A noble kinsman : a novel

Front matter

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A NOBLE KINSMAN.

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Contents

CHAPTER XIII.

CHAPTER XIV.

CHAPTER XyV.

Chapter II. The Hand Of Destiny

ALE Duke of Melito gave a courteous bow, a like a person who, though unconvinced by 7 the reasoning he has been listening to, has "no wish to prolong the argument till it becomes wearisome. In the meantime, the hour had arrived for leaving this enchanting place. Sant’ Angelo, a Greek at heart, poured a glass of wine into the sea as an offering to Neptune.

““Then we go by water ?”’ inquired Garantini.

‘Why ?” replied Sant’ Angelo.

‘* Because I see that you are propitiating Neptune.”

‘* And let us go by water,’’ said Sant’ Angelo then ; ‘at least, if our guest has no objection.”

‘A capital idea!” exclaimed the Florentine, ‘“‘ the sea is so beautiful.”

Nicastro came to the edge of the balcony

“ Boat here!”

‘Here, sir,” said a boatman, who had been resting on his oars, waiting.

“Tam here, sir,” added another, trying to get to the foot of the rock first.

“Away with you!” cried the first, who did not relish being interfered with.

‘‘T was here before you,” retorted the other.

And they began to wrangle. In the meantime the gentlemen had come down to the water’s edge, and Nicastro settled the matter at once with a peremptory argument.

“There are enough for both of you, don’t you see? Now, let us embark. Where shall we land? At the Villa ?’””

‘*T shall be there later,’’ said Carafa ; “‘ but I must first go to the Teatro del Fondo, to see if they have kept a box for me.”

‘‘Then you land at the Piliero? All right, you will come to meet us through the Chiaia.”’

‘So be it,” replied Carafa ; ‘‘ well, then, who comes with me ?”

**T do,” said Renato.

‘*And I,” added Garantini; ‘‘ moreover, all who are not going in our boat may go to the Fondo with you.”

While this chatter, accompanied by much laughing, was going on, the party were taking their seats in the two boats; the larger number in the first with their guest, five more in the second, as escort to Carafa, for so they put it. Renato, the last to get in, took his seat in the stern, near the rudder.

‘‘ Mind, Renato, don’t take us the wrong way with your absurd ideas. We are bound for the Immacolatella, and you must steer for the other side of the Castello dell’ Ovo.”

THE HAND OF DESTINY. 1l

“Thanks,” said Renato, with a smile.

The sun, near setting, was shedding a lovely crimson light on Capri and the distant hills near Amalfi. Renato was grave and silent. After the exertion of that long speech he had retired into the background, like the glow-worm when its light has gone out.

*‘T hope,”’ Carafa whispered into his ear, ‘ that all those declarations of yours to-day were in joke.”

“1? What are you thinking about ?’’ Renato asked, starting, like a man suddenly roused from his slumbers.

“Tt occurs to me that perhaps you are right, up to a certain point,” replied his friend; “but I should not like to see you make the experiment. And as I know your disposition ‘a

‘* Hold your tongue, at present ; I am not in love,” interrupted Renato. ‘‘I have only said what I think ; and in matters of opinion, I hope 2

‘Opinions are free,” replied Carafa; ‘‘but mind, I hope you have not expressed an ill-omened wish.”

‘** Come, now, you don’t believe in such nonsense ?”

“T—I don’t know anything about it. And you, how do you know it is nonsense? There’s a great deal yet in the world unexplained; and you oughtn’t to deny a thing just because you don’t understand it. Remember the verse in the ‘ Contemplations:’ Montaigne says, ‘Who knows?’ and Rabelais, ‘Perhaps.’”’

‘And if it were so,” Renato said, ‘‘I should not consider it a misfortune if some day, say to-day, what I wished for just now should happen to me. That trifling love-making and flirting, you know, Antonio, never were to my taste.”

“What are you talking about over there?” demanded Garantini, interrupting the chat with his friends on the seats near him.

‘Nothing, only Renato is giving a réchauffe of the speech he made a little while ago.”

‘Renato wishes for a dramatic passion? I shall arrange it for him,” replied Garantini. ‘‘ What would you say, Renato, what would you say to the love of a Medea, a sexagenarian ? You can have it; an old acquaintance of mine is most anxious to find a Jason. But what is that grimace for, Melito?”

‘Hold your tongue, Garantini,” said Renato, giving this brusque reply in a gentle tone.

‘* Let us change the conversation then; but I warn you that you are losing a good opportunity. You aren’t angry, surely ?”

**T? Why should you think so?”

In the meantime the boats, vigorously propelled by two rowers as eager to receive a good reward as the young Duke of Melito was to feel some stirring emotion, had turned the point at the Castello dell’ Ovo, and arrived at the end of the pier, when a forest of masts began to appear, or, to express ourselves with more moderation, a number of vessels at anchor in the harbour.

One of these vessels, rather larger than the others, seemed about to set sail, and the creaking of the windlasses and rattling of chains told plainly enough that they were lifting her anchors. It was a brigantine, perfectly new; and apparently there had just been some festivity on board, as four or five boats were at that moment leaving the side of the vessel, all filled with gentlemen and ladies, probably friends and relations of the captain, supercargo, or even of the consignee.

As the young gentlemen in their boats gave a hasty glance at this scene, Renato’s attention was attracted by a young man in the bows, who had clambered up into the rigging to wave a handkerchief and to give a final adieu to some one who had just left the ship. Following the direction of his hand, Renato’s eyes fell on a boat at a short distance from him, where two persons, a gentleman and a lady, were standing in the stern. The gentleman seemed old, the lady was young, and looked graceful and pretty. Both responded—the former with his hand, and the girl with her handkerchief—to the salutations of the sailor.

The boat containing Renato and his friends, on its way to the landing-place, almost touched the other. — And as they came nearer, Renato could see the two figures distinctly, or more exactly the graceful young lady, for the old man naturally did not interest him much.

The young lady, for such her dress and the look of her face showed her to be, was certainly good-looking. She was tall and slight, like one of the Graces, and her pale complexion gave her beautifully-made face the appearance of marble; her eyes were dark, her hair dark also; as it lay in rich masses on her forehead, she was a living instance of that harmonious exuberance of form which Athenian artists envied in the inhabitants of Magna Grecia. And was this girl conscious of her great beauty? Probably not, for from the unaffected expression of her face one could not imagine her vain like Venus or proud like Juno.

Moreover, at that moment she was watching the brigantine so intently, that she was neither conscious of the vicinity of the boat nor of the admiration of which she was the object.

‘‘ How beautiful she is,’’ exclaimed Antonio Carafa, for he too was struck by her remarkable appearance.

‘“ Yes, beautiful indeed!” exclaimed Renato, mechanically.

‘‘And that looks to me a handsome fellow too, that sailor up there in the rigging,’ continued Carafa ; ‘her lover, perhaps.”

‘“ Why a lover?” said Renato. ‘ Might it not be a brother ?”

‘Well, let us suppose so,” replied Carafa. ‘‘I am not wedded to my opinion, and give in.”

But why had Renato jumped to this arbitrary conclusion? He could not have told himself, and he did not probe the depths of his mind to discover the reason ; but it somehow annoyed him to think that the affections of this beautiful girl, born, or meant to be, a princess, should be wasted on a common sailor, and that the latter had presumed so far as to gain her affections. ‘‘ Aristocratic haughtiness,”’ the reader will say; and I am not going to defend the Duke of Melito, who was filled with all the prejudices of his caste. In the meantime the boat containing Renato and his friend had overtaken and passed the one where this divine creature was. Not being able to stop, he would lke to have turned about; but how could he do this with any show of reason? Would not Antonio have laughed him to scorn? Happily Antonio was the first to begin to watch the girl, and

Renato took courage, and turned right round to look at her. The boat was making its way slowly from the brigantine, and the girl still stood motionless, with her eyes riveted on the sailor up in the rigging.

Renato guessed from the direction which the boat was taking that these two strangers would also land at the Immacolatella, so called from an image of the Immaculate Virgin, sculptured in marble, which, I fear, cannot be intended to represent the Custom House.

Arrived at the landing-place the young friends mounted the steps leading into the Via del Piliero, and set off in haste towards Castel Nuovo. The Duke of Melito, however, lingered behind, silent and vacillating in his movements, like a mathematician -absorbed in the solution of a difficult problem. Antonio Carafa, as already narrated, was on his way to the Teatro del Fondo, not far off in the Strada del Molo, and the others were escorting him, intending to make their way afterwards towards Chiaia, when he had secured a box for that evening. Evidently Renato could not accompany them to Chiaia, and the Teatro del Fondo itself seemed too far; for as they came to the corner he told Antonio that he was going to buy some cigars. Cigars! he who only smoked a cigarette with some difficulty.

“‘T shall overtake you,” he said, to gain time; ‘‘and if I don’t come at once,” he added, in a low voice, ‘you will see me again later at the theatre.”

“Aha, aha!” exclaimed Carafa, giving his friend a glance that, in the words of the Bible, tried his heart and reins.

But Renato gave him another so beseeching that Antonio felt compassionate, and kept to himself a joke that was on the end of his tongue.

“Good luck!” he said, in a low voice; and he proceeded with his other friends towards the theatre.

Renato at last had solved his problem. He had scarcely seen his friends walk off before he turned on his heel, and instead of entering the tobacconist’s, turned the corner in haste, and hurried down the Via del Piliero, like a debtor pursued by bailifis. In sight of the Immacolatella, he slackened his speed. He was in time. The girl and the old gentleman were coming out of the Custom House door; silently and slowly, like people weary, or deeply moved, they turned to the right, towards Marinella. However they were not going so far. Near the Pietra del Pesce, they turned into one of those lanes at right angles to the Via del Sidile di Porto, a filthy street, swarming ‘with inhabitants, where eyes, ears, and nose are almost equally offended.

Renato followed them slowly. The declining evening light, and the coming and going of all those busy people, allowed him to do so without attracting the attention of any one.

The other two, with the young Duke of Melito dogging their steps, mounted, by all those turnings and windings which mark the ascent of Pendino, up to the Via dell’ Universita, and at about two-thirds of the length turned to the left into the lane called Donna Romita.

The name was poetical, and, in a sense, of good omen. But Renato felt a pang at the thought that such beauty, and in appearance such nobility, should have to live in this melancholy and apparently unhealthy spot. In the windings of the Via del Sedile di Porto, taking advantage of the crowd, he had been able for a moment to come nearer to her, and hear something of what she was saying.

‘Poor Corrado,” the old man had said; ‘‘ God knows when we shall see him again.”

‘Never fear, father; he will be back soon. Corrado has promised it, and he will keep his word.”

‘“My dear child,’’ muttered the old man, in a melancholy voice, ‘“‘you don’t know what it is to make a living ; and your brother——”’

‘“Yes; I understand,” interrupted the girl; “ but you see, father, Corrado has got a talisman that works miracles.”

Renato could hear no more, because at that moment the two speakers began the ascent, and he was obliged to keep at a civil distance. But two things, or rather three, had given him joy enough to satisfy a lover for a week. First, her voice, a sweet, silvery, caressing voice, which stirred him to the depths of his heart. Then, to hear that the sailor was not her betrothed, but her brother—her brother really, as he had maintained from the first. Finally, the name of Corrado, which seemed to denote a certain rank in his family, and which to him seemed a sort of secret link with people whom he had never seen till now. The name of Corrado, like that of Renato, was common among his family ; in fact, one might be said to alternate with the other, through five centuries of nobility, in

VOL. I. 3 a family older than the days of the Houses of Swabia and Anjou, favoured by the Aragonese with every kind of prerogative, and loaded with titles by Spaniards and Bourbons, according to the ostentatious fashion of the times.

All these seemed sufficient reasons for making hin. eager about the matter which chance, or fate, had brought into his hands. Like Ruth in Boaz’s field, who gleaned the ears of corn left behind by the reapers, he kept gleaning up useful bits of information to satisfy his youthful curiosity.

But was it all curiosity, simple curiosity which had seized him in the middle of the harbour and carried him through all those streets and those turnings and windings ?

At that moment Renato remembered the words of Antonio Carafa; then his vow, scarcely uttered, had been heard. And in what an intricate romance, in what network had he been involved by destiny ? Would it not be wiser to stop while he could still do so without pain, and carefully to retrace his steps ? Evidently, between the wish so impressively expressed by him at the Frisio rock, and the appearance of this wonderful girl, there was some mysterious connection—enough to make the most materialist of philosophers, and this Renato was not, thoughtful.

Therefore! Therefore, after having considered the pros and cons, thereby giving some time to the couple in front to make their way through the lane, Renato shrugged his shoulders impatiently, like Cesar at the crossing of the Rubicon, set fire to his ships like Fernando Cortez, and followed the girl.

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*“The Fates will it,” said one of the ancients ; and another added, “The Fates themselves find a way.” The young Duke of Melito left destiny to the task of guiding him along the paths of the future, and concerned himself about nothing, except to know the number of the house where this wonderful beauty dwelt.

And to ascertain it, he of course followed her to the very end; but happily without having to go any farther than Donna Romita lane.

Gentle readers, let us, with Renato, repeat, ‘‘ Donna Romita, good name and good omen.” ‘This was the antidote to the evil prognostications of Antonio Carafa.

Chapter. III. La Nunziata

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#1 have seen what became of the two persons f whom our young hero had followed so per-

te sistently through the streets of the old et part of Naples. And now we must turn back a step to see where they came from.

Signor Martino Palmanova was one of the best known shipowners and merchants of the Piliero, and his ships were to be met on many seas. Without ‘being an eagle, he had been among the first to comprehend that the age of cockle-shells was past, and ‘that to keep up the credit of the Italan mercantile navy, vessels of greater tonnage, like the Genoese, were required, thereby economizing in the expense of fitting out, and keeping up with the great carriers of the globe, the Americans and English, who made the «discovery before us, and accordingly have become the masters of the sea.

Signor Martino had by degrees got rid of his old fleet of feluccas and tartanes and provided himself with three-masters instead. ‘The reader has already seen one, the third in order of construction, just on the point of lifting her anchor near the entrance of the harbour. It was a brigantine, of about a thousand tons, launched about a month before at Sestri Ponente, on the Western Riviera ; and Signor Martino: Palmanova had loaded it with Neapolitan wine and: other products of the country, on commission from his correspondents in Lima.

The lading of the brigantine named La Nunziata,. was complete, and she was just about to sail. Her name, La Nunziata, was that of Signor Martino’s only daughter, a pretty girl of seventeen, with hair like spun gold, eyes as blue as the sea in some deep bay, and cheeks lightly tinged, lke the leaf of a crimson rose.

That very evening the brigantine was to sail. And Signor Martino, who had promised his daughter to ceive a little party on board, killed two birds that day with one stone: he gave his Nunziata pleasure, and he also saw that all was right on board, exemplifying the well-known proverb: ‘‘ The master’s eye fattens the horse.” Friends and relations had accepted Signor Martino’s invitation with pleasure, and the cabin was scarcely large enough to hold all the gay company who had assembled to drink the health of the two Nunziata’s—the ship and its fair namesake.

The gentlemen, no degenerate descendants of Noah, had washed down their Taranto oysters with Capri wine, and drunk the ladies’ health in champagne. The latter contented themselves with touching their glasses with their lips, preferring sweets and ices, while that wonderful amphitheatre of the city, spread out under the deep blue sky before their eyes, added to the charm of their beauty and their natural gaiety.

In the midst of all the merriment, Nunziata, the queen of the feast, was sorrowful. She responded to all attention shown her, and tried to smile; but in her studied gaiety there was something perceptibly wanting. Twice over Signor Martino had asked his daughter if anything was the matter with her, as she did not seem so gay as usual; and the girl had replied that she had never felt better in her life, and that she was all right, only the movement of the vessel seemed a little strange.

‘“You are right, my dear,” said Signor Martino ; “love the sea, and remain on shore.”

“Indeed, I can’t understand why men leave their homes to go to sea.”

And so saying, Nunziata gave a piteous glance out of her blue eyes at a young sailor, to whom it was as welcome as the friendly beacon over a stormy sea.

And was this a genuine sailor, this youth she was looking at so compassionately ? He was dressed like a sailor, but his face was too fair and his hands too finely made for a Jack Tar. Corrado Altavilla (even his name suggested no mean descent) was scarcely eighteen, and was now, for the first time, trusting himself to the faithless element. Rich in nothing but in his youth, he was going to seek his fortune beyond the sea. Worldly wealth was scarce, as you see, but fortune, according to the proverb, favours the young ; and Corrado Altavilla, having had no experience of the truth of the proverb in his own country, was going to test it in a foreign land.

At Naples life is not harder than in any other Italian city; rather one may say, though Naples is the most populous of all, it is the city where one can live with least expense, as its bright. sky is to be had for nothing, and almost for nothing its fertile soil. But Corrado Altavilla wanted more than a livelihood. For this, some modest situation would have sufficed, when added to the proceeds of a small property near Casoria, his mother’s slender portion, and to the little his father made with the sale of his water-colours and sketches in oil.

Ruggero Altavilla, for such was the name of the old man, had seen better days. But a long and ruinous lawsuit with his own relations, lasting through many years, added to the hatred and persecution of the Bourbons, prison and exile, had put the finishing touch to his fortunes. Solely out of love to his wife and the two children with which they were blessed, Ruggero Altavilla folded his wings; and though he had aright to the title of prince and to | a golden heart in his coat of arms, he had contentedly resigned himself to the obscurity of a humble lot; and turning his knowledge of painting, learnt as a pastime in his youth, to account, he made cheap sketches, views of Pompeii, Herculaneum, and Cume, for picture dealers, who sold them to foreigners for double the money.

In the proper place and at the proper time, the history of Ruggero Altavilla’s family and of the lawsuit which ruined him will be related. We must now see why young Corrado could not be contented with merely earning a living, but required to make a fortune. Corrado was in love, after a noble and thorough-going fashion, according to his nature, like that of all his family, whose motto was the simple Latin adverb, ‘‘digne,” a sufficiently expressive one.

Corrado’s beloved was a pretty girl living in a palazzo in the Via del Nilo, not far from his own modest residence. For some time this near neighbourhood had established friendly relations between the two families—the one nouveaux riches, the other decayed nobles. Their friendship had been much strengthened by the circumstance that the Palmanovas, risen from nothing, retained their simple habits, and the Altavillas, in their poverty, displayed that dignity which does not spring from pride, but from a clear conscience and the determination to ask nothing from any one.

However, if any one had told Signor Martino, shipbuilder and merchant, that Corrado Altavilla, of noble descent, but who had failed as a law-student, had presumed to aspire to the hand of his fair Annunziata, he would have jumped from his seat, higher than he would have done if any one had asked him for the loan of seventy thousand hre.

And Corrado, who understood without having ever made the experiment—Corrado, who saw the difficulty, in fact, the impossibility, of gaining his ends with the slender portion fortune had given him, speedily made his calculations like a sensible man: ‘‘ Nunziata is sixteen and loves me; therefore she may wait three years. I ask no more.”

Three years certainly are a short time in which to make one’s fortune honestly in any quarter of the globe. But Corrado had in Lima a relative on his mother’s side, and this relative had made his fortune after twenty years cf hard work. Why should he not, with his experience and his protection, shorten the years of this painful apprenticeship in the case of his youthful relative? Corrado took with him some good capital—his youthful courage and his determined will; two qualities of little use to him at Naples, where he was obliged to maintain a certain decorum, and where a trade, though willingly learnt by him, would have inflicted a dangerous humiliation, without offering any corresponding advantage.

Moreover, there was the family lawsuit to be won. The right was on their side, but the others had influence and cunning on theirs; and the expected millions were still uncertain.

‘There is still time for me to come back with a good pocketful of money,” Corrado had said to his father, “to grease the wheels of justice.”

In the meantime, you will have guessed why the fair Nunziata kept looking at the handsome sailor, and why she was so melancholy during the party given in her honour. She had not clearly understood why he had resolved on this hasty departure ; nor could she, accustomed as she was to see her every wish gratified by her father, imagine that he would have said no, if she had declared her wish to change her name for that of Altavilla. Still, even she had not dared to express this wish to her father. Neither had Corrado dared to run the risk of a refusal which might have destroyed his hopes for ever. And so, partly telling the girl himself, partly leaving it to his sister, Corrado had let her know the reasons for his departure, and obtained the promise from her which was to give him the courage and faith, so necessary in his great undertaking.

Nunziata promised nothing very serious, young as she was, and an only daughter besides. Indeed, being sixteen, and an only daughter, she had hardly yet begun to dream of marriage. Still, Corrado was her first love. But it was a childish kind of love; and, meeting him during the last two years, she had never lost her sleep on his account, nor experienced any vague ecstasy, any mysterious quickening of her pulse. Corrado pleased her, and this was a good deal; besides, he was Margherita’s brother, and this was as much, if not more.

Margherita was her particular friend, beloved, one may say, immediately after, and as much as, her last doll—the most beautiful and best beloved of all. One morning, abont three years before the time when this story begins, Nunziata had seen Margherita from the balcony of her little room, while Margherita was standing in front of her window watering her flowers. They had looked at one another and exchanged smiles, such as angels may do, who meet by chance about the world. From that day, Nunziata, who had been struck by Margherita’s beauty, and not yet attained to the age when envy eats out the heart of women, used to wait in her baleony for the moment when the pretty apparition should come to the window-sill to water her beloved flowers. Margherita, for her part, looked kindly at the pretty child, with her fair curls, her blue eyes, and her pink and white complexion, and responded with a little nod to her friendly gestures.

This dumb show went on for a week, when Nunziata gravely told her father that she had made a friend, whom she loved more than her doll, and to whom she intended to pay a visit. Signor Martino at first contented himself with smiling; but when he saw that his little daughter was talking sensibly, and that she was determined to have a friend at all costs, he bethought himself of making inquiries before gratifying this whim. All he heard was excellent; the name of the family was Altavilla—they were noble, but not rich; excellent people, who kept to themselves, were sufficient for themselves, and gave no trouble to any one. Signor Martino gave his consent. Then they had to plan how their acquaintance was to be made. Was it quite necessary that he, with his daughter on his arm, should go round the corner of his palazzo in the Via del Nilo, enter Donna Romita lane, ascend the four flights of stairs leading to the Altavilla habitation, and say to them: ‘‘Here Iam?” ‘For my part,” Signor Martino said, ‘‘I shouldn’t mind; but what would the people think of us? Might they not say that you were a little mad woman, and I, a great fool ?”’

‘Don’t trouble yourself, papa,” replied Nunziata, with the greatest gravity. “I will think about it and let you know.”

“ That’s right; do you think about it, and then let me know.”

The girl’s promise was no empty boast. Her father gone, she lost no time, and had soon found out the shortest way. She wrote a little note, and sealed it then she went to the window, and drawing the attention of her future friend in the usual way, showed that she wished to send it to her.

Signor Martino, with all his business-like qualities, could hardly have found out a device like this.

Margherita stood a moment watching the child’s pantomime. Then she seemed to call some one, who immediately appeared at the window. This was a handsome boy, who gave a glance at the opposite balcony, listened to the girl for a moment, and then disappeared like lightning. Margherita went to the window, put out her head through the flowers, and looked into the street. Nunziata imitated her, and saw the boy looking up, evidently expecting her, as no sooner had he caught a glimpse of her, than he held out his hands as if he wanted alms. Nunziata understood and dropped her letter, which after many twists and turns, fell into the boy’s hands.

Two minutes later, the missive had reached its destination, and Margherita opened it without leaving the window, under the eyes of her small correspondent.