Chapter XXXI: Martino

The jagged crests of the eastern rocks were fringed with light from the sun still lingering behind them, when Philip stepped out into the frosty air of the morning, which made his veins tingle with a pleasant glow. He enjoyed the prospect of this novel expedition, and felt glad that he was the first English tourist of the season. All the town was astir already, and the priest, with an acolyte, was awaiting him at the church door, where mass was just over, and the congregation, chiefly of women, was dispersing to their labors in the fields. Very soon the sun was shining down on the mountain track they were taking, and the whole valley lay below their eyes, lit up in its beams. The fields wore the vivid green of early spring, after the melting of the snows and before the scorching of the summer skies of brass. There were no song birds; but once the harsh cry of a vulture startled Philip as it soared above them, uttering its scream of anger. On the fir trees the crimson flowers were hardening into cones, which would soon be empurpled and bronzed by the sun, where they hung in great clusters on the boughs just beyond his reach. He must bring Dorothy to see them, he thought. As they mounted higher they came here and there upon broad patches of gentian, so thickly grown that not a blade of green peeped among the deep blue of the blossom. Spring flowers were blooming in profusion, and their path lay once through a field of forget-me-nots, where the grass was hidden under a mantle of pale, heavenly blue. Certainly he would bring his mother and Dorothy to see such a pretty sight.

Higher up the mountain path, which he could not have found without the priest as a guide, the road grew rougher and more stony, and presently they passed under the chill shadow of a long, high wall of rock. Here the snow lay unmelted in great masses, as if it had fallen in avalanches from the steep precipices above. But a path had been trodden over them, hard and slippery as frosty roads are on mountain passes where winter still reigns. Beyond these, in a valley lying high up on the mountain side, was a group of miserable hovels. From every roof there rose a cloud of smoke, as if they were all smoldering from fire, and a volume of smoke issued from each open doorway. There was neither chimney nor window in any of the rude dwellings.

"Will the signore arrest himself here till I turn again?" asked the priest courteously.

Philip strolled on a little through a mass of broken rocks, split by the frost from the precipices, and interspersed with tiny plots of cultivated ground, wherever a handful of soil could be found. But in a few minutes he heard shouts and yells from what might be called the village street, and he turned back to see what was going on. The priest, attended by his acolyte, had entered one of the huts; and now, stealing away from it, Philip could see the gaunt and wretched figure of a man, at whom the children were hooting loudly, though they kept at a safe distance from him. He came on toward Philip with a shambling gait, and with round, bowed shoulders, as if he had never stood upright. His shaggy hair was long and matted together, and his beard had been clumsily cut, not shaved, giving to him almost the aspect of a wild beast. His clothes were rags of the coarsest texture. Yet there was something--what could it be? not altogether strange and unfamiliar in his face as he drew near. There was a deep glance in his gray eyes, which lay sunken under heavy eyebrows, that seemed to speak some intelligible language to him, as if he knew the same expression in a well known face. The peasant passed by, muttering, and stopping immediately behind him, as if using him as a screen, he picked up an enormous piece of rock and flung it at the yelping children.

"Martino! Martino!" they shrieked as they ran for refuge to their miserable dens; and at the clamorous outcry a crew of dirty, half naked women, who looked barely human, rushed out into the street, as if to take vengeance on the irritated man; but at the sight of Philip they paused for an instant, and then fled back again, banging their doors behind them, as if fearful of an attack.

At the sound of the cry "Martino," Philip for a moment fancied they were calling to him; but quickly recalling to his mind where he was, he felt how impossible it was for any creature here to know his name. This poor fellow must bear it--an unlucky, pitiable namesake. He must be a dangerous madman, he thought; yet when he looked round he saw the man crouching quietly under a rock at a little distance, his shaggy head buried in his hands. Philip's whole heart was stirred. He approached him cautiously, saying, "Good-morning," and the peasant lifted up his head and fixed his deep-set and mournful eyes upon him.

"Here is a _lira_ for you," said Philip, by way of opening up a friendly feeling between them. The man turned it about in his rough hands, with something like a smile on his rugged face. Then he crouched down at Philip's feet, with his hands upon the ground--the attitude of a brute.

"The good signore!" he exclaimed.

The two young men presented a striking contrast. The one a handsome, thoroughbred, refined Englishman, whose culture had been pushed to the highest point, with all his powers of mind and body carefully trained, full of pity and kindliness toward the almost savage and imbecile creature, all but prostrate at his feet, who had grown up an outcast and a thrall among barbarians. Philip compelled him to rise from his knees.

"What is your name?" he asked, speaking slowly and clearly.

"Martino," he answered in a mumbling voice.

"That is one of my names too," said Philip, with a light laugh. He himself was struck with the utter contrast between them. The man was the same height as himself, only his head hung low, and his shoulders were rounded. Coarse and brutish as this Austrian peasant was, he felt a peculiar kindness toward him, and looked at him with the eye of a future patron and benefactor. If he had only been cared for sooner, these large limbs might have made a fine man, and his head was not a bad shape. Now he saw him near at hand there were possibilities about him which would have made him quite another creature if he had been taken in hand a few years earlier. It was too late now.

They stood opposite to one another with friendliness in both faces, but with the accursed barrier of different languages making it impossible to communicate their kindly feelings. The peasant kept looking at the coin in his grimy palm, and back again at Philip's compassionate face, but he did not try to speak. Philip was about to make another effort, when the priest approached and addressed a few sharp words to Martino, who immediately shambled off, dragging his bare and horny feet along over the stones and ice, in the direction of Cortina.

"The respectable old person is now ready to receive the signore," said the priest to Philip.

He conducted him into the dark interior of one of the hovels, into which no ray of light entered, except through the nick between the doorpost and the door, which he left purposely ajar. Coming out of the strong, clear light of the mountain side, for a minute or two Philip could discern nothing; but by and by, in the darkness, there appeared slowly and dimly a haggard, yellow face, wrinkled in a thousand lines, with cunning eyes grown bleared and red, which wandered restlessly between him and the priest. All else was dark and indistinguishable. The black roof lay low, almost touching his head, and the black walls hemmed him in closely. On the hearth a fire of dry dung was smoldering, but gave no light; and the noisome smoke rose in wreaths and columns which found a partial escape through the roof and doorway. Philip took silent note of it all, with the calm interest of an accidental bystander.

"This person wishes to disclose a strange circumstance to the English signore," said the priest with grave deliberation; "he understands the Italian a little, I think so."

"Only a little," answered Philip; "but if you will repeat to me slowly what she says, I shall make out most of the meaning. And you can help me, for you know more English than I do Italian."

The priest bowed with a smile. There was, indeed, great difficulty to make out the whole story, as Chiara told it in patois; but her manner was intensely earnest, and Philip bent all his mind to catch the meaning of her confession. It seemed an obscure and painful story of some young English girl, who had been deserted by her lover at Cortina, when she was about to become a mother, and who gave birth to the poor unfortunate creature whom he had just seen. This man was half an Englishman, the son of an English mother. This, then, was the secret of his strange feeling of being almost akin to him.

"Why did she not try to send him as a child to England?" he asked, feeling a great rush of compassion toward the man who had been thus deprived of his birthright.

There was some hesitation about the reply. Chiara had confessed her theft to the priest, but she had also left the stolen money to the church for masses to be said for her soul. She had derived no benefit from it during her lifetime, having grown to love it with all a miser's infatuation, and she was not willing to sacrifice the good it might do her in the life to which she was hastening. She could not run the risk of having to give up her idolized plunder. The priest, also, was unwilling for the church to lose any portion of its revenues.

"Chiara took charge of the child," he said, "and sent it up here to be nursed by her sister. When her sister died ten years ago she came to live in this place herself, and Martino worked for her. It was fair for Martino to work for her, when she paid for all he had."

"Yes," answered Philip; "but did this woman take no measures to find the father who deserted his child so basely?"

"Not possible," exclaimed the priest; "there were few English tourists passing this way thirty years ago. And Chiara began to love the boy, and could not part with him."

"But why does she tell the story now--now, when it is too late?" asked Philip with a tone of passion in his voice.

"She would not tell now," said the priest, "but she dies, as you behold. She is poor, and there will be nothing for Martino. When she is gone the other people here will stone him, or kill him in some way. For his mother was a heretic, and they believe she is in hell, and Martino is not a good Christian, though he was permitted to be baptized. He is very savage, like a wild beast, and the women are frightened of him. The men will kill him like a wild beast."

"She wants to find a friend and protector for him," responded Philip pitifully. "Well, I will take care of the poor fellow. Did the poor girl leave nothing behind her which might give me some clew as to who she belonged to? Martino may have some relations in England."

"There is this little packet of papers in English," said the priest; "I have not read them yet, for this person did not give them to me only a moment ago. No person has ever read them, for she kept them safe and secret all these years. She wishes the English signore to read them, and say what can be done for Martino."

"I cannot read them here," replied Philip, taking the yellow, time-stained packet from his hand; "but if you will come to my hotel this evening I will tell you the contents."

"Very good," said the priest.