CHAPTER XXI

BUT there was no explosion. Consuelo remained silent, and as it were stunned. Porpora spoke to her. She made no reply, and signed to him not to question her. She then rose, and going to a large pitcher of iced water which stood on the harpsichord, swallowed great draughts of it, took several turns up and down the apartment, and sat down before her master without uttering a word.

The austere old man did not comprehend the extremity of her sufferings.

"Well," said he, "did I deceive you? What do you think of doing?"

A painful shudder shook her motionless figure—she passed her hand over her forehead.

"I can think of nothing," said she, "till I understand what has happened to me."

"And what remains to be understood?"

"Every thing! because I understand nothing. I am seeking for the cause of my misfortune without finding any thing to explain it to me. What have I done to Anzoleto that he should cease to love me? What fault have I committed to render me unworthy in his eyes? You cannot tell me, for I search into my own heart and can find there no key to the mystery. O! it is inconceivable. My mother believed in the power of charms. Is Corilla a magician?"

"My poor child," said the maestro, "there is indeed a magician, but she is called Vanity; there is indeed a poison, which is called Envy. Corilla can dispense it, but it was not she who molded the soul so fitted for its reception. The venom already flowed in the impure veins of Anzoleto. An extra dose has changed him from a knave into a traitor—faithless as well as ungrateful."

"What vanity, what envy?"

"The vanity of surpassing others. The desire to excel, and rage at being surpassed by you."

"Is that credible? Can a man be jealous of the advantages of a woman? Can a lover be displeased with the success of his beloved? Alas! there are indeed many things which I neither know nor understand."

"And will never comprehend, but which you will experience every hour of your existence. You will learn that a man can be jealous of the superiority of a woman, when this man is an ambitious artist; and that a lover can loathe the success of his beloved when the theater is the arena of their efforts. It is because an actor is no longer a man, Consuelo—he is turned into a woman. He lives but through the medium of his sickly vanity, which alone he seeks to gratify, and for which alone he labors. The beauty of a woman he feels a grievance; her talent extinguishes or competes with his own. A woman is his rival, or rather he is the rival of a woman; he has all the littleness, all the caprice, all the wants, all the ridiculous airs of a coquette. This is the character of the greatest number of persons belonging to the theater. There are indeed grand exceptions, but they are so rare, so admirable, that one should bow before them and render them homage, as to the wisest and best. Anzoleto is no exception; he is the vainest of the vain. In that one word you have the explanation of his conduct."

"But what unintelligible revenge! What poor and insufficient means! How can Corilla recompense him for his losses with the public? Had he only spoken openly to me of his suffering (alas! it needed only a word for that), I should have understood him perhaps—at least I would have compassionated him, and retired to yield him the first place."

"It is the peculiarity of envy to hate people in proportion to the happiness of which it deprives them; just as it is the peculiarity of selfish love to hate in the object which we love, the pleasures which we are not the means of procuring him. While your lover abhors the public which loads you with glory, do you not hate the rival who intoxicates him with her charms?

"My master, you have uttered a profound reflection, which I would fain ponder on."

"It is true. While Anzoleto detests you for your happiness on the stage, you hate him for his happiness in the boudoir of Corilla."

"It is not so. I could not hate him; and you have made me feel that it would be cowardly and disgraceful to hate my rival. As to the passion with which she fills him, I shudder to think of it—why I know not. If it be involuntary on his part, Anzoleto is not guilty in hating my success."

"You are quick to interpret matters, so as to excuse his conduct and sentiments. No; Anzoleto is not innocent or estimable in his suffering like you. He deceives, he disgraces you, while you endeavor to justify him. However, I did not wish to inspire you with hatred and resentment, but with calmness and indifference. The character of this man influences his conduct. You will never change him. Decide, and think only of yourself."

"Of myself—of myself alone! Of myself, without hope or love!"

"Think of music, the divine art, Consuelo; you would not dare to say that you love it only for Anzoleto?"

"I have loved art for itself also; but I never separated in my thoughts these inseparable objects—my life and that of Anzoleto. How shall I be able to love any thing when the half of my existence is taken away?"

"Anzoleto was nothing more to you than an idea, and this idea imparted life. You will replace it by one greater, purer, more elevating. Your soul, your genius, your entire being, will no longer be at the mercy of a deceitful, fragile form; you shall contemplate the sublime ideal stripped of its earthly covering; you shall mount heavenward, and live in holy unison with God himself."

"Do you wish, as you once did, that I should become a nun?"

"No; this were to confine the exercise of your artistic faculties to one direction, whereas you should embrace all. Whatever you do, or wherever you are, in the theater or in the cloister, you may be a saint, the bride of heaven."

"What you say is full of sublimity, but shrouded in a mysterious garb. Permit me to retire, dear master; I require time to collect my thoughts and question my heart."

"You have said it, Consuelo; you need insight into yourself. Hitherto in giving up your heart and your prospects to one so much your inferior, you have not known yourself. You have mistaken your destiny, seeing that you were born without an equal, and consequently without the possibility of an associate in this world. Solitude, absolute liberty, are needful for you. I would not wish you husband, or lover, or family, or passions, or bonds of any kind. It is thus I have conceived your existence, and would direct your career. The day on which you give yourself away, you lose your divinity. Ah, if Mingotti and Moltini, my illustrious pupils, my powerful creations, had believed in me, they would have lived unrivaled on the earth. But woman is weak and curious; vanity blinds her, vain desires agitate, caprices hurry her away. In what do these disquietudes result?—what but in storms and weariness, in the loss, the destruction, or vitiation, of their genius. Would you not be more than they, Consuelo? Does not your ambition soar above the poor concerns of this life? or would you not appease these vain desires, and seize the glorious crown of everlasting genius?"

Porpora continued to speak for a long time with an eloquence and energy to which I cannot do justice. Consuelo listened, her looks bent upon the ground. When he had finished, she said: "My dear master, you are profound; but I cannot follow you sufficiently throughout. It seems to me as if you outraged human nature in proscribing its most noble passions—as if you would extinguish the instincts which God himself had implanted, for the purpose of elevating what would otherwise be a monstrous and anti-social impulse. Were I a better Christian I should perhaps better understand you; I shall try to become so, and that is all I can promise."

She took her leave, apparently tranquil, but in reality deeply agitated. The great though austere artist conducted her home, always preaching but never convincing. He nevertheless was of infinite service in opening to her a vast field of serious thought and inquiry, wherein Anzoleto's particular crime served but as a painful and solemn introduction to thoughts of eternity. She passed long hours, praying, weeping, and reflecting; then lay down to rest, with a virtuous and confiding hope in a merciful and compassionate God.

The next day Porpora announced to her that there would be a rehearsal of Ipermnestra for Stefanini, who was to take Anzoleto's part. The latter was ill, confined to bed, and complained of a loss of voice. Consuelo's first impulse was to fly to him and nurse him. "Spare yourself this trouble," said the professor, "he is perfectly well; the physician of the theater has said so, and he will be this evening with Corilla. But Count Zustiniani, who understands very well what all that means, and who consents without much regret that he should put off his appearance, has forbidden the physician to unmask the pretense, and has requested the good Stefanini to return to the theater for some days."

"But, good Heavens! what does Anzoleto mean to do? Is he about to quit the theater?"

"Yes—the theater of San Samuel. In a month he is off with Corilla for France. That surprises you? He flies from the shadow which you cast over him. He has entrusted his fate to a woman whom he dreads less, and whom he will betray so soon as he finds he no longer requires her.

Consuelo turned pale, and pressed her hands convulsively on her bursting heart. Perhaps she had flattered herself with the idea of reclaiming Anzoleto, by reproaching him gently with his faults, and offering to put off her appearance for a time. This news was a dagger stroke to her, and she could not believe that she should no more see him whom she had so fondly loved. "Ah," said she, "it is but an uneasy dream; I must go and seek him; he will explain every thing. He cannot follow this woman; it would be his destruction. I cannot permit him to do so; I will keep him back; I will make him aware of his true interests, if indeed he be any longer capable of comprehending them. Come with me, dear master; let us not forsake him thus."

"I will abandon you," said the angry Porpora, "and forever, if you commit any such folly. Entreat a wretch—dispute with Corilla? Ah, Santa Cecilia! distrust your Bohemian origin, extinguish your blind and wandering instincts. Come! they are waiting for you at rehearsal. You will feel pleasure in singing with a master like Stefanini, a modest, generous, and well-informed artist."

He led her to the theater, and then for the first time she felt an abhorrence of this artist life, chained to the wants of the public, and obliged to repress one's own sentiments and emotions to obey those of others. This very rehearsal, the subsequent toilet, the performance of the evening, proved a frightful torment. Anzoleto was still absent. Next day there was to be an opera buffa of Galuppi's—Arcifanfano Re de' Matti. They had chosen this farce to please Stefanini, who was an excellent comic performer. Consuelo must now make those laugh whom she had formerly made weep. She was brilliant, charming, pleasing to the last degree, though plunged at the same time in despair. Twice or thrice sobs that would force their way found vent in a constrained gaiety, which would have appeared frightful to those who understood it. On retiring to her box, she fell down insensible. The public would have her return to receive their applause. She did not appear; a dreadful uproar took place, benches were broken, and people tried to gain the stage. Stefanini hastened to her box half dressed, his hair disheveled, and pale as a specter. She allowed herself to be supported back upon the stage, where she was received with a shower of bouquets, and forced to stoop to pick up a laurel crown. "Ah, the pitiless monsters!" she murmured as she retired behind the scenes.

"My sweet one," said the old singer, who gave her his hand, "you suffer greatly; but these little things," added he, picking up a bunch of brilliant flowers, "are a specific for all our woes; you will become used to it, and the time perhaps will arrive when you will only feel fatigue and uneasiness when they forget to crown."

"Oh, how hollow and trifling they are!" thought poor Consuelo. When she returned to her box she fainted away, literally upon a bed of flowers, which had been gathered on the stage and thrown pell-mell upon the sofa. The tirewoman left the box to call a physician. Count Zustiniani remained for some instants alone by the side of his beautiful singer, who looked pale and broken as the beautiful jasmines which strewed her couch. Carried away by his admiration, Zustiniani lost his reason, and yielding to his foolish hopes, he seized her hand and carried it to his lips. But his touch was odious to the pure-minded Consuelo. She roused herself to repel him as if it had been the bite of a serpent. "Ah! far from me," said she, excited into a sort of delirium; "far from me, all love, all caresses, and all honeyed words!—no love—no husband—no lover—no family for me! my dear master has said it—liberty, the ideal, solitude, glory!" and she burst into such an agony of tears, that the count, terrified, threw himself upon his knees before her, and strove to calm her. But he could say nothing healing to that wounded soul, and his passion, which at that moment reached its highest paroxysm, expressed itself in spite of him. He understood but too well in her emotion the despair of the betrayed lover. He gave expression to the enthusiasm of a hopeful one. Consuelo appeared to hear him, and withdrew her hand from his with a vacant smile, which the count took for a slight encouragement.

Some men, although possessing great tact and penetration in the world, are absurd in such conjectures. The physician arrived and administered a sedative in the style which they called drops. Consuella was then enveloped in her mantle and carried to her gondola. The count entered with her, supporting her in his arms, and always talking of his love, even with a certain eloquence which it seemed to him must carry conviction. At the end of a quarter of an hour, obtaining no response, he implored a word, a look.

"To what then shall I answer?" said Consuelo, rousing herself as from a dream; "I have heard nothing."

Zustiniani, although at first discouraged, thought there could not be a better opportunity, and that this afflicted soul would be more accessible than after reflection and reason. He spoke again, but there was the same silence, the same abstraction, only that there was a not-to-be-mistaken effort, though without any angry demonstration, to repel his advances. When the gondola touched the shore, he tried to detain Consuelo for an instant, to obtain a word of encouragement. "Ah, signor," said she, coldly, "excuse my weak state. I have heard badly, but I understand. Oh yes, I understand perfectly. I ask this night, this one night to reflect, to recover from my distress. Tomorrow, yes, tomorrow, I shall reply without fail."

"Tomorrow! dear Consuelo, oh, it is an age! But I shall submit—only allow me at least to hope for your friendship."

"Oh, yes, yes! there is hope," replied Consuelo, in a constrained voice, placing her foot upon the bank; "but do not follow me," said she, as she motioned him with an imperious gesture back to the gondola; "otherwise there will be no room for hope."

Shame and anger restored her strength, but it was a nervous, feverish strength, which found vent in hysteric laughter as she ascended the stairs.

"You are very happy, Consuelo," said a voice in the darkness, which almost stunned her; "I congratulate you on your gaiety."

"Oh, yes," she replied, while she seized Anzoleto's arm violently, and rapidly ascended with him to her chamber. "I thank you, Anzoleto. You were right to congratulate me. I am truly happy—oh, so happy!"

Anzoleto, who had been waiting for her, had already lighted the lamp, and when the bluish light fell upon their agitated features, they both started back in affright.

"We are very happy, are we not, Anzoleto?" said she with a choking voice, while her features were distorted with a smile that covered her cheeks with tears. "What think you of our happiness?"

"I think, Consuelo," replied he, with a calm and bitter smile, "that we have found it troublesome, but we shall get on better by and bye."

"You seemed to me to be much at home in Corilla's boudoir."

"And you, I find, very much at your ease in the gondola of the count."

"The count! You knew, then, Anzoleto, that the count wished to supplant you in my affection?"

"And in order not to annoy you, my dear, I prudently kept in the background."

"Ah, you knew it; and this is the time you have taken to abandon me!"

"Have I not done well? are you not content with your lot? The count is a generous lover, and the poor condemned singer would have no business, I fancy, to contend with him."

"Porpora was right: you are an infamous man. Leave my sight! You do not deserve that I should justify myself. It would be a stain were I to regret you. Leave me, I tell you; but first know that you can come out at Venice and re-enter San Samuel with Corilla. Never shall my mother's daughter set foot upon the vile boards of a theater again."

"The daughter of your mother the zingara will play the great lady in the villa of Zustiniani, on the shores of the Brenta. It will be a fair career, and I shall be glad of it."

"O my mother!" exclaimed Consuelo, turning toward the bed and falling on her knees, as she buried her face in the counterpane, which had served as a shroud for the zingara.

Anzoleto was terrified and affected by this energetic movement, and the convulsive sobs which burst from the breast of Consuelo. Remorse seized on his heart, and he approached his betrothed to raise her in his arms; but she rose of herself, and pushing him from her with wild strength, thrust him toward the door, exclaiming, as she did so, "Away—away! from my heart, from my memory! farewell forever!"

Anzoleto had come to seek her with a low and selfish design, nevertheless it was the best thing he could have done. He could not bear to leave her, and he had struck out a plan to reconcile matters. He meant to inform her of the dangers she ran from the designs of Zustiniani, and thus remove her from the theater. In this resolution he paid full homage to the pride and purity of Consuelo. He knew her incapable of tampering with a doubtful position, or of accepting protection which ought to make her blush. His guilty and corrupt soul still retained unshaken faith in the innocence of this young girl, whom he was certain of finding as faithful and devoted as he had left her days before. But how reconcile this devotion with the preconceived design of deceiving her, and, without a rupture with Corilla, of remaining still her betrothed, her friend? He wished to re-enter the theater with the latter, and could not think of separating at the very moment when his success depended on her. This audacious and cowardly plan was nevertheless formed in his mind, and he treated Consuelo as the Italian women do those madonnas whose protection they implore in the hour of repentance, and whose faces they veil in their erring moments.

When he beheld her so brilliant and so gay in her buffa part at the theater, he began to fear that he had lost too much time in maturing his design. When he saw her return in the gondola of the count, and approach with a joyous burst of laughter, he feared he was too late, and vexation seized him; but when she rose above his insults, and banished him with scorn, respect returned with fear, and he wandered long on the stair and on the quay, expecting her to recall him. He even ventured to knock and implore pardon through the door; but a deep silence reigned in that chamber, whose threshold he was never to cross with Consuelo again. He retired, confused and chagrined, determining to return on the morrow, and flattering himself that he should then prove more successful. "After all," said he to himself, "my project will succeed; she knows the count's love, and all that is requisite is half done."

Overwhelmed with fatigue, he slept; long in the afternoon he went to Corilla.

"Great news?" she exclaimed, running to meet him with outstretched arms; "Consuelo is off."

"Off! gracious Heaven! whither, and with whom?"

"To Vienna, where Porpora has sent her, intending to join her there himself. She has deceived us all, the little cheat. She was engaged for the emperor's theater, where Porpora purposes that she should appear in his new opera."

"Gone! gone without a word!" exclaimed Anzoleto, rushing toward the door.

"It is of no use seeking her in Venice," said Corilla, with a sneering smile and a look of triumph. "She set out for Palestrina at daybreak, and is already far from this on the mainland. Zustiniani, who thought himself beloved, but who was only made a fool of, is furious, and confined to his couch with fever; but he sent Porpora to me just now, to try and get me to sing this evening; and Stefanini, who is tired of the stage, and anxious to enjoy the sweets of his retirement in his casino, is very desirous to see you resume your performances. Therefore prepare for appearing tomorrow in Ipermnestra. In the meantime, as they are waiting for me, I must run away. If you do not believe me, you can take a turn through the city, and convince yourself that I have told you the truth."

"By all the furies!" exclaimed Anzoleto, "you have gained your point, but you have taken my life along with it."

And he swooned away on the Persian carpet of the false Corilla.