distress of her mind, 
 she could not help looking westward and eastward 
 at the scene, so long familiar, yet ever so fresh in 
 beauty, the darkness beneath the arches of the 
 bridges and of the masses of building above them, 
 

THE TOWER OF TADDEO 207 
 
 contrasted with the luminance of the heavens and 
 the waters. Deep shadow veiled all which was 
 poor, or base, or trivial ; nothing was seen but what 
 was majestic, mysterious, and noble. On such a 
 night had Buondelmonte left the chamber of his 
 love ; on such a night had Ginevra wakened from 
 the tomb ; on such a night had Luisa Strozzi ridden 
 down on her palfrey to the masked supper at Casa 
 Nasi. Beldia looked at the loveliness of the river, 
 and the tears rose in her eyes and choked her throat 
 in thinking of the happy, harmless years which she 
 had passed beside these fair, familiar scenes. 
 
 She ceased to look, and hurried onward across the 
 Ponte Vecchio between the closed shutters of the 
 jewellers' and goldsmiths' little shops. The door 
 stood open of the house in which Vestuccio occupied 
 the first floor ; a modest but commodious house in 
 the Via dei Benci. She mounted the stairs with 
 a sick heart and rapped. Within she could hear 
 voices and laughter. A good-looking wench opened 
 the door to her, and said, with evident falsehood, 
 that her master was away. There was a scent of 
 tobacco, of garlic, of wine, of fried fish ; and, being 
 pressed hard, the servant girl admitted reluctantly 
 that the master was at home, but had friends, and 
 had bidden her deny him to all visitors. Then she 
 showed Beldia into a close little room, with its 
 window shut, and its petroleum lamp flaring, and 
 left her and sought her employer to interrupt his 
 revels. The voices on the other side of the wall 
 ceased, and the laughter also ; and in a few moments 
 Vestuccio appeared, a little red, as a man may be 
 after a good supper, but smiling pleasantly and de- 
 precating her apologies with a courteous gesture, 
 
2o8 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 1 Your servant, madamigella/ he said, lifting the 
 smoking-cap which he wore. ' My wife is in the 
 country with the little ones ; God be with them, the 
 darlings ! an old friend or two were supping with 
 rne to pass the time in their absence. Is your good 
 father taken unwell that you come to me at this hour ?' 
 
 Beldia threw off her black shawl and stood before 
 him. 
 
 ' Oh, for the pity of heaven do not play with me, 
 Ser Aurelio !' she said passionately. ' You know of 
 the great wretchedness in which my father is plunged. 
 The truth was only made known to me the other 
 day. They seized his books. He was obliged to 
 tell me then what it meant, and all the woe which is 
 upon him. You know how good he is, how simple, 
 how guileless, and how, despite all his wisdom, he 
 may easily be deceived and undone. I have come 
 to you now because you are his chief creditor, it 
 seems, and you have already taken Antella : can you 
 not be content ? Can you not spare him, give him 
 time? He trusted you. He liked you. How could 
 you betray his trust ?' 
 
 Vestuccio listened in an attitude of respect and 
 deference ; but his eyes sparkled with anger, even 
 whilst his countenance wore an expression of faint 
 astonishment and of profound regret. 
 
 ' Betray !' he repeated. ' Betray ? I ! Oh, 
 signorina mia, could ever a word so base be said in 
 seriousness to me ? My honour is writ on granite, 
 in sight of the whole town. I grieve for Ser 
 Checchi's misfortunes ; my heart bleeds for them ; 
 but I have been powerless to stop him on a road 
 which never hath but one end.' 
 
 ' To stop him !' echoed Beldia. ' You have driven 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 209 
 
 him onward in it ! It is you who hold all his 
 paper.' 
 
 Her soul had acquired nothing of the cunning, 
 and cuteness, and finesse which are so needful in the 
 commerce of the world. She felt that the man 
 before her was the origin of all their woe, and she 
 stripped his mask off and let him see that she knew 
 him as he was. 
 
 It is a discovery which is never pardoned. 
 
 ' I thought you were so attached to my father !' 
 she cried in an ingenuous reproach which she re- 
 pented of, as soon as she had yielded to it. Ves- 
 tuccio joined his hands together impressively and 
 looked up to the ceiling with pious invocation of the 
 Most High who reads all hearts. 
 
 ' I am truly devoted to your most saintly and noble 
 father, signorina/ he said devoutly. ' But, when one's 
 interests are in question, what would you expect ? 
 One must sacrifice one's own brother to one's self!' 
 
 1 1 quite understand that you would do so !' said 
 Beldia curtly and coldly, as she made a movement 
 towards the door. 
 
 ' Everyone would do so, signorina,' said Vestuccio, 
 unabashed. * Do not believe them if any say the 
 contrary.' 
 
 For to Vestuccio it seemed so natural, so holy, so 
 beautiful a thing to allow interest to rule existence, 
 that he did not see that there was anything but what 
 was most creditable in the avowal that it did so. 
 To reproach an Italian with his love of his own 
 interests is to speak to him in an unintelligible lan- 
 guage. 'Who should love me if not myself?' he 
 will say, with perfect good faith. 'We are entirely 
 
 14 
 
210 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 sure of no one except of ourselves ; therefore, in the 
 name of all justice and prudence, let us first of all 
 consider that best of all friends, our own advantage 
 and advancement.' 
 
 Love thyself first : afterwards, a long way after- 
 wards, love thy neighbour, if thou canst do so with- 
 out hurt. So ran the law to him. 
 
 ' You are a hypocrite and a rogue then!' said Beldia 
 with scorn and passion. ' If you be only a self-seek- 
 ing usurer, why do you pretend to care for others ?' 
 
 Vestuccio preserved his deferential attitude ; he 
 spread out his hands in a gesture of deprecation ; 
 his eyes alone, which looked downward, glittered 
 with the anger which was in his soul. 
 
 ' You mistake, madamigella,' he said humbly. 
 ' You wholly mistake. I have no power to arrest 
 the course which the law takes. It is your venerable 
 father, who has never comprehended that business 
 is business, and that the closest friendship must 
 give way to self-defence and to self-interest. I have 
 done for him what I would not have done for my 
 own father. I have given time and care, and 
 thought and money, and if he had listened to me, 
 things would not be now with him as they are. 
 What would you ? He has indulged the elegant 
 taste and costly whims of a scholar, whilst he was 
 only a poor bookseller on the brink of bankruptcy. 
 How could the end be other than it is ? He has 
 spent his days and nights in the useless illusory pur- 
 suit of a learning which is not worth the farthing 
 match that a child sells in the streets. In other 
 times there were monasteries open for such vain 
 dreamers as he. No one knows nowadays what to 
 do with them ; they are out of date, and the world 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 11 i 
 
 walks over them while they remain distraught at 
 their studies. It is many years now, Madama 
 Beldia, since your father began to sign his name to 
 bills and acts, without weighing well enough to what 
 he put it. One thing or another has always dragged 
 him down. There were his son's follies in one way, 
 and his own in another ; and he never could see an 
 old book or manuscript but what his it must be ; 
 and he never noticed that it was all going out and 
 nothing coming in, and he always liked to give you 
 ready money to keep the house going, and he never 
 could bring himself to grudge a bit or sup to anyone, 
 or deny anybody the pick of his own brains, and it 
 has come to this at last such things always do; 
 and if the crash have been staved off so long, why, 
 it is solely due to the efforts of your poor servant 
 Vestuccio, whom you rashly and unkindly are in- 
 clined to blame.' 
 
 He spoke so frankly, so clearly, and so openly, 
 that any stranger hearing him would have been ready 
 to swear to his truth and integrity. Almost they 
 made Beldia herself waver in her belief against him. 
 
 Every word he said so exactly portrayed her father's 
 faults and foibles that it wrung her heart to hear him ; 
 she stood close to him motionless, gazing at him as if 
 her eyes would fain plunge into his inmost soul. 
 
 He moved uneasily under that intense and pro- 
 longed gaze, and on the pretext that the lamp was 
 flaring, he turned down the flame so that the room 
 grew dusky. 
 
 Beldia drew a deep breath, as she replied to him : 
 
 1 You speak plausibly, you speak with apparent 
 candour ; I cannot deny that my father's errors are 
 such as you have said. But you have taken a cruel 
 
212 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 advantage of them. You have turned to your own 
 profit his trustfulness and absence of guile. You 
 have filled your strong box with his signatures, and 
 when the time was ripe to most profit by them you 
 have pulled the cord and let the axe fall. You can- 
 not deny it. You cannot deny it ; all these men who 
 bring these claims and charges and protested paper 
 are your creatures.' 
 
 She paused, and looked to see him abashed, 
 unmasked, ashamed. The innocent always expect 
 to behold the guilty overwhelmed by the mere 
 charge of guilt. She was wise, and clear of reason 
 in many ways, but she knew not the heart of a 
 rogue. She drew her pure, straight weapon of 
 truth, and thought to see him shrink before it as 
 Mephistopheles before the cross. But Mephisto- 
 pheles, in the person of Vestuccio, was not so 
 simple. He smiled within himself to see the 
 maiden so frankly and so foolishly laying bare her 
 soul to him, and showing him how much, and yet 
 how little, she knew, how dangerous and yet how 
 impotent she was. 
 
 * Never show your cards, madamigella !' he mur- 
 mured, and then, with a pained expression, added 
 in a colder tone : ' Your language is strange and full 
 of offence to me. But I can understand that you 
 are agitated, and so are unjust and confused. These 
 troubles have fallen on you without warning. Often 
 and often would I have warned you myself, but your 
 father would never allow me to do so, and he was 
 master of his own secrets. Believe me, madami- 
 gella, believe me, by the souls of my children, whom 
 you know that I love so well, if Ser Checchi has 
 been thus far saved from utter ruin, it is due to me 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 213 
 
 and to the influence which my townsfolk are so good 
 as to let me exercise in the counsels I give to them. 
 I am a hard-working man, who has risen from the 
 lowest state, by energy and frugality, and the city 
 knows it and honours me.' 
 
 Vestuccio's face beamed, his figure dilated ; he 
 had in his own eyes the nimbus about his head of 
 successful and prosperous virtue. He was never so 
 happy or so eloquent as when he lauded himself. 
 
 Beldia's gaze was riveted upon him, trying to read 
 his hidden mind, and failing, because the candour 
 and integrity of her own nature had no gauge by 
 which to measure the duplicity and hypocrisy of his. 
 
 ' If this be true,' she said simply, ' if you have had 
 neither hand nor head in this cabal against my 
 father, save him. He has always trusted you. You 
 have always advised him. His ruin must be due 
 to you, directly or indirectly, since you were so often 
 his adviser. Save him.' 
 
 * And how, madonna mia ?' cried Vestuccio, acting 
 innocent ignorance and bewildered surprise. 
 
 ' Get him time ; get him loans ; speak to those 
 who seize his goods, who hold his signatures, if it 
 be not you indeed who hold them. You are a man 
 of business ; you must know a thousand ways in 
 business, by which men on the brink of ruin can be 
 saved from the lowest depth of all. Save him, save 
 him, as I saved Gemma when the fungus of death 
 was growing in her throat.' 
 
 She spoke with intense and fervid feeling, whilst 
 her voice thrilled with the intensity of her dread and 
 of her hope. 
 
 Vestuccio looked downward on the floor. For one 
 brief second his heart was touched ; he loved his 
 
214 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 child, and he remembered how this woman, who 
 pleaded with him now, had remained in the con- 
 tagion of the horrible disease, when Gemma's own 
 mother had fled shrieking away from what was 
 deemed a dying bed. 
 
 He remembered, and he knew that he could save 
 her father without the outlay of a farthing, merely 
 by renunciation of gain, merely by lifting up his hand 
 to the pack which he had let loose, and bidding 
 them take their fangs off their quarry and wait. 
 
 For one moment he wavered, remembering and 
 regretting. The next moment nature, habit, the 
 instinct of avarice, the passion of acquisitiveness, 
 the cruel, insatiable hunger of the usurer, which is 
 like the appetite of the horse-leech, were all stronger 
 than the alien and evanescent impulse of mercy. 
 
 He looked away from Beldia, and answered : ' You 
 are labouring under some sad illusion, madamigella. 
 I could not stay judgment against your father for 
 a day. I have no power, no means. I am grieved, 
 grieved to the heart, but I can do nothing. The law 
 of debt must take its course.' 
 
 He had spent eight years in careful preparation 
 for the catastrophe which had now fallen on Beldia 
 and her father. Little by little he had built up the 
 scaffolding, step by step he had drawn near the 
 edifice ; he could not lay down unlit the slow match 
 with which he had made ready to set it ablaze for 
 the warming of his own hands and heart. 
 
 He loved his child, but he loved money, intrigues, 
 and acquisition more. In the actual moment of 
 her danger he would have renounced anything to 
 save her; but years had gone by since then, and his 
 gratitude had cooled. 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 215 
 
 After all it was Providence which had saved her ; 
 so he thought to himself, and hardened his heart. 
 It was not only gain which he would lose if he 
 yielded, but self-respect. He would for ever despise 
 himself, and be despised by those who acted with 
 him, if he now held back and spared the dwellers in 
 the tower. It is not by mercy and long-suffering, 
 by kindness or grateful memories, that the fortunes 
 of industrious people like himself are made. A 
 short memory for benefits and a long memory for 
 figures are the two essentials to monetary success. 
 
 He looked upon the floor, his pleasant smile 
 stereotyped upon his mouth. 
 
 ' You have taken a wholly wrong view of the 
 matter, signorina mia gentilissima,' he added respect- 
 fully. ' I might take exception at your expressions, 
 but I pass them by ; you are agitated and unhappy, 
 and know not what you say. I am powerless in 
 this matter, which you seem erroneously to think 
 that I control. It is not I who move the law, it is 
 the men of law. I have no power to stop them in 
 what they deem their duty. As I understand it, all 
 which Ser Checchi suffers from are the legal and 
 logical consequences of his own acts. If he had 
 not signed these papers, these bills, these drafts ; if 
 he had not purchased costly works, and mortgaged 
 all he possessed to pay for them, no one would 
 molest him now. People complain of the law, but 
 wrongly; the civil law never touches those who have 
 not first violated some moral law written in their 
 conscience, but broken in their acts.' 
 
 He paused to see the effect of his words ; he was 
 pleased with the last phrase ; it filled him with the 
 calm complacency of a man who has been always 
 
2i6 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 careful to be himself on the right side of the law, 
 ever to be creditor, and never to be debtor. 
 
 Beldia shuddered as she heard. From violence 
 may come mercy, from fury may be born pity ; but 
 never, never, never, she knew, could any good or 
 gentle thing arise from the accursed smoothness of 
 a self-admiring hypocrisy, from the cruelty of a 
 damnable avarice. 
 
 'Answer me one thing only, in one word,' she 
 said, looking always at him with her straight, clear 
 gaze, which he had now braced himself to meet. 
 ' Is it not you who have seized Antella ?' 
 
 ' Madamigella,' said Vestuccio, with dignity and 
 rebuke, * I had lent out my own honest gains upon 
 that land. I had lost upon it ; I had waited long, 
 very long; if at the last I have entered into my 
 own, I have done no more than that. Nay, so true 
 a friend am I to your father, that to-morrow, if he 
 pay me my capital and interest and costs, I will 
 give the land back to him, as though there had been 
 never any question of it between us. Can I say 
 more ? Who else would say as much ? I have six 
 children who look to me for bread. I cannot make 
 gifts to right and left, as childless men may do.' 
 
 She looked at him in silence, reading his soul in all 
 its meanness and baseness, and trickery and cruelty. 
 
 ( My heart is but too tender,' he continued, 
 warming to his own self-praise, as he ever did. ' It 
 is a heart of gold. I maintain my old parents in 
 every comfort, I have made the fortunes of my 
 family ; I rejoice to give ; I am full of benevolence 
 as the fresh melon of its juice; but there are limits 
 there are duties one may be indulgent, but one 
 must not be a dupe. Who will pay me for all the 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 217 
 
 time which I have thrown away in your honoured 
 father's affairs ? No one, not a farthing ; I am 
 sacrificed in every way. Others have the law on 
 him, not I. The land? What is the land? All 
 clay and rock, yielding nothing, and taxed at fifty 
 per cent. It is a dead loss to me to be forced to 
 take it instead of my good, sound, national notes. 
 If all business were done as I have done this thing, 
 lenders would be beggars. Had I only had the 
 money which I lent Ser Checchi, I could have 
 turned and turned it over and over a score of times, 
 and made hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands 
 out of it. To help him, to succour him, I have 
 robbed myself and my children, and the child un- 
 born that my wife goes with now. And what do 
 you give me in return ? Abuse, suspicion, shameful 
 and unjust reproach.' 
 
 His eyes filled, his hands spread themselves out- 
 ward in the gesture of one wrongly accused, who 
 repudiates a dishonouring charge; he stood erect 
 and self-satisfied, a very model of calumniated, and 
 upright, and self-respecting manhood. 
 
 He waited for her to reply, but she said nothing ; 
 her gaze was still fixed upon him. She was think- 
 ing bitterly how long a viper may dwell in the ivy 
 by your gates, and you have no chance to see him 
 shed his skin. 
 
 Vestuccio, being only thus answered by a silence 
 which reproached and condemned him more over- 
 whelmingly than any words could have done, re- 
 placed his smoking-cap on his head, set his eyeglass 
 in his eye, and banished the kindliness and sadness 
 from his face. 
 
 ' Pardon me,' he said curtly ; ' I can waste no 
 
218 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 more time. My friends in the next room are 
 waiting for me. Offer my respects to your honoured 
 father; it is useless to remind him that, had he 
 attended to the disinterested counsels of a practical 
 man, he would not now be in the strait he is.' 
 
 Then he opened the door sharply. 
 
 ' Lucinda, my girl,' he said to the servant maid, 
 ' light the Signorina Beldia down the stairs.' 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 BELDIA went home through the lamplit and moonlit 
 streets, sick at heart with that weary sense of the 
 futility of truth, of the nullity of justice, of the in- 
 capacity for right to struggle against wrong, which 
 is the most enervating and torturing of sorrows. 
 She knew, as plainly as though it were written on 
 the walls, that all hope was over for her father and 
 herself. 
 
 She realized with a horrible shock that their 
 position was neither higher nor better than that of 
 the many debtors whose names were printed up at 
 the doors of the Pretura, to be talked of all over the 
 city. To her nature, so delicate, so proud, and so 
 reserved, the discovery was a torture none the less 
 acute because she endeavoured to bear it bravely. 
 She knew that Vestuccio had adroitly schemed for 
 and compassed her father's destruction, but she had 
 no proofs that he had done so ; no one would have 
 heeded her protestations, and the law was on the 
 side of the evil-doer. To the tribunals, as to the 
 crowd, Vestuccio was but a prudent and provident 
 man asking only for his own ; and her father was 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 219 
 
 the imprudent and improvident one, who is always 
 a criminal in the sight of others, because he can no 
 longer benefit or purchase his contemporaries. To 
 the lender of money all were ready to doff their caps 
 and bend their backs ; the borrower of money was 
 only a poor, played-out, uninteresting, useless 
 creature in their sight. The world always respects 
 power, and never asks the means and methods by 
 which it has been gained. 
 
 In the streets and squares and shops and offices 
 of the city, Vestuccio was a power : he had many 
 men in his grip, and fortune in his future. Ser 
 Checchi could not be of any further use or profit to 
 anyone ; naturally the town took the former to its 
 bosom, and left the latter alone, like the dead ass 
 by the wayside. 
 
 When she went up the stairs of her home, the door 
 of the back-room was open, her father stood in the 
 doorway, a brass lamp in his hand, waiting for her. 
 
 ' You have been to ask grace of Vestuccio ?' he 
 said sternly. 
 
 Beldia did not reply ; to prevaricate or deny 
 never occurred to her. 
 
 ' You did wrong,' said Ser Checchi. * Long cen- 
 turies ago, in yonder street, a woman asked the 
 escaped lion to spare her babe ; and the desert 
 animal heard her prayer. But had she spoken 
 to the usurer she would have spoken in vain. I did 
 not think you would have so abased me/ 
 
 ' It was not abasement,' she said, wounded by the 
 word. ' I did but tell him the truth : that he had 
 abused your trust, that he had taken Antella un- 
 justly by abrupt foreclosing, that he was behind all 
 these other men who now attack you. I did but 
 
220 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 ask him time and patience, and such influence as 
 it would cost him nothing to use. That was all/ 
 
 Ser Checchi smiled faintly. 
 
 ' Poor innocent ! Could you provoke him more ? 
 He will only go in the morning to the attorneys, and 
 bid them hurry on their acts/ 
 
 ' Why ? Why should he hate you so ? You have 
 done him no evil/ 
 
 * I trusted him and he betrayed me. Who wrongs 
 never pardons/ 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 EVERY half-year Beldia had, of late years, gone her- 
 self to pay the rent on the twentieth day of August, 
 and on the twentieth day of February, as the 
 Florentine law mercilessly exacts ; and now, when 
 these cruel documents came to their door, in these 
 scorching days of the late summer, she thought 
 with relief that the money for the coming half-year 
 was safe in the hands of the old Canon of the 
 Duomo, Don Gervasio, with whom it had always 
 been her habit to lodge it well in advance of the 
 date at which it would be needed. This year her 
 father had given it to her earlier than usual, fore- 
 seeing the troubles which were to come upon him, 
 and desiring that this matter at least should be at 
 rest. It was almost the last money which remained 
 to him out of that small capital which he had in- 
 herited from his progenitors. 
 
 ' You gave the rent money to Don Gervasio ?' he 
 asked her anxiously one day. 
 
 ' Oh yes,' she answered ; * shall I get it from him, 
 and pay Saetta beforehand ?' 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 221 
 
 ' It would be well/ said Ser Checchi. ' Better 
 early than late.' 
 
 So she went that self- same day and got the small 
 sum from the old Canon, who kept it, with his funds 
 for charitable purposes, in an iron box with a silver 
 figure of an Apostle on its lid, and a secret to its lock. 
 
 The Canon was banker to all the poorer neighbours, 
 and, when he kept the children's pence, produced 
 them multiplied, and told their young owners that, if 
 let alone, the soldi grew, just as endive did, or cresses. 
 
 When he gave her roll of notes to Beldia now out 
 of his iron box, he looked anxiously in her face. 
 
 ' If I could be of any use, you would tell me, my 
 daughter ?' he asked wistfully. ' I have heard with 
 pain of your father's troubles. I owe him many 
 years of good neighbourliness and peaceful com- 
 munion of the intellect. I would do anything in 
 my power to lighten his burdens. You know that ?' 
 
 ' I know it well, most reverend,' said Beldia, with 
 a deep sigh. ' But my father is very proud in some 
 ways, although so humble in others. He would not 
 take a loan.' 
 
 ' And it would be wrong in me to question you as 
 to that which he chooses to keep secret,' said the 
 Canon. * Nor would I do so. But when the men 
 of law are knocking loudly at your gates, and you 
 have not wherewithal to pay them and send them 
 thence, there is no secret any more, alas ! The 
 very lads in the street know your sorrow.' 
 
 Beldia bent her head in ashamed assent; her pale 
 cheeks burned with crimson colour. 
 
 ' I know not how this misery has come upon me/ 
 she said sadly. ' My father was ever most punctual, 
 most exact, most honourable.' 
 
222 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 1 He has fallen amongst thieves,' said Don Ger- 
 vasio, ' and he has been too long mute under his 
 wounds. But I cannot pardon him for his oblivion 
 of his daughter's interests,' he added, a shade of 
 severity and censure passing over his benignant 
 features. * Books are very dear to me myself, and 
 good books and great books are the benison of the 
 world ; but not even to the wisdom of all the ages 
 should your peace and prosperity and his own fair 
 name have been sacrificed.' 
 
 ' It does not matter for me,' said Beldia quickly. 
 ( What matters is, that the books will be lost, and his 
 good name, as your reverence says, lost with them.' 
 
 Then she turned away to hide the agitation which 
 she could ill control, and slipped the bank-notes 
 within the bosom of her gown, and left the good 
 priest to go down into the street and homeward. 
 But on the threshold the Canon stopped her. 
 
 * Wait one moment. You go to pay the rent ?' 
 
 * Yes, you know that I do,' said Beldia wonder- 
 ingly, a vague fear fluttering at her heart. 
 
 * But I have heard,' murmured the Canon, ' that 
 Maso Saetta means wishes intends to to to 
 send you a notice to quit.' 
 
 Beldia uttered a sharp cry. 
 
 ' He cannot !' she cried aloud. 
 
 ' Oh, pardon me, my child, he can.' 
 
 ' He cannot !' she repeated wildty. ' He cannot, 
 father ! He cannot !' 
 
 ' My poor girl, consider. You hold the tenements 
 by no contract, no term of years ; you have always 
 held it loosely, as your forefathers did, with nothing 
 written, paying from half-year to half-year. True, 
 " Vuso fa legge," saith the proverb. But usage is 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 223 
 
 against you here. Believe me, Saetta can turn you 
 out in November, if he chooses to give you dismissal 
 now ; and and I have heard it said in the town 
 that he will do so. I grieve to pain you more, my 
 dear daughter ; but I would not have you go on a 
 fool's errand to this graceless and unkind old man.' 
 
 1 But he would never be so cruel as to take the 
 very moment of our misfortune to make us home- 
 less?' 
 
 * My dear maiden, adversity tests our friends ; but 
 few bear the test ; and Saetta was never a friend of 
 yours or anyone's. He is a greedy, hard, and igno- 
 rant person, who will only conclude from your father's 
 present position that he is not a desirable tenant any 
 more.' 
 
 ' A tenant!' 
 
 She repeated the word stupidly. It seemed to her 
 to have no fitness in connection with themselves ; the 
 tower was theirs ; they had lived in it, loved it, 
 cherished it, laboured for it ; it had had the morn- 
 ings and the evenings of their days ; it had har- 
 boured their joys and sorrows ; it had seen their 
 births and their deaths ; it had heard the cry of the 
 new-born child ; it had seen the dead whom they 
 loved borne across its threshold ; it had heard the 
 words of their prayers, the laughter of their lips, 
 the sobs of their lamentations, the gladness of their 
 delight, the deep-drawn breaths of their slumbers : 
 they belonged to it, and it was theirs by the tender 
 tie of a thousand days, by the sacred bond of a 
 thousand nights. 
 
 It was theirs theirs theirs by every bond 
 which binds the heart of man to the roof which 
 shelters him and to the walls which guard his sleep. 
 
224 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 She was at home there, as were the swallows 
 under its eaves, and the owls in its loopholes and 
 gargoyles. To dwell elsewhere than in the tower 
 seemed incomprehensible to her ; her father and 
 grandfather had been born there before her, and her 
 great-grandfather had watched the entry of Bona- 
 parte's battalions from its grated casements. 
 
 She also had been born there, and cradled and 
 reared there ; and although she had always known, 
 indeed, that the tower was not actually part of her 
 father's possessions, but belonged to Tomaso Saetta, 
 yet so used was she to her old home, and so long, 
 she knew, had it been occupied by her family, that 
 she felt rooted in the place like any tree in its native 
 soil. She would have as soon expected to see the 
 angels from its niches take wing across the Arno, as 
 have thought it possible that she could live elsewhere. 
 Whenever she dreamed of her future with Odisio, 
 it was always framed in this antique setting which 
 she loved so well ; whenever she thought of children 
 who might be born to her, it was always of them 
 as they would flit to and fro down these dusky 
 stairs, which had felt her own feet so long, and 
 as they would stand beside her at sunrise and 
 at sunset amongst the flowers on this roof, whence 
 she had so often watched the stars. 
 
 The Saetta family had become the proprietors of 
 it, indeed, because the necessities of the old patrician 
 race to which it belonged had thrown it on the 
 market at a low price, and even that low price 
 had been too high for Ser Checchi to be able to 
 purchase it, dearly as he would have loved to have 
 done so. But although Saetta had become the 
 legal owner of it, both she and her father had 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 225 
 
 always felt that it did far more truly and entirely 
 belong to themselves by all the ties which long 
 affection and occupation can create between the 
 dwelling and the dweller in it. They had taken 
 Saetta every six months five hundred francs, for the 
 half-year's rent paid in advance, and had received 
 his receipt in return; but there his interest in it began 
 and ended as far as they were concerned. He let its 
 ground-floor to the charcoal-seller and the chandler, 
 and the mezzanino to the cobbler and the tailor and 
 the cabinet-maker, and the rest to Ser Checchi, and 
 never spent a penny on its repair, or attended to 
 any fissure in its masonry or rot in its timber. The 
 tower took care of itself, and having been built by 
 the great master, Gaddi, could do very well and 
 very long without any other care ; and its wonderful 
 majolica decorations of Messer Luca's bore wind and 
 rain, sun and heat, and even that insidious enemy, 
 frost, without any apparent dulling of their brilliant 
 colours, or any blunting of their fine outlines. 
 
 Once a year Ser Checchi, from love of these angels 
 and loves and shields and wreaths, paid a mason to 
 climb and brush the dust and dirt off these lovely 
 ornaments; but Maso Saetta would never have 
 wasted a franc in doing anything of the sort. His 
 old father had bought the tower because it had come 
 in his way to buy it very cheaply, but he himself 
 despised it, thought it only fit for bats and rats, and 
 much preferred a square little house with green 
 shutters, a slate roof, and walls a few inches thick, 
 which he had built for his use outside the San Gallo 
 gate, and which stuck up its pert and paltry vulgarity 
 amidst ruined vineyards and desolated gardens. 
 
 15 
 
226 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 SHE went down into the hot and shadeless ways of 
 the city with a sense of confusion and stupor upon 
 her, as if someone had struck her on the head. 
 She did not go to the landlord, but wended her way 
 straight homeward, intending to take counsel with 
 her father. But even as she mounted the stairs and 
 opened the door of the book-room, she met, face to 
 face, the usher of the tribunal, who grinned as he 
 passed her, and pointed his thumb over his shoulder 
 at Ser Checchi, who stood holding a printed docu- 
 ment in his hand, and stared down on its lines as 
 though they were written in some characters un- 
 known to him. 
 
 ' Not this! not this ! not to us,' he said stupidly. 
 
 ' May I see it ?' she asked timidly, frightened by 
 his distraught look ; he let the paper pass from his 
 hand to her. 
 
 She understood it at a glance. It was the disdetta 
 with which the Canon had warned her that they 
 were menaced, a notice to quit the tower within two 
 months and twelve days' time. At the expiration 
 of that term, unless the premises were vacated and 
 surrendered to the owner, the law would turn the 
 occupier, and all his goods and chattels, into the 
 street by force, if they did not go willingly. 
 
 Beldia read it twice and thrice, unable to believe 
 her own sight. She had often seen such documents 
 brought to her poorer neighbours, carrying con- 
 sternation and destitution in their train, for two 
 months is but a brief space in which to pack up your 
 tents and go to unknown ground. 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 227 
 
 'But we owe him nothing?' she said, meaning 
 their landlord. 
 
 Ser Checchi shook his head. 
 
 ' Nothing. You remember you took the last rent, 
 last February, to him yourself. I suppose he is 
 afraid for the one now coming due.' 
 
 ' But when he has always been paid, can he send 
 us away ?' 
 
 ' Oh yes ! we have no contract with him. Our 
 people have lived here two hundred years and more, 
 but that does not count. He bought the tower ; he 
 can do as he likes with his own.' 
 
 He spoke wearily, drearily, stunned by this new 
 calamity, feeling too helpless under it to rebel or 
 protest. He was tired of his troubles ; he was an 
 old man, and they were too many for his strength. 
 
 He took the paper again into his hands and turned 
 it to and fro stupidly, as though he were an illiterate 
 man who could not read. 
 
 ' I did not think that Maso would have done it to 
 me, to me,' he said feebly and wonderingly. 
 
 He and Maso Saetta, the owner of the tower, had 
 been play-fellows and school-fellows in their youth, 
 and cronies in their older years, often talking of their 
 early days over a cup of coffee or a glass of lemonade. 
 
 ' Oh, it is impossible, impossible !' said Beldia, 
 her face scared and white. ' Go away ? you and I 
 oh, it is impossible ! Go away ! Leave the 
 tower ? Oh, no no no ! anything but that, any- 
 thing but that ! He has always been paid ; the law 
 cannot let him do such a monstrous thing. The 
 tower is ours, ours, ours !' 
 
 For the first time she had lost her reasonableness, 
 her patience, her intelligence. She was stung to 
 
228 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 the heart. She was beside herself with pain. The 
 tower had been her home from birth. It had had 
 all her life, all her care, all her love. She could not 
 realize that a little old man, who had no love for it 
 and no place in it, could have superior title over it 
 to hers, and power to drive her and her father from 
 the hallowed shelter of its roof. 
 
 Her father folded up the document, and placed it 
 with the other law-papers in a drawer. 
 
 ' He can do as he likes with his own,' he said in 
 the same low, broken, tired voice. ' All these acts 
 have frightened him. Proprietors love not debtors 
 under their roof-tree/ 
 
 ' But we owe him nothing !' 
 
 ' That makes no difference. He is afraid that we 
 shall. When a hound is lamed and falls, the rest of 
 the pack turn on him and rend him. It is the law 
 of life.' 
 
 * And you will do nothing ?' 
 
 'There is nothing to do.' 
 
 He knew that there was nothing to do ; against a 
 disdetta, signified by the tribunal in the landlord's 
 name, no man can appeal. It is a decree immutable 
 and unalterable ; if the tenant has not vacated the 
 house on the date appointed, the law casts him and 
 all he possesses into the street. He cannot com- 
 plain ; he was duly cited and warned. 
 
 She felt as though the world itself was slipping 
 from beneath her feet, and the solid earth giving 
 way and vanishing into space. 
 
 'But I have the money to pay him,' said Beldia 
 piteously. * Surely, surely he would not turn us out 
 if he saw the money ?' 
 
 Ser Checchi lifted his dulled, sad eyes and sighed. 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 229 
 
 ' The sight of money sometimes works miracles,' 
 he said hesitatingly. He had seen it act like an in- 
 cantation on his countrymen, making the savage 
 meek, the timid bold, the unkind full of loving-kind- 
 ness ; he had seen truth forsworn, peace signed 
 away for ever, certainty thrown aside for possibility, 
 and solid value bartered for shining dross, at the 
 mere magical sight of money in the palm. 
 
 'But no, no,' he added imperatively; 'since he 
 has done us this outrage, let it so remain. Seek no 
 redress. He does but exercise his legal right. I would 
 not humble myself or you to plead for any respite/ 
 
 ' But there may be some error ? He may think 
 we cannot pay. What can he want more than to 
 have his money's worth ? Oh, let me see him, 
 father, let me see him !' she cried, with unwonted 
 passion, losing her power of self-control and self- 
 effacement. ' If we are here we will be happy even 
 with bare walls. Things will mend. Trade will 
 return. We spend so little that we shall be able to 
 live. But it must be here, oh, it must be here ! If 
 I go hence, I shall leave my heart in the very 
 stones !' 
 
 She trembled violently, her pale face was violently 
 flushed ; being a true woman as she was, the 
 calamity which struck at her associations and affec- 
 tions affected her far more intensely than the priva- 
 tions and miseries which touched her material 
 welfare. To die of hunger in her old beloved home 
 seemed to be a sweeter and fairer fate than to dwell 
 in riches and abundance elsewhere. 
 
 Her father looked at her for a moment, and then 
 averted his eyes, unable to endure the sight of her 
 anguish. 
 
230 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 ' Do what you will,' he said to her; ' I, who have 
 brought you to this pass, have lost all title to dictate 
 to you. You may easily be wiser than I. More 
 unwise you cannot be.' 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 ON that vague permission she acted. She took the 
 money for the rent from the old priest, to whom she 
 had confided it, and went to the dwelling of Maso 
 Saetta. 
 
 He was an old man, who lived on his own small 
 means, frugally, had never married, and led the 
 monotonous, trivial, tedious life led by so many of 
 his country people, toddling between his chamber 
 and his coffee-house, amusing his forenoon at his 
 barber's, and in the evenings going to one of the 
 cheap theatres or the puppet show, or sitting on the 
 bench by Goldoni's statue to see the fine folks drive 
 down the Lung Arno. 
 
 She had always seen Maso Saetta as easily as 
 she saw the communal clock, whenever she wanted 
 to do so. But now again, and again, and again, he 
 eluded her ; was neither at his own house or at his 
 usual haunts, and seemed to have altogether altered 
 the routine of his days. She began to divine that 
 he avoided her on purpose, and redoubled her 
 efforts, going again and again in the same day to 
 the street where he dwelt. Time was passing, 
 months are but as an instant when they are bringing 
 what we dread upon their wings; and a ghastly, 
 choking terror seized her, when she thought that, if 
 she could not turn or soften him, the tower would 
 soon be no more theirs. She awoke from a short 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 231 
 
 and troubled sleep every morning with this dread 
 suffocating her; her once peaceful nights were 
 broken, her once happy waking was over ; when she 
 heard the bells chiming in the clear dusk of the 
 dawn, she no more rose gladly because another day 
 had begun. She rose in apprehension, and with 
 oppression, dreading what the coming hours should 
 bring. 
 
 Her father never asked her if she had seen Maso. 
 He knew well that she had not, or she would have 
 told him. 
 
 'Aren't you thinking of getting a new roof to 
 cover you ?' said Dessi, the bailiff, officiously to her. 
 * Time flies, and you won't be wise if you provoke 
 the sfratta.' 
 
 The sfratta is the corollary and colophon, as it 
 were, of the disdetta, the last act of all which tells 
 the refractory tenant that the carabineers are 
 coming to drive him out into the street, and pitch 
 his goods out after him. 
 
 Beldia did not answer; she ignored Dessi as 
 utterly as it was possible to do. ' The proud- 
 stomached wench !' he thought angrily. ' How dare 
 she hold her head in the air like that, when I have 
 locked up her very jam-pots and bed-linen, and have 
 even got her saucepans and fish-kettle in my keeping ?' 
 
 ' Out you'll go, mind that,' he said spitefully one 
 day. ' You won't turn Maso more than you'll melt 
 the bronze boar. Not a bit of it. Don't you hope 
 to do it. Vestuccio has got hold of Maso.' 
 
 Beldia sighed heavily, but she had self-command 
 enough to ask him nothing. She knew that it was 
 most probable that what he said was true ; the 
 influence of Vestuccio spread far and wide. 
 
232 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 She only doubled and trebled her efforts to see 
 the landlord ; the time it took up to do so she could 
 ill spare, for all the household work was now hers 
 to do, and such food as she could obtain she had to 
 prepare ; and she strove to make it as tempting and 
 delicate as she could to attract her father's failing 
 appetite. At length, all other means proving use- 
 less, she resolved to wait at the barber's shop, where, 
 from the time that he had reached puberty, Saetta 
 had never neglected to go as the city clocks tolled 
 noon ; and there at last, although his hour was 
 changed to escape her, she saw him come, looking 
 furtively from side to side as he hurried across the 
 threshold. 
 
 She hurried after him, and caught the lappets of 
 his long coat. 
 
 ' Ser Maso, Ser Maso, hear me ; for pity's sake 
 stop and hear me !' 
 
 He looked down on her in terror; he was a little, 
 red-faced, plump, merry-looking man ; but he lost 
 his colour and frowned as he said nervously, trying 
 to pluck his coat from her grasp : 
 
 'I cannot listen I cannot indeed. You must 
 go to the lawyers if you want anything. Everything 
 is in the lawyers' hand?. Let me go. Pray let 
 me go.' 
 
 ' But I have brought the money for the half-year 
 to come,' said Beldia, taking the bank-notes from 
 the bosom of her gown. 'You cannot send us away 
 if we are ready and willing to pay. Our people 
 have been there two hundred years, and you are my 
 father's friend ; perhaps you feared we could not 
 pay, and so you did this cruel thing ; but here is the 
 money for the half-year to come.' 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 233 
 
 The eyes of Maso Saetta twinkled, winked, and 
 leered as they saw the crisp bank-notes so near his 
 grasp; he longed to snatch them, he ogled them as 
 any satyr a nymph ; he made a little clawing, grasp- 
 ing, unconscious movement of his hands, which is a 
 frequent gesture with Italians when they behold 
 money. But he turned his head away resolutely, 
 and shut his eyes tightly to shut out the temptation- 
 
 ' It is not that/ he said quickly. ' Oh, not at all, 
 not at all ! It is quite another matter. I want the 
 tower empty; I have other uses for it. I have other 
 tenants. Very likely I may sell it. Very likely the 
 municipality will pull it down ' 
 
 ' Pull it down ?' 
 
 1 Eh!' said the owner, with a deprecating out- 
 ward curl of his lips. ' It is very old ; it is dirty and 
 grim and ugly ; it takes up room, and they want 
 everything smart and wide, and clear and white- 
 washed. All the water-side of the Borgo San 
 Jacopo is marked for demolition, and if they pull 
 down the tower I shall have large compensation, and 
 the della Robbia will sell alone for a vast deal.' 
 
 ' Pull down the tower !' 
 
 She echoed the words faintly, leaning against the 
 doorpost of the barber's shop to keep herself from 
 falling. 
 
 'E antico T repeated Maso Saetta, with that 
 boundless scorn which the Italian can put into those 
 two words. 
 
 ' It is old !' he repeated, chuckling in cynical 
 derision of its age, and then, seeing her pained, 
 scared face, her appealing eyes, the bank-notes in 
 her hand, he grew angry at the unreason and un- 
 timeliness of this absurd appeal to him, which 
 
234 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 tempted him and worried him, and made him feel 
 ashamed of using his own unquestionable rights. 
 
 ' My good maiden/ he said breathlessly, thrusting 
 his face close to hers, and waving his shaking 
 fingers in the air, ' this is unreasonable, this is un- 
 kind, this is preposterous ! You should have more 
 consideration. When a man employs a lawyer, he 
 does so because he wishes to be put to no trouble in 
 the matter himself. I respect your father, and I 
 pity him, and no one can understand how he has 
 lost his wits, and come to such a pass as he has. 
 But one must think of one's own interests before all. 
 You cannot expect me to forget my own interests. 
 I have acted on good advice, and I shall not draw 
 back from what I have done. You should not try 
 to unnerve me in this manner. It is unkind. 
 Besides, how could you and your father keep up a 
 place like that, when your books are all sold, and 
 your trade at an end ? Be reasonable, my dear. 
 Be reasonable. It is not honest what you want to 
 do : to live on at my expense and cheat the piper of 
 his pay. Oh-h-h ! Do not set your back up like 
 that. When folks cannot pay they must go softly 
 and meekly ; they walk on broken bottles. Yes, 
 yes ; I see the money ; but I suppose it belongs to 
 the creditors. If Gigi Fanno saw it, he would take 
 it and lock it up. I shall not say anything about it, 
 but you had best hide it in your gown. Yes, yes ; I 
 know all you want to say. I have been a friend of 
 Ser Checchi's ; I never said I have not, but friend- 
 ship is one thing, and interest is another. One 
 must consider one's own interest before all. I want 
 the tower emptied ; I want the tower vacant. You 
 have had your notice to quit. It is quite regular, 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 235 
 
 quite legal. What have you to complain of ? Am 
 I, or am I not, the owner of the place ? Ay, you 
 cannot dispute that. Then go back to your father, 
 and tell him so, and tell him that, when one em- 
 ploys a lawyer, one does not expect to be \vorried 
 out of one's life by women. No no no ! I have 
 said it and I stick to it. You have the notice to 
 quit. Out you go ! out you go ! Of course a week 
 more or less we will not make a fuss about, for old 
 acquaintance' sake. But out you go. I have other 
 views for the tower. And you, hearken to a word of 
 sense go you and take a couple of little rooms. It 
 is as much as you can afford, and maybe you won't 
 be long able to pay for even those ; and, I am told, 
 everything except your beds is seized. The idea the 
 idea of poor folks without a table or chair wanting 
 to go staying on at the tower! Two hundred years? 
 I know you say so. Yes, I believe it is so. But your 
 people were only tenants all that while. My father 
 rest his soul ! bought it forty years ago, and the 
 deed of sale was registered, and may be seen by 
 whoever will. I am the master I am the master ! 
 and out you go. No no ; no no ! It is of no use 
 to torment me ; you ought to have more feeling, 
 you ought to have more consideration. You will 
 cause me an apoplexy ; I must go home unshaven, 
 and take a purging dose. You should not excite 
 one so. I feel a booming in my ears. If I perish 
 of a stroke, you will have killed me.' 
 
 And he began to cry, for he was exceeding 
 frightened. 
 
 'It is a shame, signorina, to torment a poor, 
 good, kind man thus,' said the barber, who had 
 been listening all the while, a brass pot of hot water 
 
236 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 swinging in his hand. ' It is a shame to importune 
 him so, and it may cause him a stroke, as he says. 
 Like enough, alack ! Ser Maso has a heart of gold, 
 and it irks him to deny the smallest thing to man or 
 child. Come into my inner room, sir,' he added, 
 ' and lie down on my sofa a bit, and let me make 
 you a cooling draught. If you walk home in the 
 agitation you are in now, you may very well not 
 reach your house in safety.' 
 
 ' You are right,' said Maso Saetta, with a kind of 
 pride in being so near his end, mingled with a great 
 commiseration for himself. ' My feelings are always 
 too much for me, and to be obliged to seem unkind 
 to an old friend is very painful. But when one has 
 had good advice, and has set the law in motion, no 
 reasonable being would be turned aside from his 
 own interests.' 
 
 Here his tottering steps bore him across the 
 threshold of the inner room of the barber, and the 
 door of it was closed on him, and Beldia was left 
 alone in the shop with some curious passers-by, and 
 some round-eyed street urchins crowding round the 
 door to see what was the matter. 
 
 ' What can that maiden be thinking of? She and 
 her old fool of a father must be mad,' said the 
 barber in the inner chamber, as he mixed a lemon- 
 juice and citrate of magnesia; 'they have nothing 
 in the world ; they are cleaned out like disem- 
 bowelled rabbits, and they expect to stay on in such 
 a fine place as Taddeo's tower. They are a dis- 
 grace to the town. You do well, sir, to get rid of 
 them. The man has always been a poor, dreamy, 
 feckless creature, looking for noon at twilight and 
 thinking twelve is thirteen; and as for the signorina, 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 237 
 
 Madonna Beldia as they call her, why, there is 
 naught to say against her virtue, but she is a wench 
 who thinks herself a queen, and nobody good enough 
 to speak to ; my woman once takes her a piece of 
 harmless gossip, as women will, and she reads her a 
 sermon on back-biting and bearing false witness ! 
 She is like a starched coif, and I for one shall not 
 be sorry to see her roughly handled and the starch 
 creased. Drink this, dear and good sir, and lie 
 quiet a little ; she cannot come in hither.' 
 
 ' She is a good young woman enough, but head- 
 strong,' said Maso Saetta faintly. * She does not 
 realize her own situation. If Gigi Fanno knew she 
 had that money in her breast, I misdoubt the law 
 would not let her ringer it. Debtors cannot secrete 
 large sums.' 
 
 ' Nay, it is a fraud,' said the barber. ' How is 
 your head now, sir ? If you would like a leech or 
 two I could run over to the apothecary's opposite.' 
 
 ' No, no, the ill is passing. Are you sure she 
 cannot come in here ?' 
 
 * Sure and certain, sir. The bolt is shot." 
 
 ' It would be only right that the creditors should 
 know she has that money. Really and truly it is 
 theirs.' 
 
 1 It is theirs, sir, yes. If I said a word to Gigi ? 
 I shave him twice a week.' 
 
 ' It might be well ; the law must never be de- 
 frauded. Yes ; I think it would be well.' 
 
 ' Then I will say the word, sir, before the day is 
 over,' said the barber with virtuous unction, and that 
 mysterious pleasure in doing harm to people with 
 whom he had no concern, which is frequent in 
 human nature. 
 
238 THE TOWER OF T ADDED 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 SER CHECCHI had courage and integrity in his 
 blood, and at first, for the sake of his daughter and 
 of his own good name, he struggled against his 
 adversity. But he could not bring himself to stoop 
 very low, or to beg very humbly ; words of suppli- 
 cation choked him. Though a man of great intel- 
 lectual humility, he had been always proud and 
 sensitive, having accorded many favours but asked 
 none ; so that he petitioned ill, and did not under- 
 stand the trick of greasing the palms of those 
 middlemen who are always supreme in such circum- 
 stances ; moreover, the covert influence of Querci 
 and of Vestuccio was always opposed to him, closing 
 any doors he strove to open, and hastening on what 
 he tried to retard, so that he could do little, very 
 little ; and the time grew close at hand for the 
 actual sales to take place. The neighbours had a 
 sore sense of deception, when they still involun- 
 tarily felt unwilling respect for that slight, bent, 
 feeble figure, with its soft gray hair touching the 
 shoulders, and the luminous large eyes looking so 
 far beyond them and theirs, as Ser Checchi went on 
 his weary way through the streets to beg mercy and 
 delay from his torturers. 
 
 The very reverence which he had inspired among 
 those who saw him in his daily walks in the city 
 went against him now, for to the vulgar it is always 
 irritating to have been subdued into feeling respect 
 where there is no money to warrant their feeling 
 it, or to reward them for having done so. 
 
 ' What an artful old hypocrite to look so venerable, 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 239 
 
 and buy choice copies as if he were some rich 
 scholar, whilst all the while he was head over ears 
 in debt !' said the tradesfolk of the neighbourhood ; 
 and this, or something like this, was the general 
 sentiment amongst the small number of persons who 
 were interested in observing the decline and fall of 
 his fortunes. 
 
 Once in her despair, feeling that no personal 
 reluctance or pride should prevent her essaying any 
 means which could possibly alleviate her father's dis- 
 tress, Beldia went to the offices of Pampilio Querci, 
 situated in the Canto dei Nelli. His name was 
 attached to the suit of more than one creditor, and 
 she knew that, although not officially, he was virtu- 
 ally the adviser of Vestuccio. The attorney, a little, 
 dapper, spruce, pert figure, bald at twenty-six years 
 old, and pallid as a candle, received her with elabo- 
 rate and frigid politeness, sitting behind a writing- 
 table strewn with legal papers, and the manuscripts 
 of the archaeological articles which he was preparing 
 for a learned Roman review. 
 
 He listened to her politely, but evidently wearied 
 as by a twice-told tale. He was grieved, he was in- 
 consolable, he was in despair, but he could not defer 
 execution : he was but the instrument of his clients ; 
 was Dessi insolent and overbearing ? he was 
 pained to hear it, but he could do nothing ; cus- 
 todians were independent citizens, under no one's 
 orders ; they had heavy responsibilities, they could 
 scarcely be blamed if they were anxious to protect 
 themselves ; in the event an absurd hypothesis, 
 she would excuse him for even putting it forward- 
 in the utterly impossible event of anything seized in 
 the name of the law being made away with by the 
 
240 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 debtor, or anyone belonging to him, Giuseppe Dessi 
 was responsible for its disappearance. 
 
 He might, therefore, be excused, if he were over- 
 solicitous and somewhat impertinent ; nevertheless, 
 if she thought she had any real ground of complaint, 
 she might address a petition against him to the most 
 worshipful the Pretore of the tribunal of the section; 
 he could not guarantee that such an application 
 would meet with success, but it might do so, if re- 
 spectfully and humbly worded. 
 
 All this he said in long, involved, pompous and 
 deliberate phrases, balancing a paper-knife on his 
 forefinger, and looking at her impertinently through 
 his eyeglasses, as he leaned back in his office chair. 
 
 He had been as amorously moved towards her at 
 one time as a cold-blooded and cautious little egotist 
 can ever be so moved to anyone ; and it consoled 
 his wounded vanity and his balked passion to see 
 this serene and stately maiden a supplicant before 
 him, and to be able in turn to reject her suit. 
 
 Had she not deserved every humiliation and 
 tribulation which could befall her ? What venge- 
 ance of 'the handless and footless goddess ' could 
 be too great upon a woman so blind and so ingrate. 
 
 ' It is well that my fancy was restrained from 
 fulfilment/ he reflected. ' She grows plain, quite 
 plain, and she looks old.' 
 
 He did not say in so many words, ' If you had 
 listened to my suit, all these miseries would have 
 been spared to you ;' but his attitude, his smile, his 
 bland reproof, his frigid condolence, all said it for 
 him in unmistakable meaning. 
 
 She might have possessed him, and his dapper 
 person, and his checked suit, and his bran-new 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 241 
 
 house amidst the tramway lines and the jute fac- 
 tories, and she had preferred a wandering Lombard 
 scholar, with loose chestnut curls and an old velvet 
 jacket, and no house at all anywhere, except in out- 
 lines upon his drawing-board. 
 
 Beldia was mute under the malignant ingenuity 
 which made her parent's misfortunes seem traceable 
 to her. It was possible enough, she knew, that had 
 she accepted the young advocate's suit, the affairs of 
 Ser Checchi would never have drifted to so desperate 
 a ruin. 
 
 ' If it be your vengeance, it is a poor, and paltry, 
 and cruel one,' she said at length. ' My father had 
 no part or act in my rejection of your hand. He 
 showed you hospitality, kindness, liberality ; and in 
 return you steal his thoughts, and hawk them to the 
 public press, and hound on his enemies against him. 
 It is you who have counselled Maso Saetta to drive 
 us from the tower.' 
 
 * That is wholly untrue, signorina; you are cruelly 
 unjust. As a man I feel, and feel poignantly ; but 
 of my feelings you were pleased once to make no 
 account ; as a lawyer I am a mere machine, I can 
 listen to no entreaties, I can neither pause nor waver 
 in my course. My duty, my sole duty, is towards 
 my clients, and, whatever it may cost me, I must do 
 their bidding, and follow what I conceive to be their 
 interests.' 
 
 1 You need not have accepted their affairs,' said 
 Beldia, weary of the long, pompous, and empty 
 periods. ' You owe my father much, signore : you 
 have learned much from him, and your learning has 
 brought you other wages than those of that pure 
 
 16 
 
242 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 intellectual delight which it has always been suffi- 
 cient for him to feel.' 
 
 She glanced as she spoke at the manuscript ready 
 for press, and at the printer's proof which lay be- 
 neath his hand upon the table, between the sum- 
 mons-papers. Over Querci's pallid face there passed 
 a quiver of embarrassment. Though his hand had 
 written, and his name had signed, these scholarly 
 articles, he knew well enough that it was of her 
 father's scholarship, and her father's suggestions 
 and discoveries, that those papers were full ; though 
 from their initial letter to their colophon no allusion 
 was made, no reference was hinted, as to the man 
 who had in reality inspired them. 
 
 ' I have sat at the feet of Ser Checchi in certain 
 studies with pleasure and profit/ he said, with some 
 faint confusion disturbing for a moment the starch 
 of his stiff and self-satisfied manners. ' I would 
 never deny it for a moment. But it is not my fault 
 if he has been so engrossed in those studies that 
 practical matters have been lost sight of by him. I 
 cannot afford to imitate his error, precious al- 
 though such learned pursuits and investigations are 
 to me. If he has not had at his side a practical 
 adviser, who would have saved him from the conse- 
 quences of such absence of mind, it is not my fault 
 either. , If you had chosen, I would have united my 
 interests to his. But you preferred that it should 
 be otherwise. It is the greatest pain to me that I 
 have been compelled by my professional obligations 
 to assume an attitude offensive, and apparently 
 hostile, to you. But I am, of a truth, no more 
 responsible for it than is this paper-cutter for the 
 opinions of the volume upon which it is employed. 
 
THE TOWER OF^TADDEO 243 
 
 Had they not come to me, these adversaries of 
 yours, they would have gone to some other solicitor, 
 who would probably have shown less delicacy and 
 patience in a painful duty than I have done.' 
 
 Then she turned away from him as she had done 
 from Vestuccio, and went out of the office. Querci 
 rose and hastened after her to open the outer door. 
 
 ' Signorina,' he murmured, when I can befriend 
 you conscientiously, believe me that I shall ever 
 rejoice to do so. I am not Signore Saetta's keeper, 
 nor Ser Checchi's, nor was I ever, allow me to re- 
 mind you, attorney for the latter. Messer Tomaso 
 has, on the contrary, always honoured me with his 
 confidence. I owe a duty to my clients which I 
 must fulfil, and he is one of them. But if you can 
 obtain from him, or from them all, or from any one 
 of them, an order to suspend proceedings, I shall be 
 relieved and glad.' 
 
 He extended his hand as he spoke ; she did not 
 take it. 
 
 She had seen his clients again and again before 
 this day, and one and all they had replied to her 
 that they could move in no way, that the advocate 
 Querci held their affairs in his hands, and that they 
 dared not meddle with him. Her life swung like a 
 pendulum between the thresholds of creditors' 
 houses and lawyers' studies ; she was worn out by 
 the ceaseless and useless swing to and fro betwixt 
 these men, who sent her backwards and forwards 
 from one to another as the players at pallone sent 
 their ball. 
 
 Querci closed the door upon her, and returned to 
 his desk. 
 
 ' Plain yes, she grows plain,' he thought once 
 
244 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 more with unction. 'And she must be four-and- 
 twenty years old by now. When the old man is 
 dead, she will have to go out to domestic service 
 in some capacity; she has nothing, and her Lom- 
 bard will be wise enough to keep the ocean 
 between them. To think that I ever wished to 
 marry her ! and that I might have been taken at my 
 word !' 
 
 Then he lit a cigarette, and felt that fortune had 
 protected him, and dreamed of himself as he would 
 be in future years town councillor, provincial coun- 
 cillor, deputy, secretary of finance, commander of 
 civil orders, even who could say not ? even cousin 
 of the King, by virtue of the Annunciation Insignia. 
 Why not ? A Sicilian notary is so now. 
 
 The bean-stalk climbing of a Messer Crispi makes 
 ambitions ferment, like new wine, in the brains and 
 bosoms of all youthful lawyers. 
 
 Then he roused himself from his dreams, took 
 up his pen, and resumed his essay, looking every 
 three minutes at the memoranda which he had taken 
 down a year or two before from the teachings of Ser 
 Checchi, concerning the African origin of the Sar- 
 dinian race, and the epoch of the Etruscan invasion 
 of Latium. 
 
 Half an hour after there was a tap at his door, 
 and a man entered. 
 
 ' Good-day, Messer Vico,' said Querci, with cheer- 
 ful politeness, slipping his manuscript into his blot- 
 ting-paper. ' I am at your service ; what is it ?' 
 
 Ludovico del Beni, a tall, bony, brown man, with 
 a weak mouth and kindly eyes, wiped his forehead, 
 spat on the floor, twirled his hat in his fingers, and 
 then said sheepishly: 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 245 
 
 ' Please, sir advocate, I do not like this business.' 
 
 Querci looked at him sharply. 
 
 ' Why not ?' he inquired. 
 
 Ludovico del Beni, called Vico by all who knew 
 him, who kept a small shop of mattings, and cord- 
 age, and brushwork, stood first on one foot and then 
 on the other, and spat again on the floor with great 
 ceremony and solemnity. 
 
 ' Well, sir,' he said, with a pause, ' he is an old 
 man, and a gentle one ; and my mind misgives me 
 that he has not got long to live, and it seems to me 
 that I'm neither here nor there in this business, and 
 I'd like to be out of it ; and why don't Ser Aurelio 
 do his own jobs, and put his name to them ? And 
 the young woman, she came to me last evening, and 
 she is very pretty spoken, and she is fond of the old 
 man, and so I wanted to say, sir can't they be given 
 time, and let off a bit ? It is not a business as I 
 like ; no, I never was a hard man, and I don't care 
 to look like one ; and I said to the young woman, 
 if the sales could be stopped, and if the matter 
 could be arranged in any other way ' 
 
 * It cannot,' said Querci, with a sharp click of his 
 teeth, like the shutting of a steel trap. ' Confine 
 yourself to your own affairs, my friend ; they are 
 like enough to cause you trouble.' 
 
 The tradesman looked at him nervously, and, with 
 a meek and deferential pleading in his voice, said 
 timidly: 
 
 * The prosecution is in my name, is it not ?' 
 ' Of course. It is you who hold the bill.' 
 
 ' To please Ser Aurelio. I have never had a penny 
 of the money.' 
 
 ' That is not the present question. You are the 
 
246 THE TOWER OF TADDZO 
 
 actual and apparent holder of the bill. You obtain 
 judgment and levy execution. A sale follows, as 
 night follows day.' 
 
 * But I do not like to look like a knave.' 
 
 ' A knave !' 
 
 Querci was shocked ; nothing alarms men of his 
 kind so much as plain language. 
 
 ' There is no question of knavery,' he said coldly. 
 ' If there be any knavery at all, it is on the part of 
 the debtor, who made himself responsible for sums 
 which he knew he could not meet. I would advise 
 you not to talk in this way; you yourself have paper 
 out which is not worth very much. It may prove 
 necessary to see how much, if your compassion for 
 the old man in the tower runs away with your 
 common-sense.' 
 
 The tradesman trembled as he heard, and took 
 out his large cotton handkerchief, and wiped the 
 perspiration from his forehead. 
 
 ' But, sir,' he said piteously, ' we ought all to be 
 merciful, and not judge our neighbours ; and it is 
 quite true what she says, that Ser Checchi has 
 always been a most quiet, harmless, honest citizen, 
 and if his craze for books ran away with him, and 
 he had -a bad son to drain him dry, why, so may 
 anybody; and my own lads cause me trouble 
 enough, and I have a fellow-feeling.' 
 
 ' Your reflections come late in the day, my friend,' 
 said Querci with cutting contempt. ' The notice of 
 sale will be out on Friday.' 
 
 ' In my name ?' 
 
 ' In your name, and in the names of others. It is 
 impossible, you see, for Ser Aurelio to wait any 
 longer. There is too much danger in delay. Other 
 
THE TOWER Of T ADDED 247 
 
 creditors may arise, and the chance of enforcing full 
 payment will be lost. Besides, the orders are given/ 
 The man stood silent, regretful, and disturbed. 
 
 * But I have nothing to do with it,' he said 
 timidly. 'I am put forward as if I had, but you 
 know well, sir advocate, none better, that I have no 
 more to do with it than the babe unborn.' 
 
 Querci frowned ; the imbecility and obstinacy of 
 the man incensed his higher intelligence. 
 
 1 Why talk this nonsense at the eleventh hour ?' 
 he said with severity. * If you speak in such a way 
 to anyone besides myself, you will have unpleasant 
 communications from Vestuccio yourself. Re- 
 member all that you owe to his forbearance and to 
 his good nature.' 
 
 The unhappy tradesman drooped his head and 
 shifted nervously from one foot to another, and 
 seemed to shrink into himself as a young shy dog 
 will do when he sees a whip. 
 
 * Very well, sir,' he said humbly. ' If it must be, 
 it must be. But I am sorry for that maiden and the 
 old man !' 
 
 He was one of the many humble tradesfolk who 
 were of so much use to Vestuccio in his financial 
 transactions, people necessitous and easily moulded, 
 who, having been assisted by him in the beginning 
 of his intimacy with them, became in due course his 
 creatures, his instruments, his marionettes, moved by 
 him either through their terror or their cupidity. 
 He would not for worlds have figured in law courts 
 himself as a persecuting and usurious creditor, but 
 it was in no way against his reputation to pass on 
 the bills which he received to his puppets, and guide 
 unseen their manoeuvres in the tribunals, and secretly 
 
248 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 impose on them an inexorable severity, whilst openly 
 and publicly he lamented their rigour. 
 
 When a bill has passed out of your hands, what 
 can you do about it ? Nothing, clearly, were you 
 king or emperor. Whoever holds it is the headsman 
 who strikes when he chooses. You may express your 
 grief that it has gone out of your hands ; but, once 
 put in circulation, you can no more stop it than 
 you can stop the rolling and exploding of a cask of 
 petroleum, if you have set it alight and started it 
 down a slope. 
 
 No one ever saw the match in Vestuccio's hand ; 
 people only saw him running with a bag of sand to 
 put out the flaring barrel, and always arriving too 
 late, and expressing his regrets with touching pathos 
 for the carelessness with which others left inflam- 
 mable oils within reach of ignited fuses. 
 
 True, there were a few who were not dupes of his 
 comedy ; there were even many who knew the whole 
 truth, but such persons respected him the more for 
 his dexterity and duplicity. The public is not 
 angry with a good citizen who purrs pretty phrases 
 in its ear, whilst he leads it by the nose wherever he 
 pleases. 
 
 * If he had trusted all his affairs to me,' he said 
 often at this juncture, with tears in his eyes, ' Ser 
 Checchi would not now be in the position he is. I 
 was grieved to foreclose on Antella, it cut me to the 
 heart to do anything harsh ; but when there are also 
 many creditors, one dares not lag behind, one's 
 duty to one's family is paramount.' 
 
 This was the kind of speech which enchanted and 
 enslaved his fellow-townsmen. Disguise is usually 
 popular. It expresses deference for your neighbour's 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 249 
 
 opinion. If you did not care for his opinion, you 
 would not dissemble to propitiate him. Human 
 nature forgives anything except bluntness. Bluntness 
 offends; it is the brother of truth. Vestuccio was 
 never blunt, and he was always popular. 
 
 Ser Checchi ceased to struggle, desisted from all 
 effort. He accepted his fate, and bent his head to 
 the storm meekly, ashamed, bitterly ashamed, of the 
 folly which had drawn it on his head. 
 
 He ate scarcely anything, slept but rarely and fit- 
 fully, and his hands had a continual tremor in them ; 
 he wrote illegibly, and grasped his pen with difficulty. 
 ' Why was not my hand paralyzed ere I put 
 my signature to any bill?' he said bitterly to his 
 daughter. ' Everything comes too late, even in- 
 firmity !' 
 
 When she heard him say this, she burst into 
 a passion of weeping. 
 
 ' It is not paralysis, father,' she cried piteously ; 
 ' no, no no, no.' 
 
 ' It will be,' said Ser Checchi quietly. 
 He did not deceive himself; he knew that his 
 strength was failing, his health giving way. 
 
 * Only let my body die before my brain !' he said 
 in his heart, in the scholar's terror of aphasia. 
 
 One day a registered letter was brought to Beldia ; 
 her heart leaped up in sudden hope, thinking that it 
 bore news of her betrothed ; but before her eager 
 hands could take the packet her face fell she recog- 
 nised the handwriting of Cirillo. 
 
 She opened the letter with fear ; nothing but 
 trouble had ever come to them from him. 
 
 Out of the envelope dropped a bank-note. There 
 were a few hurriedly written lines with it : 
 
250 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 1 1 won fifty thousand francs last night. I send 
 you twenty of them. Your pearls enabled me to 
 play. I am well, and hope that what I send may 
 get my father out of trouble. You see the devil is 
 not as black as your maiden fancy paints him. Ac- 
 knowledge this, Poste Restante, Monaco.' 
 
 The letter was dated from Monte Carlo, and the 
 French bank-note was for twenty thousand francs. 
 
 Beldia sat still with them both on the table before 
 her, the sunshine falling on the paper-money. Here 
 was deliverance ; here was relief ; here was succour. 
 
 The motes of the sunbeams swam and circled 
 before her sight ; there was a dull noise in her 
 ears ; she was strangely moved to relief, and yet to 
 terror. 
 
 A gambler's money ! would her father take it ? 
 
 She did not hear his voice calling to her until he 
 had called thrice. She rose and went to him, the 
 letter and money crumpled in her hand. 
 
 Ser Checchi stood at the head of the stair. 
 
 'You have had a letter; is it from Odisio?' he 
 cried to her ; for the Lombard, with his pure 
 scholarship and his loyal manhood, was dear to 
 him. 
 
 Beldia stood before him with a strange sense of 
 guiltiness upon her ; as if she had come out of some 
 shameful place ; and yet of gladness too, seeing the 
 means by which all their mourning might be changed 
 to rejoicing, and their woes undone. 
 
 Without daring to say one word in either joy or 
 fear, she held out the letter to him. He glanced 
 sharply at the money in her hand, a flush of hope 
 and warmth passing over his wasted features. 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 251 
 
 Then he read Cirillo's writing once, twice, thrice, 
 very slowly, as if he could not fathom its meaning, 
 or believe his own senses. He stretched out his 
 hand and took the bank-note from her and folded it 
 up with the letter ; his face had grown cold and 
 stern, as though it were cut in stone. Looking on 
 him, she had no need to ask him if he accepted the 
 gift. 
 
 ' Give me an envelope and sealing-wax,' he said 
 harshly. 
 
 She went to her chamber and brought both. He 
 put the letter and the money together in the enve- 
 lope, and sealed it with his big seal, and addressed 
 it to his son's name at the post-office of Monaco. 
 
 ' Send it to be registered,' he said sternly. ' If 
 there be not a franc in the house to pay the postage, 
 pawn my shirt.' 
 
 Beldia grew very pale. 
 
 ' Father, he means well,' she said timidly. ' He 
 has never seen as we see. He will only lose it at 
 play if it go back to him ; and it would save all, it 
 would save the books !' 
 
 The sunken blue eyes of Ser Checchi flashed their 
 lightnings of terrible wrath upon her. For one 
 moment she thought that he would strike her. 
 
 ' Take the alms of my son ! The spawn of a 
 gambling hell 1 Dare you tempt me ? you ? Let 
 the books go ; let the last stick and thread and crust 
 which belonged to me go, but do not play the devil's 
 part for him, and try to buy my soul with a gam- 
 bler's gold !' 
 
 She dared not argue more ; and the letter went 
 back to Cirillo by that evening's post, sealed with 
 the big onyx seal of his father, with which he had 
 
252 THE TOWER OF T ADDED 
 
 played when he \vas a little curly-haired child, and 
 stood at Ser Checchi's knee on Sunday afternoons 
 at Antella. 
 
 Beldia knew that her father was right, that he 
 was only true to himself in this act of inexorable 
 honour. Yet, woman-like, she mourned for Cirillo, 
 in whose hard heart she knew that there must have 
 been a soft place, when he had penned that letter 
 and parted with that large sum ; she knew that 
 there must have been in him some awakening to 
 conscience, some regret for his faults and follies, 
 some yearning for his kindred and his birthplace. 
 
 She wished that it had been returned to him less 
 harshly. She wrote herself, and strove to soften the 
 rejection of his aid, but to her letter she received 
 no answer, neither then nor at any other time. 
 
 She never doubted that her father had done 
 rightly, or that his choice was the only one possible 
 to a man reared in the strong and pure ethics of the 
 great writers whom he loved. But that rescue had 
 been so near, succour so close, seemed to make their 
 fate more cruel. It would have been a delight so 
 exquisite, a pleasure so honest and so just, to have 
 barred the door against the invasion of the law and 
 had their home once more intact and inviolate. To 
 put down this sweetness untasted, to thrust away 
 this healing draught untouched, made their torture 
 only harder to endure. 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 THE days wore on, each one sadder, harder than 
 the previous day ; the men of the tribunal came, 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 253 
 
 fussing and fuming, peeping into and roaming in 
 and out of every room, and Beppe Dessi swelled 
 with more insolence and more importance as the 
 period of probation allowed by the law drew nearer 
 and nearer to its end. 
 
 The bare walls with a few of the necessaries of 
 daily life were soon to be all which would be left to 
 them, and soon even those walls were to shelter 
 them no more ; they would be driven out to a new 
 home. 
 
 Unknown to them, Don Gervasio had taken a few 
 humble chambers near his own dwelling, so that 
 they should not find themselves utterly houseless ; 
 but he dared not speak of this even to Beldia ; the 
 thought that she could live elsewhere than in the 
 tower seemed to paralyze all her energies and 
 stupefy her intelligence. 
 
 ' Oh, never elsewhere ! never elsewhere !' she 
 said piteously to the old priest. ' We have done no 
 harm that we should be forced away like slaves to 
 be sold in a market, arid the money for the rent is 
 there.' 
 
 But the money for the rent was not there ; since 
 Gigi Fanno, warned by Saetta's barber, had ob- 
 tained an order from the tribunal for Don Gervasio 
 to deliver it up in the name of the creditors which 
 the priest had been forced to obey. But he had 
 not the courage to tell her this ; he knew that she 
 would learn it soon enough ; he knew that, were it 
 still in his possession, it would be powerless to move 
 their landlord to mercy ; he knew that Maso Saetta 
 would send them out by main force if they did not 
 go voluntarily ; and, therefore, unknown to her, he 
 hired the little chambers looking on a shady monas- 
 
254 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 tery garden near Porta Romana, so that when the 
 inevitable eviction should take place, there should 
 be some shelter ready for her and for her father. 
 
 As though the terrible force of the temptation 
 which had assailed him when he had refused his 
 son's gift had broken down his moral and physical 
 strength, Ser Checchi from that hour grew feebler 
 and sicklier, and less able to meet the woes which 
 pressed on him. As though the contrast of what 
 was with what might have been, had he stooped to 
 retain his son's gift, made the bitterness of his lot 
 too much even for his fortitude, he passed whole 
 days shut up in his bed-chamber, lost in apathetic 
 meditation, and at times his eyes would fill with 
 sudden tears, which he did not strive to conceal ; 
 something of the pathetic weakness of an innocent 
 animal, harassed and tortured without resistance, 
 had come into him. It seemed as if his last forces 
 had spent themselves in the rejection of Cirillo's 
 gold. 
 
 Once she heard him mutter to himself: 
 
 ' Even her pearls even her mother's pearls 
 gone in a foreign hell !' 
 
 He did not view his son's action as she saw it ; it 
 only seemed to him an insult, an outrage, a degrada- 
 tion the more. 
 
 On one of these weary, empty, yet laborious, days 
 in early autumn, when the city is at its dreariest, 
 and dustiest, and dullest, Beldia, looking from a 
 back casement which opened from the kitchen on 
 the river, saw a boat come up and station itself 
 under the tower wall, whilst the men who were in it 
 fastened a rope's end to one of the iron stanchions 
 in the basement. She watched them unconsciously 
 
',.'. ^rt*^v 
 
 '*ti&i -i ' 
 
 '*-- 
 
 - ' t 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 255 
 
 for a little time; her mind was dulled as by an 
 opiate by the continued succession of sorrows, 
 anxieties, humiliations, and miseries ; as far as her 
 thoughts were awake at all, they were dwelling in 
 fancy on the vintage fields of Antella, with the white 
 and dun oxen pacing through them, and the yellow 
 dragon's mouth, and the lilac colchicum growing in 
 the grassy furrows. It was the first autumn in all 
 her life that she had not been amidst those fields 
 when grapes were ripening in late summer suns. 
 But, lost as she was in pain and in remembrance, 
 the movements of these men below ended by arrest- 
 ing her attention ; they had a pot of white paint on 
 the bench of their little shallow boat, and with a big 
 brush they were making a broad white line along 
 the brown stones of the tower at as great a height 
 as they could reach. The terror which was now 
 always with her as to the loss of her old home, 
 made her watch with puzzled fear this singular 
 marking of the ancient place. 
 
 ' Good people, what are you doing there ?' she 
 asked them, leaning as far out of the window as she 
 could. 
 
 They looked up, and the one who held the brush, 
 standing at rest a moment, answered her civilly : 
 
 ' We are marking the river-wall : where this line 
 runs everything is to be pulled down. We have 
 been below already, as you may see, signorina, if 
 you look over yonder.' 
 
 ' Pulled down !' she echoed the words stupidly. 
 
 ' Ay, ay,' said the man. * 'Tis a pity, I do think 
 myself; there is a lot of life in these old stones still; 
 but, you see, at Palazzo Vecchio they want to have 
 everything spick-and-span new ; they want to make a 
 
256 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 quay here, they say, with electric light, and a tram- 
 way, and new houses, all whitewashed, just like the 
 quay on the other side, where the old Zeccha, and 
 the trees, and the Alberti chapel used to be. And 
 like enough, when all's been cleared, they'll choke it 
 up w r ith factories and gas works, just as the shore is 
 choked up down yonder. But there! 'tis no busi- 
 ness of mine, and the gentlemen want to turn some 
 money what else do they get themselves made 
 town - councillors for ? Why, madamigella, how 
 queer you look ! Have you not heard of it before ?' 
 
 And the good man, confused and troubled at the 
 effect of his news, splashed his big brush into the 
 iron pot again, and went on drawing his broad 
 white line along the stones welded together so 
 firmly by the artisans of Taddeo Gaddi. 
 
 Beldia sank down on the window-seat of the 
 kitchen, and hid her face in her hands, as one who 
 hears a death-warrant. 
 
 She did not doubt the workman's story. She 
 remembered what Maso Saetta had said, and she 
 knew the frightful apathy of the city before its own 
 undoing, wrought for the greed and gratification of 
 its Jacks in office. 
 
 Destroyed ! the tower destroyed ! The blood 
 surged in her ears and the tearless sobs strangled 
 her breath like knotted cords. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 MEANTIME of Odisio Fontana there had entirely 
 ceased to come any tidings whatever, since the day 
 that the ship in which he had sailed had touched at 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 257 
 
 the island of Madeira. Gathering courage from her 
 desperate dread, Beldia had written to his old 
 master in Milan, and he to her had replied, formally, 
 as to a stranger, that he also knew and had heard 
 nothing, and shared her fears as to the fate of the 
 vessel, of which no tidings had been rumoured by 
 the underwriters. He told her that the poor mother 
 of Odisio had been spared the sorrow, for she had 
 died, suddenly and painlessly, in her sleep, in the 
 summer heats, and her small income had died with 
 her. The Milan architect added that he had taken 
 charge of the few things which she had left, and had 
 placed them in safety to await communication of the 
 wishes of her son. 
 
 Although Beldia had never had directly any word 
 from her, she had heard so much from Odisio of his 
 mother that she felt a personal pain and loss, when 
 she learned that she would never see in life this 
 gentle and learned northern woman, who had chosen 
 to give her son rather the riches of the mind than 
 the goods of the world, the freedom of the spirit 
 rather than the servitude of wealth. 
 
 It was a minor sorrow, lost in the deeper grief of 
 her father's woes, and her own ignorance whether 
 the man she loved were living or dead ; but it was 
 the one drop which filled her cup to overflowing. 
 
 She had not known how much solace and support 
 she had unconsciously derived from the thought of 
 Odisio's mother, until now that she learned of her 
 death. 
 
 Nor either of Cirillo did she know aught. From 
 the night when he had vanished down the dusky 
 street with her pearls upon him, he had given no 
 
258 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 sign of life. She supposed that he had got safely 
 out of the country, since, had he been arrested, it 
 would have been publicly known. But his fate was 
 hidden in obscurity. Her father never named him. 
 From time to time he roused himself from his de- 
 pression and apathy to question her of her betrothed; 
 but of his son he said never a word. 
 
 * Your mistress's Lombard is lost at sea, they tell 
 me, good Nica,' said Beppe Dessi to Veronica one 
 afternoon, when, as his wont was, he swaggered 
 through the rooms, prying here and there, locking 
 and unlocking, peering and fingering, jabbering and 
 grinning. In that curious way in which bad news 
 travels swiftly and cruelly, it had become known in 
 the quarter that the Genoese vessel was reported 
 missing. 
 
 ' Were he dead on land, we would not ask you to 
 pay for his burying,' said Veronica, who had come 
 in, as she often did, to linger about her old kitchen, 
 and try and coax her late mistress into eating some 
 tit-bit which she brought with her ; she had a coarse 
 and shrewish tongue, but her heart was neither hard 
 nor unfaithful. 
 
 ' Ships be often silent for many a month, and 
 come safe into port after all,' she added ; ' anyhow, 
 'tis better to drown at sea than live to get fat on 
 other folks' pain, and gnaw other folks' loaves, as 
 you do, Beppino.' 
 
 Old Dessi chuckled, shaking his broad stomach. 
 * You have a vixen's tongue, but a witless one, 
 my dear/ he replied. ' Few men are as merciful as 
 I. Haven't I left your good people the use of their 
 rooms and their things, when I might have locked 
 them all up, and left nothing out but a mattress and 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 259 
 
 a pipkin, and a knife and fork, as the law doth pre- 
 scribe ?' 
 
 He was seated as he spoke in Ser Checchi's own 
 chair ; he had his pipe in his mouth ; with his fat, 
 dirty fingers he was turning over a fair copy of the 
 ' Bellezze di Firenze.' Not that he knew one book 
 from another, or could tell a copper-plate engraving 
 from a lithograph ; but he liked to look important, 
 and he could see the librarian in the inner chamber 
 wince and move nervously, whenever a fine volume 
 was roughly and rudely handled thus. 
 
 He had no personal ill-will to Ser Checchi, with 
 whom he had never had any interviews until the 
 executions levied on the books ; but the low mind 
 hates the higher spirit by instinct, and with ferocity, 
 and gloats over its torment, as the grinning yokel 
 loves to see the stately and gracious stag pulled 
 down by hounds in a muddy lane. 
 
 Veronica, who was no respecter of persons, and 
 whose temper was quickly roused, snatched the 
 volume of Cinelli from him with no gentle hand, and 
 banged it upon his shoulders. 
 
 ' You porpoise !' she screamed, ' would you ape a 
 scholar ? Look at the black marks your paw has 
 left on the margins ! Custodian you may be, and a 
 fine farce it is, if you be so ; but you have no right 
 to damage the goods you have charge of with that 
 soot you have got on your fist from the grasp of 
 your godfather the devil.' 
 
 Beppi Dessi laughed, because he always laughed 
 at everything ; but he was angry too ; had Veronica 
 not been a big, buxom, brown widow, much to his 
 liking, he would have made her feel his anger as a 
 representative of the sanctity of the law. 
 
26o THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 ' Jest away, sauce-box,' he said jocosely, chucking 
 her under the chin. ' You won't laugh when you 
 see the books go to sale on the carts on Friday, and 
 all the pots and pans you used to see here swinging 
 and jingling atop of them.' 
 
 Veronica turned gray under the healthy brown 
 and red of her complexion. 
 
 ' Friday ? 'Tis not as near as that ; the saints 
 help us !' 
 
 ' Ay, that it is !' said Dessi, smacking his lips as 
 over some savoury morsel. ' To-morrow I shall put 
 up bande, and, you know, five days after, out every- 
 thing goes, if the King's liege himself was the 
 debtor.' 
 
 ' The bande /' echoed Veronica, as in old days in 
 that old tower women might have said with blood- 
 less lips 'The plague !' or 'The headsman !' 
 
 When the bande the declarations of the date of 
 sale are pasted on the walls and hung up by a 
 string to the door of the doomed dwelling, nothing 
 can arrest the sale of the debtor's possessions. It 
 is the funeral knell over the burial of credit and of 
 honour. 
 
 Bribes, prayers, tempted cupidity, hope of other 
 modes of payment, may retard the bringing of the 
 bande, but once brought, nothing except payment can 
 avert the sale which they announce. 
 
 ' Not the bande /' shrieked Veronica. ' Not yet, 
 not yet ! Oh, Beppino dear, good, kind Beppino 
 you will put off the day, you will persuade the people, 
 you will not bring these horrible, thrice accursed 
 bande here ?' 
 
 Dessi's fat sides shook with contented facetious- 
 ness. 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 261 
 
 'Ay, ay, ay! It is " dear Beppino " "good, 
 kind Beppino " now, is it ? Is the devil my god- 
 father now?' 
 
 ' The devil is your godfather, and your father too, 
 if you bring those vile things here. You know well 
 enough when those papers are out there is nothing 
 to be done no hope, no help, no anything. Look 
 ye, Beppe, you never dare 
 
 ' Dare !' said the great man, swelling bigger and 
 bigger with his own importance. ' Dare ! That is 
 a fine word to use to me ! If you don't take care to 
 keep a civiller tongue behind your teeth I will clap 
 you in prison for the maltreatment of a peaceable 
 citizen in the orderly pursuit of the duties which 
 the law entails on him. My shoulders ache now 
 with your bang of that big book ; and were you 
 not a passable, good - looking wench for your 
 years ' 
 
 ' What are my looks, bad or good, to you ? I am 
 not come to such a pass that I need take a gouty 
 old bailiff for my lover!' screamed Veronica, hissing 
 in her rage like the hot water in her own boiling 
 coppers. ' You are a monster, Beppe ! a beast, a 
 pig, a raging tiger ! What ! bring the salesmen 
 here to my honoured master, to my dear and saint- 
 like mistress ! You never can, you never shall. I 
 will tear the coat off your back, and your hair off 
 your head in the street with my hands and my 
 teeth ' 
 
 ' These folks are not your master or your mistress 
 any more, so you need not fuss about them ; and it 
 is not I who force the sales ; it is the creditors,' 
 said Beppe Dessi sullenly, for his dignity was hurt 
 by her invectives. ' And neither Gigi nor I have 
 
262 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 aught to do with hurrying on or holding off the 
 sales, as you would know without being told, if you 
 weren't an ignorant vixen ; and I know not what 
 good could be got out of waiting any longer, if we 
 could wait, for these people have not a farthing left, 
 and every day the costs run on, and so every day 
 which is wasted is a theft to the creditors, and to 
 me myself, as one may say. For, as it is, there will 
 be precious little to divide between us when all this 
 lumber of musty books is sold/ 
 
 Veronica's nerves gave way ; she fetched him 
 a sounding box on the ear, then threw her apron 
 over her head, as her habit was under emotion, and 
 sobbed aloud. 
 
 The bande ! how often in that poor quarter of 
 the town were these words heard like a tocsin tolling 
 in ruin and death ! 
 
 The sound of the blow and the cries roused Ser 
 Checchi where he was seated in the little dining- 
 room, whither he had gone to avoid seeing the pro- 
 fanation and pollution of his volumes by the hands 
 of the bailiff. 
 
 He rose and approached them. 
 
 * Woman, what do you here ? You are no more 
 in any service of mine,' he said to her. * Yes, I 
 know you mean well ; but you have no place here 
 now, and I cannot have this brawling in my 
 chamber.' 
 
 ' Ser Checchi ! Ser Checchi !' sobbed Veronica, 
 ' the old beast swears that he will put up the papers 
 to sell on Friday. Who ever heard the like ? The 
 papers once up, what can you do ? There will 
 be only five days to find help, and you will not find 
 it ; everything will go, from your books which have 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 263 
 
 ruined you, to the stewpans and pipkins that I used 
 fifteen long years in this house come Barnabas' 
 Day!' 
 
 Ser Checchi wavered slightly, like a man who has 
 been struck a heavy blow. But he steadied himself, 
 feeling the eyes of Beppe Dessi staring with curiosity 
 and triumph upon him. 
 
 ' Is it true ?' he asked the man briefly. 
 
 'Ay, ay, sir; it is true,' said Dessi, for once 
 serious, and forced into respect, he knew not why. 
 
 ' And you sell everything ?' 
 
 1 Everything, sir,' replied the bailiff; and he added 
 with his audacious fat chuckle : ' I suppose you 
 think much of them, but they'll make a mighty poor 
 show in the auction-room.' 
 
 Ser Checchi made one passionate movement, as 
 though he would have struck the blasphemer to the 
 ground ; then, with a violent effort controlling his 
 impulse, he left the room in silence. He felt as 
 one who hears his children insulted, his friends dis- 
 honoured in his presence, and is powerless to avenge 
 them. 
 
 All those dear companions of his studies ! All 
 those precious assistants of his labours ! All those 
 valued ministers to his meditations ! The Seneca, 
 the Pindar, the Cicero, the St. Augustine, the Ter- 
 tullian, the Villani, the Vitruvius, the Aldine Horace, 
 the Etienne Plato, the Giuntini Avicenna, the 
 Labacco, the Cicoonara, the Pistolesi, the scores 
 and scores of familiar and beloved brethren of his 
 heart and mind, which were now for ever to pass 
 from their honoured rest within his walls, and be 
 flung into unworthy hands, perchance be torn and 
 tossed piecemeal to some shameful fate ! And it 
 
264 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 was his own fault, his own clumsy, stupid, foolish 
 fault, his own ignorance, carelessness and witlessness, 
 which had brought him to this pass, and made him 
 powerless to protect himself or them ! 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 DON GERVASIO did his best to help his old friend, 
 but he was a poor priest with no money but that 
 which he held in trust for others ; and though he 
 stooped to use expostulation and supplication in 
 Ser Checchi's cause, which he would never have 
 used in his own, he could effect little, except to 
 obtain some slight delay in the execution of the 
 sentences. Ser Checchi deserved no enemies, but 
 he had few friends : men who are at once shy and 
 proud do not easily make friends, and his absorp- 
 tion in his intellectual and interior life had seemed 
 like arrogance and stiffness to the other tradesmen 
 of the neighbourhood. The few who valued and 
 cared for him like the old churchmen and profes- 
 sors who frequented his rooms, and were of like 
 tastes with himself were poor indeed in worldly 
 goods, and, even were they willing to aid him, were 
 without any means to do so. The simplicity and 
 solitude of his life had been such as to isolate him 
 from all practical men of affairs, except indeed from 
 Vestuccio. But Vestuccio, though his name did not 
 figure on these fatal documents, was the instigator 
 and director of all their misfortunes. That Beldia 
 felt ; even her father confessed it ; the appropriation 
 of Antella proved it. 
 
 ' If Aurelio Vestuccio had kept faith with me, no 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 265 
 
 ill would have ensued,' said her father ; and she 
 forbore to press him for details ; she had not lived 
 amongst tradesfolk all her life without knowing the 
 misery and ruin which come of protested bills, of 
 overdrawn accounts, of unpaid interest, of worth- 
 less paper. Their lives had indeed been detached 
 almost completely from that of their neighbours ; 
 yet still she had always been acquainted with these 
 things which she witnessed daily, weighing on the 
 mind, and eating away the savings of the small 
 people of her quarter. She was conversant enough 
 with the aspects of commercial failure to under- 
 stand that her father had no chance of rising above 
 his bankruptcy. 
 
 He had no credit. 
 
 He was an honest man ; indeed, he had never had 
 wit enough to be otherwise, said the wags of the 
 neighbourhood ; but he had no commercial credit ; 
 everyone knew him to be a dreamer and a scholar, 
 to whom nobody in their senses would have dared to 
 lend a five-franc piece. At least, not now that the 
 deeds of sale had been hung above his door. 
 
 If it be a golden rule to kick a man when he is 
 down, it is none the less so never to lend a penny to 
 anyone who wants it. 
 
 Had the lands of Antella been in the case, things 
 would have gone differently; both bankers and 
 lawyers love a property which is immovable. But 
 Antella, from its topmost branch to its lowest ditch, 
 from the tiles on its roof to the cress in its runlets of 
 water, was wholly and absolutely given over to Ves- 
 tuccio. His claims were paramount ; he was its 
 mortgagee ; his name appeared on the deeds of 
 mortgage openly, and on the surface of things he 
 
266 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 seemed to have conducted himself with as much 
 forbearance and benevolence as were possible to a 
 cautious man of business, who was bound to consider 
 prudence and self-interest. Everyone who spoke of 
 this matter on piazza, and in studio and office, said 
 with one voice, that Messer Aurelio had behaved 
 excellently well, and if he had at the last entered 
 into his own, it was only just that he should do so ; 
 and everyone applauded his past moderation. 
 
 If many in the town knew or guessed that the 
 other lenders were but his allies and instruments, if 
 it were generally understood that his masterhand 
 loosened or tightened the meshes of the web in 
 which the weakness of Ser Checchi had been 
 drawn, no one failed to respect him the more for 
 that. It is thus that fortunes are made in these 
 days, when everyone is content to measure the 
 golden fruits, and no one asks or cares what filthy 
 rags or foul excrements may have manured the 
 roots of the tree which bore them. Besides, no 
 one cared about Ser Checchi at all, except a few 
 bookworms, archaeologists, and antiquarians like 
 himself, who were as poor as they were learned. 
 Everyone cared about Aurelio Vestuccio a rising 
 man, a promising citizen in whose success many 
 other interests were involved, from those of the 
 bankers and private gentlemen who found it lucra- 
 tive to be behind him in his larger mortgages and 
 loans, to the little tradesfolk who saw in his success 
 the triumph of their own class, and never found him 
 reluctant to lend them a hundred francs in their 
 hard moments. 
 
 The actual day of sale soon arrived, as Beppe 
 Dessi had declared that it would do, seeming so 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 267 
 
 sudden in its crash of doom, although such cruel 
 torment had preceded and foreshadowed it. 
 
 All the neighbourhood was aware of the date, for 
 the printed announcements swinging under the 
 doorway shield, and at the public tribunal, had 
 made it public, and all the men and women in 
 the street got up between times to lose no portion 
 of the tragedy, which was a comedy to them. 
 
 As soon almost as the sun arose, the men of law 
 gathered at the great door of the tower, and leaving 
 carts and hand-barrows waiting for their loads on 
 the stones below, climbed the stairs in company 
 with their hired men, stalwart, rough, brawny 
 porters with hairy arms and sun-brown skins and 
 coarse voices, who pushed, noisy and hot and tur- 
 bulent, up the dusky staircase. The people who 
 lived within sight of the tower were all out of their 
 own dwellings, and gathered in the street agog and 
 gaping, the baker's wife foremost among them ; and 
 in the house itself, the charcoal-seller, the chandler, 
 the cobbler, the tailor, and the cabinet-maker craned 
 their necks to watch, and doffed their caps to the 
 minions of the law, with nervous smiles and eager 
 salutations, ' Good-day, good gentlemen ! We hope 
 we see you well !' 
 
 The lookers-on crowded below amongst the sacks 
 and cheese and charcoal, the lad Poldo amongst 
 them ; there was a great uproar of voices and a 
 great pushing and struggling to see what would first 
 be brought down the stairs ; in the streets the mules 
 harnessed to the carts were stamping, and shaking 
 their bells ; the usual street cries were unheard, for 
 the vendors had come in with the crowd, the fair 
 morning sunshine poured its light on the loves and 
 
268 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 garlands and shields of Messer Luca ; the men 
 tramped on up the stairs, under the noble Latin 
 inscription of the library door. 
 
 Beldia, shut in her own chamber, kneeling at 
 prayer, heard the noise and confusion, and rose to 
 her feet and listened breathlessly. 
 
 Even up to this very latest moment she had 
 always thought that some miracle would happen, 
 that the books would in some way be saved. 
 
 She hurried to her father's room. He was up and 
 clothed ; indeed he had not lain down all the night. 
 
 * Oh, father,' she murmured with dry white lips. 
 ' Oh, father ! they are come !' 
 
 ' I hear them, my love,' he answered gently. He 
 was quite still, save only for the nervous trembling 
 and twitching of his hands. 
 
 She put her arms about his throat, and pressed 
 her head against his breast. 
 
 He stroked her hair tenderly. 
 
 ' Good child, good child,' he said in a low and 
 dreamy voice. ' You have never rebuked me.' 
 
 Then he put her with gentleness away from him 
 and went out across the passage and into the book- 
 room, and sat down in his great leathern chair. 
 
 ' You cannot bear to see them taken away, father,' 
 murmured Beldia. ' Come elsewhere, come into 
 my room, they will not dare disturb you there.' 
 
 He waved her aside. 
 
 * They shall find me in my place,' he answered. 
 ' I am a feeble and foolish spendthrift, but I am not 
 a coward.' 
 
 And he waited, seated in his big, black, leather 
 chair, where so often he had sat to follow and enjoy 
 the abstruse learning of his cherished studies, and 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 269 
 
 trace the handwriting of penmen dead seven cen- 
 turies and more. 
 
 ' Keep your chamber, my dear,' he said to her. 
 ' I would not have their cruel eyes fall on you in 
 your sorrow.' 
 
 ' But let me stay with you, father. Pray let me 
 stay ! I will be calm and silent ; I can control what 
 I feel. You may trust me.' 
 
 ' I never distrust you. But I will not have you 
 seen by those coarse men. Shut yourself in your 
 chamber; let me not be disobeyed by you' 
 
 The neighbours meanwhile were all staring out of 
 their doors, eager to see with their cruel relish for 
 the misfortunes of others, which is not confined to 
 the courtly world which Rochefoucauld knew. 
 Only the cobbler, he who had used to take care of 
 the plants and the pigeons, had tears in his eyes, 
 and cried aloud, * Alack the day ! who would ever 
 have believed to see the like of this after all these 
 years of honoured solvency !' 
 
 Whereupon Beppe Dessi cuffed him on the ear, 
 half in joke, half in anger. 
 
 ' You fool !' said the bailiff, ' anybody with the 
 eye of a fish might have seen what was coming ten 
 years ago. A tradesman cannot buy books like a 
 Pope and all his Cardinals without going bankrupt.' 
 
 ' Alack, alack, so good a soul to come to such a 
 pass !' cried the cobbler, the big tears coursing down 
 his nose. 
 
 ' What good doth goodness?' said Beppe Dessi. 
 ' 'Tis but a poor soft thing which gets hunted like a 
 hare.' 
 
 And they went on up the stairs with Gigi Fanno 
 and the porters, and the young clerk with the pen 
 
2/o Y/fE TOWER OF T ADDED 
 
 behind his ear, and all their followers, trooping 
 noisily, chattering and holloaing in their wake ; but 
 they stopped on the threshold of the door, surprised 
 and taken aback to see the old librarian in his accus- 
 tomed place. 
 
 ' The impudent old idiot !' muttered Beppe Dessi, 
 and his coadjutor, blustering, yet in his secret soul 
 afraid, advanced to the table at which Ser Checchi 
 sat, and producing the acts and authorities of sale, 
 recited the usual formulas in a pompous, unintel- 
 ligible gabble, concluding with the usual interroga- 
 tion : 
 
 1 You are unprepared to pay these just demands 
 capital, interest, and costs ?' 
 
 ' I cannot pay,' replied Ser Checchi coldly. There 
 was a coarse laugh, led by Dessi and echoed by the 
 other men, which Gigi Fanno silenced with a gesture. 
 ' You had best then not molest or hinder the pro- 
 ceedings of the law/ he said pompously. ' We have 
 come to remove the goods which are forfeited by 
 sentence and order of the civil and correctional 
 tribunal of this city.' 
 
 * Obey your orders,' replied Ser Checchi. His 
 hands had ceased to tremble : they were clasped 
 before him upon his desk. His face was colourless 
 but calm. Something in his tone awed and hushed 
 the boisterous and offensive humour of the men. 
 Beppe Dessi alone, chuckling and thrusting out his 
 paunch, said, with a tap of his pipe-bowl on the 
 cover of a quarto Tertullian, ' They've cost you dear, 
 your ugly old books, but they'll only sell for waste 
 paper, I warrant me. If I'd wished to ruin myself, 
 I'd have done it better than that good wines now, 
 or good dishes, or plump women 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 271 
 
 ' Enough chatter, Beppe,' said his colleague, 
 putting up his papers in his pocket. ' Get to work. 
 The rooms must be cleared by eight. The sale is 
 at ten o'clock. Quick !' 
 
 He made a sign of impatience to his followers, 
 
 and the men threw themselves on the first bundles 
 
 of volumes which were near them. Already corded 
 
 together, pell-mell, with no reference to their dates, 
 
 or values, or titles, the books, which had taken fifty 
 
 years of assiduous toil and patient devotion to 
 
 collect, were rapidly divided, seized, hoisted on 
 
 the rough men's shoulders, and carried down the 
 
 stairs, to be thrown into the carts waiting for them 
 
 as though they were bales of straw or sacks of beans. 
 
 Warming to their work of devastation, as soldiers 
 
 to the sacking of a town, they cleared away parcel 
 
 after parcel with an alacrity wholly contrary to their 
 
 usual lazy, dawdling, sleepy ways, and the folios and 
 
 manuscripts, which had been as neighbours and 
 
 brethren on the same shelves so long, were torn 
 
 from one another, and borne out of that tranquil 
 
 atmosphere of learning and of peace down into the 
 
 brawling and dirt of the narrow pavement below, 
 
 and flung, even as the Pisan captives, bound hand 
 
 and foot, had once been carried through these very 
 
 streets, on the planks and straw of the barrows and 
 
 waggons. 
 
 The shelves had long been empty. Now the 
 floors were cleared. Ser Checchi sat motionless at 
 the table : not a word or a gesture escaped him. 
 
 The vulgar souls of the men were frightened by 
 that calm and dignified attitude ; the carters in- 
 stinctively moved a little more quietly, carried their 
 burdens away a little more carefully. Only Beppe 
 
272 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 Dessi going to and fro shouting his orders, swearing 
 his oaths, grinning, laughing, calling out now a 
 blasphemy, and now a joke, came up to him and 
 struck him familiarly on the shoulder : ' Hi ! old 
 book-worm, get up ! Your chair goes too, you 
 know. We've left you a stool in the kitchen. Get 
 up, I say !' 
 
 Ser Checchi rose slowly, and turned, and faced 
 him. The tough hide of the bailiff winced under 
 his regard. The porters made a muttering sound 
 of rebuke and protest. Gigi Fanno whispered in 
 his colleague's ear : * Softly, softly ! the chair can 
 wait for to-morrow's sale !' 
 
 But the old man laid his hands upon it, as if in 
 blessing ; it was an old friend, and had been in his 
 house two centuries and more ; then he pushed it 
 towards them in silence, and went to the embrasure 
 of the kneeling window and seated himself on its 
 stone step. 
 
 ' 'Tis a shame, a crying shame to take even his 
 chair from under him !' muttered one of the porters ; 
 but Beppe Dessi struck the grumbler a sharp blow 
 with his stick. 
 
 * You are a beast of burden, not a counsellor, 
 Tonino,' he said to the man ; ' when we ask your 
 opinion you can give it ; speak again, and you shall 
 go before the Questura for contumacy. Take out 
 the old fool's chair.' 
 
 The poor fellow, grumbling inaudibly, hoisted, 
 with effort, the large leathern seat upon his 
 shoulders, and staggering under its weight carried 
 it through the doorway and set it down with a crash 
 upon the stone landing at the head of the stairs. 
 
 Then they bore away the table, with its desk, the 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 273 
 
 volumes which had been upon it, the large old brass 
 inkstand and the bronze cup for sand, and the other 
 chairs which stood about the chamber, and the 
 cypress wood shelves and fittings of the book-cases. 
 
 Ser Checchi looked on in silence ; seated on the 
 embrasure of the high-barred window, the light of 
 earliest morning shining on his brow and eyes. 
 
 'The old man is stronger than I thought,' mut- 
 tered Gigi Fanno to Dessi. They were chagrined ; 
 they had hoped for some scene of resistance and 
 violence, or at least for one of tears and of suppli- 
 cation. 
 
 This calm and dignified silence baffled their malig- 
 nity and gave their coarse natures no pleasure. 
 
 The tramping tread of the carters up and down 
 the stairs, the loud angry voices in dispute, the dust 
 which rose in gray clouds, the noise, and haste, and 
 clumsy bustle continued for a time, then ceased ; to 
 be succeeded by the grinding of the wheels on the 
 stones below, and the oaths of the men to their 
 mules and their stable boys. Then all was still 
 beneath ; the little curious, indolent crowd of 
 spectators had moved away after the carts and 
 barrows. Ser Checchi was left alone in the empty 
 rooms, filled with the choking smell of dust, and 
 sweat, and unwashed human flesh. 
 
 He tried to rise, but his limbs failed him ; he 
 could not get up from the stone seat ; he ceased to 
 try to move, and waited, knowing that his daughter 
 would soon come to him. 
 
 ' May I come in, master ?' asked the harsh voice 
 of the woman servant Veronica, as her broad, 
 brightly-coloured figure stood in the doorway. Her 
 
 18 
 
274 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 voice was gentle now, and broken with sobbing, her 
 face was swollen with tears. 
 
 ' Forgive me, master ! Oh, forgive me !' she said 
 with a loud cry, as she fell on her knees. * Never 
 did I think to see a martyrdom like this. I will 
 serve you day and night on no wage, if you will let 
 me. I have never had a moment's peace since 
 I left you and the damagella.' 
 
 He seemed not to hear, or not to understand : 
 his mind was not with her : it was with his lost 
 books. 
 
 ' Get me my hat and stick,' he said hoarsely. 
 ' Quick ; go, get them, I say.' 
 
 ' What would you do, master ?' she asked, terrified 
 at something in his look and voice. 
 
 ' What is that to you ? Go, get my hat and stick, 
 I say.' 
 
 Trembling, Veronica went and got them, and 
 brought them to him. 
 
 ' Help me up,' he said irritably with the first 
 irritation he had shown. She put her strong arms 
 under his, and raised him up. He stood a moment, 
 but his limbs failed him ; he knew they would 
 answer to his will no longer. 
 
 ' Call my daughter,' he said, again sinking heavily 
 on to the stone seat. ' Say nothing to her of me ; 
 mind you, nothing ; only tell her that the men are 
 gone, that she may come to me. Do what I tell 
 you, and do no more.' 
 
 Frightened, the woman hastened from the room. 
 
 In another moment Beldia came, followed by 
 Folko, growling as he lingered over and smelt the 
 traces of the many steps. 
 
 Her father motioned her back as she would have 
 
THE TOWER OF T ADDED 275 
 
 come to him, ' Go to the salesroom in the piazza 
 of San Firenze,' he said imperatively. ' Cover your- 
 self so that none recognise you, and stay there until 
 my Dante Codex be bid for, then return and tell me 
 to whom it is allotted.' 
 
 * But you are ill, father ! Do not send me from 
 you for pity's sake !' 
 
 ' I am not ill. Go, as I bid you, and stay the 
 whole day if needful, until you learn that which I 
 tell you.' 
 
 Beldia obeyed without more protest. 
 
 1 Keep Folko in,' she said to Veronica ; ' and if 
 you have indeed any love for us, stay with my father 
 till I return.' 
 
 ' That will I ; never fear,' replied Veronica. The 
 woman was sobbing noisily, with a loud but sincere 
 sorrow ; she could not understand their tearless 
 eyes, their calm, low voices, their self-control under 
 their torture. 
 
 The morning wore away ; Veronica prepared 
 some food for the dog and gave it to him, made 
 some coffee for her late master which he did not 
 touch, brought a pillow to place behind his 
 shoulders, and put to the wooden shutter to keep 
 out the sun. 
 
 Then there was nothing more for her to do ; she 
 took out her straw plaiting and sat down at the 
 head of the stairs, whence she could see Ser Checchi 
 without annoying him by her presence. The hours 
 wore away, she counted them by the tolling of 
 Santo Spirito ; the old Dutch clock in its tall 
 lacquered case, which had sounded the hours for so 
 many years in those rooms, had been taken away to 
 the auction-rooms. 
 
2^6 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 1 To be sold for a song, I dare say,' she thought ; 
 she knew well how sales are controlled and con- 
 ducted ; that long ere the auctioneer's signal has 
 sounded, the cabal of professional buyers have 
 agreed amongst themselves what to run up and 
 what to run down, and how to play into each other's 
 hands, so that, go the sale how it may, they alone 
 will be gainers by it. 
 
 The day wore away and seemed as though it 
 would never end. Ser Checchi did not move, his 
 head leaned against the pillow which she had placed 
 for him, and its linen was not whiter than his 
 features ; she took him a little red wine, he put his 
 lips to it, but could not drink. Every moment was 
 torture to him, every moment something which had 
 been his was passing away into the hands of 
 strangers, never to return. 
 
 When Beldia's step was heard on the stairs his 
 pale cheeks flushed, the nervous trembling in his 
 hand returned? his eyes had a pitiful longing in 
 them. 
 
 ' The Dante ?' he muttered faintly, as she entered 
 the room. She was clothed in black, and had a 
 black shawl drawn over her head like a hood. 
 Great slow tears were now rolling down her 
 cheeks. 
 
 1 The Dante ?' he said, more loudly, as he raised 
 himself on his elbows and gazed at her. 
 
 She answered him, unwillingly ; but in obedience 
 and truth. 
 
 * It went with other old books in a lot for forty 
 francs ; there was no competition ; Vestuccio's clerk 
 bought it.' 
 
 * As I thought !' he murmured. ' As I thought.' 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 277 
 
 Beldia fell at his feet. 
 
 ' Oh, my father, my dear father ! what a wretch I 
 am to tell it you, but you would have it so ! alas, 
 alas ! of what use is one's love for you, if it cannot 
 save you from these miseries !' 
 
 ' This wretchedness is none of your fault,' he 
 answered feebly, while his hand touched her hair. 
 * And it is always well to be loved and obeyed.' 
 
 Half an hour passed by in silence ; and they 
 watched there, afraid to move, afraid to disturb 
 him ; the sun fell through a chink across his eyes, 
 and he looked up at it vaguely with failing sight. 
 
 Then he was silent : his head bent, his eyes 
 closed. 
 
 The two women watched him in awe and fear, the 
 white dog crept up to his feet. , 
 
 Veronica thought he was cold ; and opened the 
 shutter to let in the flood of early evening light. 
 
 ' The sun can give me no warmth,' he said faintly. 
 ' The cold is coming upward soon it will reach my 
 heart, so far it is well ; I shall not leave the tower ! 
 But you you all alone ah, Beldia !' 
 
 It was the last word he ever spoke. By the fall 
 of night he was dead. 
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 THEY buried him at Trespignano, the graveyard of 
 the poor ; and at the same hour as that of his 
 burial, Aurelio Vestuccio, seated at his desk in his 
 little office, wrote out a receipt for two thousand 
 pounds of English money ; the price paid for the 
 Codice of the ' Divina Commedia ' by an English 
 bibliophile, who was more learned in black-letter 
 
278 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 than in commerce, and who was ignorant that the 
 volume had been bought at a public sale only a few 
 days earlier for as many pence. 
 
 The bibliophile was sworn to secrecy in the 
 matter of this purchase on account of the law which 
 forbids the sale of antique and precious things to 
 foreigners. In the city of Dante no one ever knew 
 or heard what had become of the folio. 
 
 Once the smith of Giogoli, asking troublesome 
 questions of him in the Piazza della Signoria, Ser 
 Aurelio said to him, shaking his head : ' Ah ! my 
 good friend, I shall never see back those five 
 hundred francs which I gave you for that rusty 
 volume which our poor old blind bookseller so 
 stupidly thought such a treasure. I bought it in at 
 his sale as you know ; but I had to give it away 
 for ten francs. I was poor old Ser Checchi's dupe 
 always ! Well, well ! we will say no harm of the 
 dead. 1 
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 
 A YEAR and six months passed away ; the winds of 
 spring once more were on the air, the showers of 
 spring once more were on the soil, and everywhere, 
 in the duskiest shadows of the house walls and 
 palace parapets, the flowers of spring were lying 
 in dewy sheaves and moss-lined baskets all over the 
 city. 
 
 It was a brilliant forenoon in the month of March, 
 the river, brimming and green, rolled rapidly beneath 
 its bridges to its fall over the weir ; the sky was of 
 purest azure, flecked with little, light, snowy clouds ; 
 the bronze Bacchus of San Jacopo had blossoming 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 279 
 
 boughs of pear and peach leaning up against his 
 stone water-trough, and bunches of Narcissus poeticus 
 were heaped inrush-skips underneath the stern walls 
 of the old Manelli tower. Baskets full of early 
 primroses were carried down the narrow ways, and 
 the field daffodils blazed in their deeper gold, tied 
 up by their own blade-like leaves, and brought to 
 die of drought and dust, far from their pleasant 
 nests at the foot of olive-tree or maples in the grassy 
 paths of the hillside farms. The bells above-head 
 were chiming in melodious riot, and the sparkling 
 sunshine shone through the open portals of churches, 
 and on the gray wings of pigeons of the house-roofs, 
 on the silver dishes and jewelled trinkets of the 
 goldsmiths' stalls, and on the yellow head and white 
 shirt of a little chorister walking and ringing his bell 
 before the Host. 
 
 A man went quickly past the jewellers' and gold- 
 smiths' shops upon the bridge built by Taddeo 
 Gaddi, and the flower and fruit stalls under the 
 Bacchus. 
 
 He moved with a light step, as of one who was 
 happy and eager ; his face was sunburnt, and his 
 clothes were worn ; his bright clear eyes glanced from 
 the old walls to the blue sky, from the primrose and 
 daffodil baskets to the iron stanchions and the stone 
 machicolations, seeing in one and all dear and 
 familiar friends. He went on his way rapidly, until 
 a few paces farther onward the shadow of the Tower 
 of Taddeo fell across the narrow causeway which it 
 dominated. Whilst he was still some yards away 
 from its lofty walls, he stared at them, doubting his 
 own sight ; all its ornament, its shields, its garlands, 
 its amorini, and its angels, in their canopied niches, 
 
280 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 all were gone ; its balconies and its gratings were 
 gone also; its windows were blank and dark, like 
 eyes which are wide open but sightless, and in the 
 arch where its Madonna had sat throned, there was 
 a mere vacant, gaping aperture. 
 
 He stood upon the opposite side of the way, and 
 gazed at its desecrated walls in stupefaction ; a 
 woman, in a baker's shop which fronted it, came 
 out and looked at him, and said to herself, with her 
 hands resting on her hips : 
 
 ' Holy Jesus save us ! If it be not the Lombard 
 come back, who they said was drowned !' 
 
 He at whom she stared had already crossed the 
 street and was knocking violently with the heavy 
 bronze knocker on the great oaken nail-studded 
 door, which used to stand open all the day long, 
 with the mastiff, Lillo, as the guardian at its 
 threshold. The loud knocking resounded through 
 the street, echoed by the high walls around. But 
 there was no response to it other than its own echo. 
 The tower was as mute as a grave. 
 
 Amazed and terrified, he turned to the baker's 
 wife, who stood in her doorway, and recognised 
 her. 
 
 ' What has happened ? Where are they ? What 
 has been done here ? Why is it silent and ruined 
 thus ?' 
 
 The woman, nothing loath to be a bearer of 
 ill-tidings, crossed the road and stood beside him. 
 
 ' Why, man, you look as white as a ghost under 
 your brown skin ! I thought you were a ghost. They 
 said you were lost at sea in some outlandish parts. Eh ! 
 it's no use your staring at the tower ; there is no one 
 in it ; Ser Checchi is dead, and the place is empty. 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 281 
 
 The municipality have bought it, and are going to 
 pull it down. They pull down everything they can, 
 you know ; the old stones are gilt gingerbread to 
 them.' 
 
 ' Dead ! dead ! Ser Checchi ?' 
 
 He echoed the words in horror, and staggered 
 and leaned against the doorway, with a sick sense 
 of faintness upon him. 
 
 ' Beldia ?' he said hoarsely. 
 
 ' She is alive ; she lives hard by,' answered the 
 baker's wife. ' She has not a bronze halfpenny, and 
 she works for her bread. Lord ! how odd you 
 look ! Did you never hear that the old tower was 
 sold up before he died ? Ay, he lost everything ; 
 and they do say that what killed him was the sale 
 of his old musty books. Anyhow, he died on 
 the very day of the sale : he had been ailing some 
 time. Some say Vestuccio, the dealer, was at the 
 bottom of all. 'Tis he bought those garlands 
 and loves of Luca's off the wall yonder, and chipped 
 them out of their niches, and took them away. 
 He has sold them to some foreign museum. There 
 was talk of the authorities stopping him, but he 
 squared them, and made a fine picking. He bought 
 the old iron, too. Holy Mary ! how ill and scared 
 you look ! Come across to my shop and take a 
 drink of wine. It will put heart into you.' 
 
 He thanked her, but refused her by a gesture ; his 
 features were contracted and his chest heaved with 
 tearless sobs. 
 
 ' Ser Checchi ! my dear, innocent, generous Ser 
 Checchi !' he murmured, ' shall I never see his 
 face, hear his voice ? Oh, my God ! what he must 
 have suffered before he died ! And she !' 
 
282 THE TOWER OF T ADDED 
 
 ' You think of her still, then ? Where have you 
 been all this while ? Some said you were drowned. 
 Most thought you only kept away to get rid of her, 
 and keep out of her father's troubles/ 
 
 ' The ship went down in mid-ocean,' he answered 
 briefly. ' I saved myself by swimming. I have 
 been on a desert island, and was only rescued a 
 few weeks ago by a barque which was bound for 
 Valparaiso. I did not write, because I have 
 travelled as fast as any post could come. All that 
 matters nothing now. Tell me of her ; where can 
 I find her?' 
 
 ' In the Canto dei Santi over yonder. Number 
 eighty, fourth floor. But she looks old and ill. She 
 is not worth a thought from a comely gallant like 
 you. Why should you go after her ? Come in and 
 have a drink of something, and tell me all about 
 your wreck and the strange things on land and 
 water which you have seen.' 
 
 For this Calypso, with her buxom shape, her bold 
 amorous eyes, and her curling red-brown locks, 
 thought that she could easily console this stranded 
 Odysseus. 
 
 But he put her roughly away, as she laid her hand 
 upon his arm, and with a backward look of longing 
 at the old tower in its mutilated strength, he went 
 on to find the place which she had named : a narrow 
 passage-way connecting two side streets behind the 
 dome of the Carmine, shaded by the adjacent trees 
 of a palace garden, and frequented by the pigeons 
 circling around the cupola of Massaeio's church. 
 
 ' Ser Checchi dead!' he murmured to himself as 
 he went. ' Ser Checchi dead ! and the books dis- 
 persed ! oh, vile beast that I was to leave them 
 
THE TOWER OF TADDEO 283 
 
 alone in their helplessness and their sorrow for sake 
 of gain ! Well have I merited to return poorer even 
 than when I sailed I' 
 
 With a beating heart, torn between joy and grief, 
 between hope and fear, he climbed the steep and 
 uncleanly stair, foul with noxious odours and slippery 
 from the continual tread of many feet. 
 
 He struck on the panel of the low wooden door 
 which was shown to him as hers ; the barking within 
 of a dog, in which he recognised the voice of Folko, 
 answered him. 
 
 'Who is there?' asked Beldia, as she withdrew 
 the bolt of the door. 
 
 Then he feared to be too sudden for her, and to 
 startle her too perilously as one risen from the 
 grave ; he hung back a moment, thinking how he 
 could best prepare her for their meeting ; but in 
 that instant of time the white dog, thrusting his 
 nose through the open chink of the door, pushed 
 it further open and sprang on him in instantaneous 
 joy of recognition ; then Beldia saw him also. 
 
 She would have fallen on the stones insensible, 
 had he not caught her and raised her to his heart. 
 
 She was in truth so changed that he would scarce 
 have known her. She had lost her bloom, her youth, 
 the gloss on her fair hair, the light in her serene 
 eyes; she had grown old before her time from 
 sorrow and from solitude. Through winter and 
 summer, autumn and spring, she had dwelt here 
 alone with the dog ; visited only by Don Gervasio 
 and by Veronica, copying papers and sewing linen 
 to buy her daily pittance of food ; hearing all through 
 these latter days, as they echoed to her ear over the 
 roofs, the blows of the pickaxes and hammers which 
 
284 THE TOWER OF TADDEO 
 
 were routing out and beating down, under a cloud 
 of dust, the beauty and the strength of that beloved 
 old home which was passing from its place in the 
 city as her father had passed from his place amongst 
 living men. 
 
 It had been a life of extreme misery, of incessant 
 toil, of endless anxiety ; oftentimes she had gone 
 without bread herself that she might give some to 
 the dog, and she had no supper but a glass of water; 
 and the sole thought which had sustained the breath 
 of life in her was her belief that her lost betrothed 
 would still return to her. 
 
 ' You never doubted me ?' asked Odisio, an hour 
 later. 
 
 She answered : 
 
 ' Nay, love had I doubted you, I should not have 
 found strength to live till now.' 
 
 COLOPHON. 
 
 On the site of the Tower of Taddeo there is now 
 standing the chimney of a factory, belching forth its 
 stinking vapours to the sullied waters and the out- 
 raged heavens. 
 
 The change is called Progress. 
 
 THE END. 
 
 WILLING AND SONS, PRINTERS, GUILPFORD. 
 
2i BEDFORD STREET, W.C. 
 
 Sunlocks, London 
 
 A List of 
 
 Mr. William Heinemann's 
 
 Publications and 
 
 Announcements 
 
 The Books mentioned in this List can 
 be obtained to order by any Book- 
 seller if not in stock, or will be sent 
 by the Publisher on receipt of the 
 May i8qt>. published price and postage. 
 
of ButborS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Alexander . 30 
 
 VAGE 
 
 Ely . . 17 
 
 Knight . 
 
 PAGE 
 
 . 18 
 
 PAGE 
 Renan . n, 17 
 
 Allen . . 27 
 
 Evans . . u 
 
 Craszewski 
 
 . 29 
 
 Ricci . .10 
 
 
 
 Crocker 
 
 . 20 
 
 Richter . . 17 
 
 Anstey . 18 
 Arbuthnot . 21 
 
 Farrar . .17 
 Ferruggia . . 29 
 
 Candor 
 -.awson 
 
 . 10 
 
 Riddell . .31 
 Rives . . .31 
 
 Aston . 6 
 Atherton . 31 
 
 Fitch ... 22 
 Fitzmaurice-Kelly 6 
 
 -,e Caron . 
 Jee (Vernon) 
 
 ! 26 
 
 Roberts (A. von) 29 
 Roberts (C. G. D.) 16 
 
 Baddeley . 13, 20 
 
 Forbes . . 16 
 
 Leland . 
 
 14 
 
 Robinson . . 24 
 
 Balestier 24, 26, 32 
 
 Fothergill . . 3 1 
 
 L,e Querdec 
 
 9 
 
 
 Barrett . 25, 31 
 Battershall . . 25 
 Behrs . .13 
 
 Franzes . . 29 
 Frederic 17, 24, 30 
 Furtwangler . 10 
 
 Leroy-Bealieu 
 Lie 
 Linton 
 
 . 17 
 . 29 
 . 24 
 
 Saintsbury. . 15 
 Salaman (J. S.) . 17 
 Salaman (M. C.) 18 
 
 Bendall . . 20 
 Benedetti . .n 
 
 Garmo . . 22 
 
 Locke 
 Lowe . 
 
 25, 27 
 13, 6 
 
 Sarcey . .13 
 Scidmore . .16 
 
 Benham . . 23 
 
 ^arner . 
 
 Lowry 
 
 . 32 
 
 Scudamore . 16 
 
 Benson . .15 
 Beringer . . 27 
 Bjornson . 28, 29 
 Bowen . . 22 
 Boyesen . .17 
 Brandes . . 6, 7 
 Briscoe . . 3 2 
 Brooke . . 24 
 Brown . . 16 
 Brown & Griffiths 21 
 Buchanan . 16, 19, 
 31.32 
 Burgess . .14 
 Butler . . 22 
 Byron . . 3 
 Caine (Hall) 15,23,25, 
 3 
 
 uarnett .0 
 Gaulot . .12 
 Gontcharoff . 29 
 Gore . . 21 
 Gounod . ." 
 Gosse . 6, 8, 12, 
 15, 19, 20, 26 
 Grand . 23, 25 
 Gray (Maxwell) . 25 
 Gras . . 23 
 Griffiths . .21 
 Guyau . . 9 
 
 Hall ... 20 
 Hamilton . 24, 27 
 Hanus . . 22 
 Harland . . 3? 
 Harris . . 25 
 
 Lynch 
 
 Maartens . 
 McFall 
 Macnab 
 Maeterlinck 
 Malot. 
 Marey 
 Marsh 
 Masson 
 Maude 
 Maupassant 
 Maurice 
 Merriman . 
 Michel 
 Mitford . 
 Monk 
 
 . 3 
 
 15 
 25 
 . 19 
 3 
 
 . 21 
 . 12 
 
 . 16 
 
 : 3 
 
 . 18 
 
 . 10 
 
 . 27 
 
 Serao . . 29 
 Sergeant 23, 24, 30 
 Somerset . . 15 
 Southey . . 5 
 Steel . . .25 
 Stevenson .19, 23, 25 
 Sutcliffe . . 24 
 
 Tadema . . 27 
 Tallentyre . . 18 
 Tasma . . 30 
 Thompson . . 16 
 Thomson . . 15 
 Thomson (Basil) 23 
 Thurston . .21 
 Tirebuck . . 24 
 Tolstoy 17, 19, 29 
 
 Caine (R.) . . 20 
 Cambridge . . 30 
 Challice . . 8 
 
 Hauptmann . 19 
 Heine . 13. M 
 Henderson . . 32 
 
 Murray (D.C.)l 16 
 
 Murray (G. G. A.) 6 
 
 Tree ... 19 
 
 Turgenev . . 28 
 
 Chester . . 18 
 
 Henley . . 19 
 
 Nordau 14, 
 
 23, 24 
 
 Upward . .27 
 
 Clarke . . 26 
 Coleridge . 14, 15 
 Colmore . . 31 
 Colomb . . 16 
 Compayre . . 22 
 Compton . . 27 
 Coppe-e . . 32 
 Couperus . . 29 
 Crackanthorpe 25, 32 
 
 Hertwig . .21 
 Heussey . . 13 
 Hichens . 24, 27 
 Hirsch . . 9 
 Holdsworth 24, 27 
 Howard . . 26 
 Hughes . . 22 
 Hungerford 26, 30 
 Hyne. . . 26 
 
 Morris 
 Nugent 
 
 Ogilvie 
 Oliphant . 
 Osbourne . 
 Ouida. . 
 
 Paget . 
 Palacio-Valdes 
 
 23 26 
 7 
 
 19 
 . 18 
 25 
 . 26 
 
 4 
 . 29 
 
 Valera . . 29 
 Vandam . 8, 13 
 Vazoff . . 29 
 Vincent . . 15 
 
 Wagner . . 17 
 Wahszewski . 12 
 Walker . . 14 
 Ward. . . 31 
 
 Crackanthorpe 
 
 Ibsen , ic 
 
 Patmore 
 
 . 20 
 
 Warden . . 32 
 
 (Mrs.). . 27 
 Crane . . 9, 23, 27 
 
 Ingersoll . .16 
 Irving . . 19 
 
 Pearce 
 Pendered . 
 
 3 
 . 24 
 
 Waugh . .12 
 Weitemeyer . 15 
 
 Davidson . . 22 
 
 
 Pennell 
 
 17 
 
 Wells . . 24, 26 
 
 Dawson . . 20 
 
 Jacobsen . . 29 
 
 Phelps 
 
 
 West ... 22 
 
 De Broglie . n 
 De Goncourt . T 3 
 
 Jaeger . .13 
 James . 23, 24 
 
 Philips 
 Pinero 
 
 32 
 
 . 20 
 
 Whibley . . 7 
 Whistler . . 18 
 
 De Joinvilie . 12 
 De Quinccy . 14 
 Dixon . . 25 
 Dowden . . j 
 Dowson . . 25 
 
 Johnstone . . 5 
 
 Keary(E. M.) . 10 
 Keary (C. F.) . 24 
 Keeling . . 25 
 Kennedy . . 31 
 
 Pritchard . 
 Pugh . 
 
 Raimond . 
 Rawnsley . 
 Raynor 
 
 2 3 , 2 7 
 23,27 
 
 White . . 24 
 Whitman . .16 
 Williams . . 10 
 Wood . . 26 
 
 Zangwill . 18, 26 
 
 Eeden . 18 
 
 Kimball . 2 
 
 Rees . 
 
 . 33 
 
 Zola . 24, 26, 32 
 
 Ellwanger . 18 
 
 Kipling . 26 
 
 Rembrandt 
 
 . 10 
 
 Z. Z. . . 23, 24 
 
MR. HE1NEMANWS ANNOUNCEMENTS. 3 
 
 THE WORKS OF LORD BYRON. 
 
 EDITED BY WILLIAM ERNEST HENLEY. 
 
 IN TEN VOLUMES. 
 VOLUME I. LETTERS, 1804-1813. 
 
 To be followed by 
 VOLUMES II.-IV. LETTERS AND SPEECHES. 
 
 VOLUME V. HOURS OF IDLENESS, ENGLISH 
 BARDS AND SCOTCH REVIEWERS. 
 
 VOLUME VI. CHILDE HAROLD. 
 
 Small cr. 8vo, price 5s. each. 
 
 Also an Edition limited to 150 sets for sale in Great 
 Britain, printed on Van Gelder's handmade paper, price 
 Five Guineas the set net. 
 
 It is agreed that Byron's Letters, public and private, 
 with their abounding ease and spirit and charm, are 
 among the best in English. It is thought that Byron's 
 poetry has been long, and long enough, neglected, so that 
 we are on the eve of, if not face to face with, a steady 
 reaction in its favour : that, in fact, the true public has had 
 enough of fluent minor lyrists and hide-bound (if superior) 
 sonnetteers, and is disposed, in the natural course of 
 things, to renew its contact with a great English poet, who 
 was also a principal element in the aesthetic evolution of 
 that Modern Europe which we know. 
 
 Hence this new Byron, which will present for the first 
 time since the Seventeen Volumes Edition (1833), long 
 since out of print a master- writer and a master-influence 
 in decent and persuasive terms. 
 
 It is barely necessary to dwell on Mr. Henley's special 
 qualifications for the task of editing and annotating the 
 works of our poet. 
 
4 MR. HEINEMANN'S ANNOUNCEMENTS. 
 
 THE PAGET PAPERS. 
 
 DIPLOMATIC AND OTHER CORRESPONDENCE 
 
 OF 
 
 THE RIGHT HON. SIR ARTHUR PAGET, G.C.B. 
 1794-1807. 
 
 [WITH TWO APPENDICES, 1808 AND 1828-1829]. 
 ARRANGED AND EDITED BY HIS SON 
 
 THE RIGHT HON. SIR AUGUSTUS B. PAGET, G.C.B., 
 
 Lute Her Majesty's Ambassador in Vienna. 
 
 With Notes by Mrs. J. R. GREEN. 
 In Two Volumes, Demy 8vo, with Portraits, -yts. net. 
 
 THESE volumes deal with the earlier Napoleonic Wars, and throw a 
 new light on almost every phase of that most vital period of European 
 history. They are the Dispatches of one of His Britannic Majesty's 
 Envoy- Plenipotentiaries at different European Courts during that 
 period, and are unique probably as the account of an hostile eye-witness 
 of the Campaign, which has so persistently been described from the side 
 of the victorious intruder. "The Paget Papers" explain much that 
 has been unexplained so far of the complicated policy of that time of 
 shifting alliances, and especially the attitude of the lesser Courts. The 
 policy of Prussia between Holland and Poland, the attitude of Bavaria, 
 the temper of the Neapolitan Kingdom, were all brought under Sir 
 Arthur Paget's notice in his successive embassies from 1794 to 1800. 
 After the Peace of Amiens he watched from the Court of Vienna the 
 building up of the Third Coalition, and was with the Emperor during 
 the Campaign of Austerlitz ; while his final mission carried him to the 
 Dardanelles, where, curiously enough, the same political play was then 
 being gone through as has been witnessed there quite recently. The 
 volumes will be edited by Sir Arthur Paget's son, the Rt. Hon. Sir 
 Augustus Paget, G.C.B., late Her Majesty's Ambassador at Vienna, 
 and illustrated with numerous Portraits of the chief contemporary 
 figures of the time. 
 
MR. HEINEMANN'S ANNOUNCEMENTS. 5 
 
 LIFE OF NELSON. 
 
 BY ROBERT SOUTHEY. 
 
 A NEW EDITION 
 
 EDITED BY DAVID HANNAY. 
 Crown 8vo, Gilt, with Portrait. 
 
 SOUTHEY'S LIFE OF NELSON is an acknowledged masterpiece of litera- 
 ture. It can never cease to have value, even if it is at any future time 
 surpassed in its own qualities. Up to the present it has never been 
 equalled. While we are waiting for the appearance of a better Southey, 
 the old may well be published with a much-needed apparatus criticus, 
 The object of the new edition is to put forth the text, supported by 
 notes, which will make good the few oversights committed by Southey, 
 the passages in Nelson's life of which he had not heard, or which he, 
 influenced by highly honourable scruples, did not think fit to speak of 
 so soon after the hero's death, and while some of the persons concerned 
 were still living. A brief account will also be given of the naval officers, 
 and less famous soldiers or civilians mentioned, though it will not be 
 thought needful to tell the reader the already well-known facts concern- 
 ing Pitt, Sir John Moore, or Paoli. Emma Hamilton, of whom Southey 
 said only the little which was necessary to preserve his book from 
 downright falsity, will have her history told at what is now adequate 
 length. The much debated story of Nelson's actions at Naples will be 
 told from a point of view other than Southey' s. It is not proposed 
 to write a new life of Nelson, but only to set forth the best of existing 
 biographies with necessary additions and corrections, as well as with 
 some comment on his qualities as a commander in naval warfare. 
 
 THE LIFE OF THE LATE 
 SIR JOSEPH BARNEY. 
 
 W. H. SONLEY JOHNSTONS. 
 
 In One Volume, with Portraits, 8vo. 
 
 SIR JOSEPH BARNEY was a personality and an influence ; music was 
 only a part of him. He was an arduous worker, a brilliant talker, a 
 raconteur of merit, a good speaker, and a popular favourite in society. 
 The period through which he lived was one of the most important and 
 fruitful in the annals of English music, and Mr. Johnstone will receive 
 the assistance of composers and others in making this work as compre- 
 hensive as possible. 
 
 The main divisions will be : Music in England Half-a-Century Ago- 
 Early Life of Barnby His Eton Career His Albert Hall Career As 
 Composer and Conductor His Social and General Life The Academy 
 and Guildhall. 
 
MR. HEINEMANN'S ANNOUNCEMENTS. 
 
 literatures of tbe 
 
 EDITED BY 
 
 EDMUND GOSSE. 
 
 - HEINEMANN begs to announce a Series of 
 Short Histories of Ancient and Modern Literatures 
 of the World, Edited by EDMUND GOSSE. 
 
 The following 'volumes are projected \ and it is probable that 
 they will be the first to appear : 
 
 FRENCH LITERATURE. 
 
 BY EDWARD DOWDEN, D.C.L., LL.D., Professor of English 
 Literature at the University of Dublin. 
 
 ANCIENT GREEK LITERATURE. 
 
 BY GILBERT G. A. MURRAY, M.A., Professor of Greek in the 
 University of Glasgow. 
 
 ENGLISH LITERATURE. 
 
 BY THE EDITOR. 
 
 ITALIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 BY RICHARD GARNETT, C.B., LL.D., Keeper of Printed Books 
 in the British Museum. 
 
 MODERN SCANDINAVIAN LITERATURE 
 
 BY DR. GEORG BRANDES, of Copenhagen. 
 
 JAPANESE LITERATURE. 
 
 BY WILLIAM GEORGE ASTON, M.A., C.M.G., late Acting 
 Secretary at the British Legation at Tokio. 
 
 SPANISH LITERATURE. 
 
 Br J. FITZ MAURICE-KELLY, Member of the Spanish Academy. 
 
MR. HEINEMANN'S ANNOUNCEMENTS. 7 
 
 WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE. 
 
 A CRITICAL STUDY. 
 BY GEORG BRANDES. 
 
 Translated from the Danish by WILLIAM ARCHER, 
 In Two Volumes, demy 8vo. 
 
 Dr. Georg Brandes's "William Shakespeare" may best be called, perhaps, 
 an exhaustive critical biography. Keeping fully abreast of the latest English 
 and German researches and criticism, Dr. Biandes preserves that breadth 
 and sanity of view which is apt to be sacrificed by the mere Shakespearologist. 
 He places the poet in his political and literary environment, and studies each 
 play not as an isolated phenomenon, but as the record of a stage in Shakespeare's 
 spiritual history. Dr. Brandes has achieved German thoroughness without 
 German heaviness, and has produced what must be regarded as a standard 
 work. 
 
 ROBERT, EARL NUGENT: 
 
 A MEMOIR. 
 BY CLAUD NUGENT. 
 
 In One Volume, demy 8vo, with a number of Portraits and othei 
 Illustrations. 
 
 A BOOK OF SCOUNDRELS. 
 
 BY CHARLES WHIBLEY. 
 
 In One Volume, crown 8vo, with a Frontispiece. 
 
 In '* A Book of Scoundrels " are described the careers and achievements of 
 certain notorious malefactors who have been chosen for their presentment on 
 account of their style and picturesqueness. They are of all ages and several 
 countries, and that variety may not be lacking. Cartouche and Peace, Moll 
 Cutpurse and the Abbe* Bruneau, come within the same covers. Where it has 
 seemed convenient, the method of Plutarch is followed, and the style and method 
 of two similar scoundrels are contrasted in a " parallel." Jack Shepherd in the 
 stone-room of Newgate, reproduced from an old print, serves as a frontispiece. 
 
 IN CAP AND GOWN. 
 
 THREE CENTURIES OF CAMBRIDGE WIT. 
 EDITED BY CHARLES WHIBLEY. 
 
 Third Edition, with a New Introduction, crown 8vo. 
 
8 MR. HEINEMANN'S ANNOUNCEMENTS. 
 
 SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY 
 STUDIES. 
 
 A CONTRIBUTION TO THE HISTORY OF 
 ENGLISH POETRY. 
 
 BY EDMUND GOSSE, 
 
 Clark Lecturer on English Literature at the University of Cambridge. 
 A New Edition. Crown 8vo. 
 
 PROTESTANTS IN SPAIN 
 
 IN THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY 
 BY RACHEL E. CHALLICE. 
 
 WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY 
 
 His GRACE THE ARCHBISHOP OF DUBLIN, 
 
 And a Preface by CANON FLEMING. 
 
 In One Volume. 
 
 UNDERCURRENTS OF THE 
 SECOND EMPIRE. 
 
 BY ALBERT D. VANDAM, 
 
 Author of "An Englishman in Paris " and " My Paris Note-bofJc." 
 Demy 8vo, IDS. 6d. 
 
 MADE IN GERMANY. 
 
 REPRINTED WITH ADDITIONS FROM THE NEW REVIEW. 
 In One Volume. 
 
 The Industrial Supremacy of Great Britain has been long an axiomatic 
 commonplace ; it is fast turning into a myth. 
 
 These papers are not prompted by the Bimetallic League, nor by devotion to 
 fair trade, nor by any of the economic schemes and doctrines which reformers 
 are propounding for the cure of our commercial dry-rot It is the Author's 
 object to proceed on scientific lines, to collect and arrange the facts so that they 
 may clearly show forth the causes, and point with inevitableness to the remedies, 
 if and where there be any. 
 
MR. HEINEMANN'S ANNOUNCEMENTS. g 
 
 THE BLACK RIDERS 
 
 VERSES. 
 
 BY STEPHEN CRANE, 
 Author of "The Red Badge of Courage." 
 
 LETTERS OF 
 A COUNTRY VICAR. 
 
 Translated from the French of YVES LE QUERDEC. 
 BY M. GORDON-HOLMES. 
 
 In One Volume, crown 8vo. 
 
 This translation of a work which, in the original, has evoked a quite exceptional 
 measure of attention, will be welcomed for its vivid pictures of country life in 
 France, and of the relations subsisting between Church and laity. 
 
 THE AGNOSTICISM OF THE 
 FUTURE. 
 
 FROM THE FRENCH OF 
 
 M. GUYAU. 
 
 In One Volume, 8vo. 
 
 GENIUS AND DEGENERATION: 
 
 A PSYCHOLOGICAL STUDY. 
 BY DR. WILLIAM HIRSCH. 
 
 With an Introduction by Professor E. MENDEL. 
 
 Translated from the Second German Edition. 
 In One Volume, demy 8vo, los. net. 
 
 A2 
 
io MR. HEINEMANN'S LIST. 
 
 ANTONIO ALLEGRI DA CORREGIO: His Life, his 
 
 Friends, and his Time. By CORRADO RICCI, Director ot the Royal 
 Gallery, Parma. Translated by FLORENCE SIMMONDS. With 16 Photo- 
 gravure Plates, 21 full-page Plates in Tint, and 190 Illustrations in the 
 Text. In One Volume, imperial 8vo, 2 as. net 
 
 %* A Iso a special edition printed on Japanese vellum, limited to 100 copies, 
 with duplicate plates on India paper. Price 12 125. net. 
 
 REMBRANDT : His Life, his Work, and his Time. By EMILE 
 MICHEL, Member of the Institute of France. Translated by FLORENCE 
 SIMMONDS. Edited and Prefaced by. FREDERICK WEDMORE. Second 
 Edition, Enlarged, with 76 full-page Plates, and 250 Illustrations in the 
 Text. In One Volume, Gilt top, or in Two Volumes, imperial 8vo, 
 2 2S. net. 
 
 %* A few copies of the EDITION DE LUXE of the First Edition, printed on 
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 REMBRANDT. Seventeen of his Masterpieces from the collec- 
 tion of his Pictures in the Cassel Gallery. Reproduced in Photogravure 
 by the Berlin Photographic Company. With an Essay by FREDERICK 
 WEDMORE. In large portfolio 27$ inches x 20 inches. 
 
 The first twenty-five impressions of each plate are numbered and signed, 
 and of these only fourteen are for sale in England at the net price of Twenty 
 Guineas the set. The price of the impressions after the first twenty-five is 
 Twelve Guineas net, per set. 
 
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 of Essays on the History of Art. By ADOLF FURTWANGLER. Authorised 
 Translation. Edited by EUGENIE SELLERS. With 19 full page and 200 
 text Illustrations. In One Volume, imperial 8vo, 3 35. net. 
 
 %* Also an EDITION DE LUXE on Japanese vellum, limited to 50 numbered 
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 THE HOURS OF RAPHAEL, IN OUTLINE. Together 
 with the Ceiling of the Hall where they were originally painted. By 
 MARY E. WILLIAMS. Folio, cloth. 2 25. net. 
 
 A CATALOGUE OF THE ACCADEMIA DELLE 
 BELLE ARTI AT VENICE. With Biographical Notices of the 
 Painters and Reproductions of some of their Works. Edited by E. M. 
 KEARY. Crown 8vo, cloth, as. 6d. net ; paper, 2s. net. 
 
 A CATALOGUE OF THE MUSEO DEL PRADO AT 
 
 MADRID. Con.piled by E. LAWSON. In One Volume, crown 8vo: 
 
 [In preparation. 
 
MR. HEINEMANN'S LIST. TI 
 
 BROTHER AND SISTER. A Memoir and the Letters of 
 ERNEST and HENRIETTE RENAN. Translated by Lady MARY 
 LOYD. Demy 8vo, with Two Portraits in Photogravure, and Four 
 Illustrations, 14*. 
 
 Mr. GLADSTONE has written to the publisher as follows : "I have read the 
 whole of the Renan Memoirs, and have found them to be of peculiar and pro- 
 found interest." 
 
 The Illustrated London News. "One of the most exquisite memorials in 
 all literature." 
 
 The Daily Telegraph. " A faithful record of a perfect friendship." 
 
 CHARLES GOUNOD. Autobiographical Reminiscences with 
 Family Letters and Notes on Music. Translated by the Hon. W. HELY 
 HUTCHINSON. Demy 8vo, with Portrait, ior. 6d. 
 
 The Daily News." Interwoven with many touching domestic details, it 
 furnishes a continuous history of the dawn and development of his genius down 
 to the period when his name had become familiar in all men's mouths." 
 
 The Globe." Will, of course, have many interested readers, and will find 
 its way into the libraries of all musical enthusiasts." 
 
 STUDIES IN DIPLOMACY. By Count BENEDETTI, French 
 
 Ambassador at the Court of Berlin. Demy 8vo, with a Portrait, los. 6d. 
 
 The Times. " An important and authentic contribution to the history of a 
 great crisis in the affairs of Europe." 
 
 AN AMBASSADOR OF THE VANQUISHED. 
 
 Viscount Elie De Gontaut-Biron's Mission to Berlin, 1871-1877. From 
 his Diaries and Memoranda. By the DUKE DE BROGLIE. Translated 
 with Notes by ALBERT D. VANDAM, Author of "An Englishman in 
 Paris." In One Volume, 8vo, los. 6d. 
 
 The Times. " The real interest of the book consists in the new contributions 
 which it makes to our knowledge of the dangerous crisis of 1875." 
 
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 ality of judgment." 
 
 ANIMAL SYMBOLISM IN ECCLESIASTICAL 
 
 ARCHITECTURE. By E. P. EVANS. With a Bibliography and 
 Seventy-eight Illustrations, crown 8vo, gs. 
 
 The Manchester Courier. " A work of considerable learning. We have 
 not often read a book that contains more quaint and unusual information, or is 
 more closely packed with matter. It is very pleasant reading and may be com- 
 mended to all who are interested in the by-paths of literature and art." 
 
12 MR. HEINEMANN'S LIST. 
 
 Great 3Li\?e0 anb Events. 
 
 Uniformly bound in cloth, 6s. each volume. 
 
 A FRIEND OF THE QUEEN. Marie Antoinette and 
 Count Fersen. From the French of PAUL GAULOT. Two Portraits. 
 
 The Times." M. Gaulot's work tells, with new and authentic details, the 
 romantic story of Count Fersen's devotion to Marie Antoinette, of his share in 
 the celebrated Flight to Varennes and in many other well-known episodes of 
 the unhappy Queen's life." 
 
 THE ROMANCE OF AN EMPRESS. Catherine II. of 
 Russia. From the French of K. WALISZEWSKI. With a Portrait. 
 
 The Times. " This book is based on the confessions of the Empress her- 
 self; it gives striking pictures of the condition of the contemporary Russia 
 which she did so much to mould as well as to expand. . . . Few stories in 
 history are more romantic than that of Catherine II. of Russia, with its 
 mysterious incidents and thrilling episodes ; few characters present more curious 
 problems." 
 
 THE STORY OF A THRONE. Catherine II. of Russia. 
 From the French of K. WALISZEWSKI. With a Portrait. 
 
 The World. "No novel that ever was written could compete with this 
 historical monograph in absorbing interest." 
 
 NAPOLEON AND THE FAIR SEX. From the French 
 of FR^D^RIC MASSON. With a Portrait. 
 
 The Daily Chronicle. " The author shows that this side of Napoleon's 
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 ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON. A Study of His Life and 
 Work. By ARTHUR WAUGH, B.A. Oxon. With Twenty Illustrations 
 from Photographs specially taken for this Work. Five Portraits, and 
 Facsimile of Tennyson's MS. 
 
 MEMOIRS OF THE PRINCE DE JOINVILLE. 
 
 Translated from the French by Lady MARY LOYD. With 78 Illustrations 
 from drawings by the Author. 
 
 THE NATURALIST OF THE SEA-SHORE. The Life 
 
 of Philip Henry Gosse. By his son, EDMUND GOSSE, Hon. M.A., 
 Trinity College, Cambridge. With a Portrait. 
 
MR. HEINEMANN'S LIST. 13 
 
 MY PARIS NOTE-BOOK. By ALBERT D. VANDAM, Author 
 
 of " An Englishman in Paris." In One Volume, demy 8vo, price 6s. 
 
 EDMUND AND JULES DE GONCOURT. Letters and 
 Leaves from their Journals. Selected. In Two Volumes, 8vo, with 
 Eight Portraits, 325. 
 
 ALEXANDER III. OP RUSSIA. By CHARLES LOWE, 
 
 M.A., Author of "Prince Bismarck: an Historical Biography." Crown 
 8vo, with Portrait in Photogravure, 6$. 
 
 The Athenaum. "A most interesting and valuable volume." 
 The Academy. "Written with great care and strict impartiality." 
 
 PRINCE BISMARCK. An Historical Biography. By 
 CHARLES LOWE, M.A. With Portraits. Crown 8vo, 6f. 
 
 VILLIERS DE L'ISLE ADAM: His Life and Works. 
 From the French of VICOMTE ROBERT DU PONTAVICE DE HEUSSEY. 
 By Lady MARY LOYD. With Portrait and Facsimile. Crown 8vo, cloth, 
 
 105. 6tt. 
 
 THE LIFE OF HENRIK IBSEN. By HENRIK JAEGER. 
 
 Translated by CLARA BELL. With the Verse done into English from the 
 Norwegian Original by EDMUND GOSSE. Crown 8vo, cloth, 6s. 
 
 RECOLLECTIONS OF MIDDLE LIFE. By FRANCISQUE 
 
 SARCEY. Translated by E. L. CAREY. In One Volume, 8vo, with 
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 THE FAMILY LIFE OF HEINRICH HEINE. Illus- 
 
 trated by one hundred and twenty-two hitherto unpublished letters ad- 
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 Baron LUDWIG VON EMBDEN, and translated by CHARLES GODFREY 
 LELAND. In One Volume, 8vo, with 4 Portraits, izs. 6d. 
 
 RECOLLECTIONS OF COUNT LEO TOLSTOY. 
 
 Together with a Letter to the Women of France on the " Kreutzer 
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 QUEEN JOANNA I. OF NAPLES, SICILY, AND 
 
 JERUSALEM ; Countess of Provence, Forcalquier, and Piedmont. An 
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I 4 MR. HEINEMANN'S LIST 
 
 LETTERS OF SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE. 
 
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 DE QUINCEY MEMORIALS. Being Letters and other 
 
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 CONVENTIONAL LIES OF OUR CIVILIZATION. 
 
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 DEGENERATION. By MAX NORDAD. Ninth English 
 
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 THE PROSE WORKS OF HEINRICH HEINE. 
 
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 subscribers for the Complete Work. 
 
 I. FLORENTINE NIGHTS, SCHNABELEWOPSKI, 
 THE RABBI OF BACHARACH, and SHAKE- 
 SPEARE'S MAIDENS AND WOMEN. 
 
 II., III. PICTURES OF TRAVEL. 1823-1828. 
 
 IV. THE SALON. Letters on Art, Music, Popular Life, 
 and Politics. 
 
 V., VI. GERMANY. 
 
 VII., .VIII. FRENCH AFFAIRS. Letters from Paris 
 1832, and Lutetia. 
 
 THE POSTHUMOUS WORKS OF THOMAS DE 
 
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 I. SUSPIRIA DE PROFUNDIS. With other Essays. 
 
 II. CONVERSATION AND COLERIDGE. With other 
 
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MR. HEINEMANN'S LIST. 15 
 
 CRITICAL KIT-KATS. By EDMUND GOSSE, Hon. M.A. of 
 
 Trinity College, Cambridge. Crown 8vo, buckram, gilt top, 7*. 6d. 
 
 QUESTIONS AT ISSUE. Essays. By EDMUND GOSSE. 
 
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 THE REALM OF THE HABSBURGS. By SIDNEY 
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 IMPERIAL GERMANY. A Critical Study of Fact and 
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 THE CANADIAN GUIDE-BOOK. Part II. WESTERN 
 
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MR. HEINEMANN'S LIST. 17 
 
 AS OTHERS SAW HIM. A Retrospect, A.D. 54. In One 
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 ISRAEL AMONG THE NATIONS. Translated from the 
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1 8 MR. HEINEMANN'S LIST. 
 
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MR. HEINEMANN'S LIST. 19 
 
 dramatic ^Literature, 
 
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20 MR. HEINEMANN'S LIST 
 
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 VII. DANDY DICK. 
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 MISTRESS. 
 
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MR. HEINEMANN'S LIST. 21 
 
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 57 
 
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22 MR. HE1NEMANWS LIST. 
 
 (The (Breat Educators 
 
 A Series of Volumes by Eminent Writers, presenting in their 
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 The Times." A Series of Monographs on ' The Great Educators ' should 
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 ALCUIN, and the Rise of the Christian Schools. By 
 
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 FROEBEL, and Education by Self- Activity. By H. COURT- 
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 HERBART AND THE HERBARTIANS. By Prof. DE 
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 PESTALOZZI; or, the Friend and Student of Children. 
 
MR. HEINEMANN'S LIST. 23 
 
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24 MR. HEINEMANWS LIST. 
 
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MR. HEINEMANN'S LIST. 25 
 
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MR. HEINEMANN'S LIST. 27 
 
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 JOANNA TRAILL, SPINSTER. By ANNIE E. HOLDS- 
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 GEORGE MANDEVILLE'S HUSBAND. By C, E. 
 
 RAIMOND. 
 
 THE WINGS OF ICARUS. By LAURENCE ALMA TADEMA. 
 
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28 MR. HEINEMANN'S LIST. 
 
 UNIFORM EDITION OP 
 
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 Vol. V. SMOKE. 
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 Vol. VIII., IX. A SPORTSMAN'S SKETCHES. 
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MR. HEINEMANN'S LIST. 29 
 
 Defnemann's Snternatfonal 
 
 EDITED BY EDMUND GOSSE. 
 
 New Review. " If you have any pernicious remnants of literary chauvinism 
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 IN GOD'S WAY. From the Norwegian of BJORNSTJERNE 
 
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 PIERRE AND JEAN. From the French of GUY DE MAU- 
 
 PASSANT. 
 THE CHIEF JUSTICE. From the German of KARL EMIL 
 
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 WORK WHILE YE HAVE THE LIGHT. From the 
 Russian of Count LEO TOLSTOY. 
 
 FANTASY. From the Italian of MATILDE SERAO. 
 
 FROTH. From the Spanish of Don ARMANDO PALACIO- 
 
 VALDiS. 
 
 FOOTSTEPS OF FATE. From the Dutch of Louis 
 
 COUPERUS. 
 
 PEPITA JIMENEZ. From the Spanish of JUAN VALERA. 
 
 THE COMMODORE'S DAUGHTERS. From the Nor- 
 wegian of JONAS LIE. 
 
 THE HERITAGE OF THE KURTS. From the Norwegian 
 
 Of BJORNSTJERNE BjORNSON. 
 
 LOU. From the German of BARON ALEXANDER VON ROBERTS. 
 DONA LUZ. From the Spanish of JUAN VALERA. 
 THE JEW. From the Polish of JOSEPH IGNATIUS KRASZEWSKI. 
 UNDER THE YOKE. From the Bulgarian of IVAN VAZOFF. 
 FAREWELL LOVE ! From the Italian of MATILDE SERAO. 
 
 THE GRANDEE. From the Spanish of Don ARMANDO 
 PALACIO-VALDES. 
 
 A COMMON STORY. From the Russian of GONTCHAROFF. 
 WOMAN'S FOLLY. From the Italian of GEMMA FERRUGGIA. 
 
 SIREN VOICES (NIELS LYHNE). From the Danish of 
 J. G. JACOBSEN. 
 
 In preparation. 
 NIOBE. From the Norwegian of JONAS LIE. 
 
30 MR. HEINEMANN'S LIST. 
 
 popular 3s, 6fc 
 
 ELI'S DAUGHTER. By J. H. PEARCE, Author of "Incon- 
 sequent Lives." 
 
 INCONSEQUENT LIVES. A Village Chronicle. By J. H. 
 
 PEARCE, Author of "Esther Pentreath," &c. 
 
 HER OWN FOLK. (En Famille. ) By HECTOR MALOT, 
 
 Author of " No Relations." Translated by Lady MARY LOYD. 
 
 CAPT'N DAVY'S HONEYMOON, The Blind Mother, 
 and The Last Confession. By HALL CAINK, Author of " The Bondman," 
 " The Scapegoat," &c. 
 
 A MARKED MAN : Some Episodes in his Life. By ADA 
 CAMBRIDGE, Author of "A Little Minx," "The Three Miss Kings,' 
 "Not All in Vain," &c. 
 
 THE THREE MISS KINGS. By ADA CAMBRIDGE. 
 A LITTLE MINX. By ADA CAMBRIDGE. 
 NOT ALL IN VAIN. By ADA CAMBRIDGE. 
 
 A KNIGHT OF THE WHITE FEATHER. By TASMA, 
 Author of "The Penance of Portia James," "Uncle Piper of Piper's 
 Hill," &c. 
 
 UNCLE PIPER OF PIPER'S HILL. By TASMA. 
 THE PENANCE OF PORTIA JAMES. By TASMA. 
 
 THE COPPERHEAD ; and other Stories of the North 
 during the American War. By HAROLD FREDERIC, Author of "The 
 Return of the O'Mahony," "In the Valley," &c. 
 
 THE RETURN OF THE O'MAHONY. By HAROLD 
 
 FREDERIC, Author of " In the Valley," &c. With Illustrations. 
 
 IN THE VALLEY. By HAROLD FREDERIC, Author of 
 
 " The Lawton Girl," " Seth's Brother's Wife," &c. With Illustrations. 
 
 THE SURRENDER OF MARGARET BELLARMINE. 
 
 By ADELINE SERGEANT, Author of "The Story of a Penitent Soul." 
 
 THE STORY OF A PENITENT SOUL. Being the 
 
 Private Papers of Mr. Stephen Dart, late Minister at Lynnbridge, in the 
 County of Lincoln. By ADELINE SERGEANT, Author of " No Saint," &c. 
 
 NOR WIFE, NOR MAID. By Mrs. HUNGERFORD, Author 
 of "Molly Bawn," &c. 
 
 THE HOYDEN. By Mrs. HUNGERFORD. 
 
 MAMMON. A Novel. By Mrs. ALEXANDER, Author of " The 
 
 Wooing O't," &c. 
 
 DAUGHTERS OF MEN. By HANNAH LYNCH, Author of 
 
 " The Prince of the Glades," &c. 
 
MR. HElNEMANN'S LIST. 31 
 
 popular 3s, 6fc, IRovels, 
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE CAPE FRONTIER. By BERTRAM 
 
 MITFORD, Author of "Through the Zulu Country," &c. 
 
 'TWEEN SNOW AND FIRE. A Tale of the Kafir War of 
 1877. By BERTRAM MITFORD. 
 
 ORIOLE'S DAUGHTER. By JESSIE FOTHERGILL, Author 
 
 of "The First Violin," &c. 
 
 THE MASTER OF THE MAGICIANS. By ELIZABETH 
 STUART PHELPS and HERBERT D. WARD. 
 
 THE HEAD OF THE FIRM. By Mrs. RIDDELL, Author 
 of " George Geith," " Maxwell Drewett," &c. 
 
 A CONSPIRACY OF SILENCE. By G. COLMORE, 
 
 Author of "A Daughter of Music," &c. 
 
 A DAUGHTER OF MUSIC. By G. COLMORE, Author of 
 
 "A Conspiracy of Silence." 
 
 ACCORDING TO ST. JOHN. By AM^LIE RIVES, Author 
 
 of " The Quick or the Dead." 
 
 KITTY'S FATHER. By FRANK BARRETT, Author of 
 
 "The Admirable Lady Biddy Fane," &c. 
 
 A QUESTION OF TASTE. By MAARTEN MAARTENS, 
 
 Author of "An Old Maid's Love," &c. 
 
 COME LIVE WITH ME AND BE MY LOVE. By 
 
 ROBERT BUCHANAN, Author of "The Moment After," "The Coming 
 Terror," &c. 
 
 DONALD MARCY. By ELIZABETH STUART PHELPS, 
 Author of " The Gates Ajar," &c. 
 
 IN THE DWELLINGS OF SILENCE. A Romance 
 of Russia. By WALKER KENNEDY. 
 
 LOS CERRITOS. A Romance of the Modern Time. By 
 GERTRUDE FRANKLIN ATHERTON, Author of "Hermia Suydam," and 
 "What Dreams may Come." 
 
32 MR. HEINEMANN'S LIST. 
 
 Sbott Stories in ne Dolume, 
 
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 WRECKAGE, and other Stories. By HUBERT CRACKAN- 
 
 THORPE. Second Edition. 
 
 MADEMOISELLE MISS, and other Stories. By HENRY 
 
 HARLAND, Author of " Mea Culpa," &c. 
 
 THE ATTACK ON THE MILL, and other Sketches 
 of War. By EMILE ZOLA. With an Essay on the short stories of M. 
 Zola by EDMUND GOSSE. 
 
 THE AVERAGE WOMAN. By WOLCOTT BALESTIER. 
 With an Introduction by HENRY JAMES. 
 
 BLESSED ARE THE POOR. By FRANCOIS COPP^E. 
 
 With an Introduction by T. P. O'CoNNO*. 
 
 PERCHANCE TO DREAM, and other Stories. By MAR- 
 GARET S. BRISCOE. 
 
 WRECKERS AND METHODISTS. Cornish Stories. By 
 H. D. LOWRV. 
 
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 PRETTY MISS SMITH. By FLORENCE WARDEN, Author 
 
 of "The House on the Marsh," "A Witch of the Hills," &c. 
 
 MADAME VALERIE. By F. C. PHILIPS, Author of "As 
 
 in a Looking-Glass," &c. 
 
 THE MOMENT AFTER: A Tale of the Unseen. By 
 
 ROBERT BUCHANAN. 
 CLUES; or, Leaves from a Chief Constable's Note-Book. 
 
 By WILLIAM HENDERSON, Chief Constable of Edinburgh. 
 
 THE NORTH AMERICAN REVIEW. 
 
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