Chapter XXIV: An English Home

"Nor hath thy knowledge of adversity
Robbed thee of any faith in happiness,
But rather cleared thine inner eyes to see
How many simple ways there are to bless."
LOWELL.

The next day, according to his promise, Carlo went over to Merlebank.

"How good of you to come," said Clare, hastening forward to greet him as he was shown into the drawing-room; "I was afraid this gloomy afternoon might frighten you away. I must introduce you to Francesca's cousins whom you have so often heard of."

Carlo looked eagerly enough to see if he could trace any likeness to Francesca in the four girls who came up in frank and friendly fashion to shake hands with him. Kate, the eldest, was about her age, and he instantly perceived that she had the same English gray eyes--dark gray, with no blue in their depths. Though, however, she was a nice-looking girl, she made no pretensions to beauty; but every now and then a tone in her voice would thrill him by its likeness to Francesca's and he felt much attracted by her, though he perceived at once that she was passing judgment on him, and that her manner was more critical and less friendly than that of the younger girls.

Lucy, the second sister, was fairer and prettier, and seemed to be the sweet-tempered one of the family, but she interested him less than Kate, whose slightly aggressive manner piqued him into curiosity. Molly was a rather tomboyish young person of fourteen, with a frank hail-fellow-well-met manner; and Flo, the baby of the family, was just eleven, a slim little girl, with short, fair hair, and very short petticoats, who enjoyed life in a kittenish sort of way, and, while much petted by every one in the house, had somehow just escaped spoiling.

Clare sat, looking wonderfully natural, in the corner of the big Chesterfield sofa, and made him sit beside her, where they could talk comfortably together, a little removed from the group of girls who, on the other side of the hearth, clustered round Gigi and made much of him. The drawing-room was such a room as Carlo had never before seen, and after the weary round of dingy lodgings and second-rate hotels to which he had of late been accustomed he could fully appreciate it. It reminded him just a little of the _salotto_ at Casa Bella in its air of comfort and homelikeness, but whereas the Casa Bella room had a semi-Italian air, from its Cantigalli _plaques_ and pottery, and its striped silk _couvrettes_, this room was thoroughly and typically English. A second room, visible by day, was curtained off in the evening, when snugness reigned supreme; a fire of coals, crowned by a huge log, burned in the low, wide grate, and sent a ruddy glow over the brass fender and dainty brass fireirons; while a warm-toned Persian carpet and wallflower-red curtains harmonized well with the salmon-tinted walls, upon which were gathered a wealth of pictures that at once attracted Carlo's eye, though the names on the massive gilt frames Brett, Ansdell, Vicat Cole, and Millais, conveyed to him as a foreigner, no special meaning.

Clare was a little afraid of alluding to Casa Bella after her rather careless speech of the preceding day, but she spoke of the Ritters, and of other mutual friends, and asked endless questions about Naples and Pozzuoli which Carlo was enchanted to answer. For many months he had been utterly cut off from all his old ties, and from the people who could sympathize with them; it was delightful to him to go over the familiar ground once more with some one who knew it and loved it almost as well as he did. To be with Clare again made him feel strangely young and light-hearted. He forgot Anita and Comerio; he forgot all the petty jealousies and disputes of the company; he even forgot his own private troubles, found genuine relief in speaking Francesca's name, and could almost have fancied that he was once more a boy, resolving to work and wait till he could present his name to Captain Britton with the prefix of _Avvocato_.

"You can stay a nice long time, I hope?" said Clare. "Mr. Britton will be coming in soon, I think, and he specially wished to see you. He so much enjoyed your singing on Saturday."

"This is my off day," explained Carlo, "so I am not bound to be back by any special time. It is _Fra Diavolo_ to-night, and I have no part in that."

"Is that your only chance of a holiday? Do you mean that you sing all the other nights of the week?"

"That just depends on whether the engagements dovetail into each other. Very often they do. When the town is important we generally stay a week, and then the round seldom varies. Arrive on Sunday, _Faust_ on Monday, _Fra Diavolo_ Tuesday, _Somnambula_ Wednesday, _Lucia_ Thursday, _Barbiere_ Friday, _Rigoletto_ Saturday, on to the next place on Sunday."

"Is the travelling always done on Sunday?"

"Not always, but very frequently. You see it is the only day you close your theatres. Now with us the theatres are shut on Friday, but we play our best operas in our best style on the _Festa_. There is something to be said for both sides of the question. Last week we had engagements of two and three nights only at small places, and travelled here in detachments, the bulk of the company by special train on Friday evening, the rest of us on Saturday afternoon. So at Ashborough the days are slightly varied, and on Thursday we move on to Queenbury for two nights."

"It must be a very hard life," said Clare.

"It is no light work, as some people seem to fancy, specially when the winter is so severe."

"Yes, you must have felt the cold dreadfully."

"I have at any rate learnt to appreciate warmth. The only drawback is that in England it seems impossible to be warm on both sides at once. You may scorch your shins at the fire, and yet the back of your leg will still be frozen! But I see you understand here how to build up a glorious fire. We don't come across such fireplaces as that."

While he talked he watched with the interest of a foreigner all that was going on, wondered for what reason the footman appeared with a trivet and a bright copper kettle, and speculated as to the little folding-table which was being set up on the other side of the fireplace. A daintily-worked cloth was spread over it, then came the explanation in the form of a beautifully inlaid ebony and silver tray, with the most fascinating of silver tea-services, and delicate blue and white china cups.

"This is just like Salem," announced Gigi. "We've never had real proper tea since Salem."

Carlo, seeing that Kate had some unknown designs on the copper kettle, hastened to offer his services.

"Tea-making is a process I have never seen," he said wondering what on earth he was to do with the kettle now that he had valiantly seized upon it.

"Thank you, a little in the teapot, please," said Kate. "That will do."

He restored it to the trivet, and noticed that Kate's hands were exactly like Francesca's. He could not take his eyes off them as she measured out tea from a pretty little silver caddy with a silver cockleshell. They were not luxuriously brought up girls, in spite of their father's wealth. They were accustomed to helping themselves, and did not care to have servants always at their beck and call. Indeed, Kate was of so independent a nature that she would willingly have dispensed with Carlo's assistance, and observing that the kettle did not boil, she set it further back on the trivet, and with something a little defiant in her expression, prepared to take it off at the critical minute.

"What was the first edition for?" asked Carlo.

"Oh, that was to warm the teapot, a very important part of the matter," she explained.

"Pray let me have my share in this mysterious process," said Carlo, forestalling her as she was about to carry off the kettle in triumph. "It has to me, you know, all the interest of a new experiment in chemistry."

"You don't mean to say Francesca hasn't introduced afternoon tea yet at Casa Bella?"

There was a general exclamation.

"You see in Italy we naturally enough go in more for cooling drinks. She was very clever at making lemonade."

He felt himself coloring at the recollection of that hot summer day in the Rose-room, and was glad to turn his back on the five pairs of eyes, and to put the kettle again on the trivet. A further diversion was made by the entrance of the servant with cakes and thin bread-and-butter and a great dish of crumpets, which was set down in the fender to keep hot. There was something charmingly easy and informal in the whole thing, Carlo thought; he wondered what it was that gave the English their special power of making homes, and once more the tone of Kate's voice took him back with a pang that was half of pleasure, half of pain, to the thought of Francesca. For a minute he called up the picture of what might have been. He saw the Villa Bruno with the alterations which she would have made in it; he possessed in imagination the wife and the home which he had renounced; and the dream was so sweet that it was almost worth the revulsion of feeling which quickly followed.

There must have been a brain-wave between him and Kate, for at that moment she startled him with the question. "I suppose they have new neighbors now at Casa Bella? Who took your house when you left?"

"It was taken by Count Carossa," he replied. "Mr. Britton met him at Naples on Whit-Sunday. He has a yacht not unlike the _Pilgrim_, and was anchored close by."

"I remember now, father mentioned him. What sort of man is he? Will Uncle Britton like him?"

"I believe he was much taken with him," replied Carlo, hearing his own calm replies with a sort of astonishment.

"Uncle is dreadfully fond of people with titles," said Kate. "It is his one weakness. Is Count Carossa really nice, do you think?"

"I have only met him once," replied Carlo. "He is quite young and very rich, rather an original sort of man, has travelled a great deal, and is a good _raconteur_."

He ran off the list of his rival's merits unfalteringly, but was secretly relieved by an interruption.

"Don't you hear wheels?" exclaimed Lucy, opening the drawing-room door that she might listen better.

"Yes, it is father!" cried little Flo, "for Bevis is waking up. See," she said, drawing Carlo's attention to a very old deer-hound which lay stretched out comfortably on the hearth-rug. "Bevis always does that when he hears the carriage, but when it is only people coming to call he sleeps right on."

In the hall there was a little bustle of arrival and welcome. The return of the father and son from business made one of the pleasantest of the daily events in that quiet country household. They brought with them a sort of atmosphere of the world which was refreshing. Generally there were commissions to be delivered, or library books to be eagerly seized upon, and invariably there was some sort of news to be discussed. Carlo realized something of this as Mr. Britton came into the room with Lucy, his favorite daughter, clinging to his arm, and the dog Oscar, son to the elderly Bevis, at his heels.

The shipbuilder never showed to greater advantage than in his own house. Looking now at his clear gray eyes, his refined face, his thick white hair and snowy, well-kept beard, he seemed to Carlo the perfection of an English gentleman. His manner was delightful, a little more courteous than the manner of the Englishmen Carlo had hitherto come across, but free from all suspicion of formality, a manner that was genuinely friendly without being in the least over-familiar. He gave Carlo a hearty welcome, and turned to introduce him to his son, who seemed to be much what Mr. Britton must have been forty years ago.

Harry Britton had not yet acquired, however, his father's easy, genial way of talking; he seemed not quite at his ease with the Italian; and, after the greetings were over, moved away with a perceptible air of relief, which tickled Carlo not a little, and began to open the shiny black bag which he held in his left hand. From this he proceeded to dole forth various purchases which the girls had asked him to make, ending with the evening paper, which he as usual brought dutifully to Clare, with a little time-honored joke which had for them all a halo of happy associations.

Carlo watched the little bit of by-play, and understood it all perfectly. It brought back to his mind the old days when Clare was in Italy, and had been to him just such a true, staunch, cheery friend as she was now to Harry Britton. To his tired brain there was something indescribably refreshing in that glimpse of home-life. It was a scene which he never forgot, and which often returned to him with a sense of comfort in his wandering, homeless life. For there are people so genuine, so English, so whole-hearted, that they can make even afternoon callers feel, for the time being, one of themselves--can send them forth again with a pleasant, living picture in their hearts, and a consciousness that there is true friendliness and good fellowship in a world which had seemed to them for the most part a place of weary formality and routine.

He felt a great wish to do something for these people, and knowing that etiquette forbade them to ask him to sing, and that Clare was anxious to hear him, he took advantage of some reference which Mr. Britton made to his singing in Faust, to offer to sing them "_Dio Possente_."

The unmistakable look of real delight which greeted the suggestion, and the eager way in which Molly and Flo ran to open the piano, pleased him more than the loudest public applause could have done. He sang very well, and entranced his hearers, rousing even Harry out of his shy reserve.

"Do you ever sing English songs?" he asked, when the chorus of thanks had ceased, volunteering his first uncalled-for remark to the Italian.

"Not very often," replied Carlo, wondering whether he could get through "Love for a Life," and, after a moment's debate, decided to risk it for the sake of pleasing Francesca's cousin. "There is one song by my old Maestro with English words. Perhaps you know it?"

He struck a few chords, then broke into the introduction to the song which transported him once more to that first happy day of his betrothal. To sing it was hard, and yet his very emotion gave him a power which he would not otherwise have possessed,--it made him able to bring tears into the eyes of more than one of his listeners--it set kind-hearted Mr. Britton weaving plans for a reconciliation, and imagining a happy ending to Francesca's love-story.

"I sang that for you," said Carlo, with a little bow of acknowledgment for Harry's warm thanks. "Now, if you are not quite tired of me, I should very much like to sing one song for Miss Claremont. You must choose it, Clare," he said, turning to her, and looking with a smile into her sympathetic eyes.

"May I really choose?" she said. "Then I should like that old favorite of mine, 'The Pilgrim of Love.'"

"That will also be an indirect compliment to the yacht," said Carlo laughing. "Or was that called after the _Pilgrim's Progress_? But let me see, can I get through the words? How do you pronounce that bit I always used to come to grief over?"

"'Nay, nay, courteous father'?" suggested Clare, recalling merry disputes in the Casa Bella drawing-room.

"That was it! 'Curteous' or 'corteous'--how do you say it?"

They laughed over the old discussions, and discussed them over again, and after some little delay Carlo sang the song, and finally left them to be haunted for many a day to come by the refrain, "No rest but the grave for the pilgrim of love."

"He seems a nice sort of fellow!" was Harry's comment, when, the guests having departed, his natural manner returned to him. "I say, it didn't matter, did it, my asking him if he sang English songs? I thought none of those operatic fellows did."

"Oh, dear no," said Clare. "Nothing pleases Carlo so much as to give pleasure."

"Well, it was awfully jolly of him to sing such a lot. He doesn't seem a bit stuck up. But, I say, why on earth can't they be called like ordinary Christians? Carlo and Gigi! Did you ever hear of a more horsey and doggy couple!"

"That's just your narrow-mindedness," said Clare, laughing. "Carlo is as good a name as Charles, and Gigi sounds no more foolish to an Italian than Johnny or Tommy to us."

"Well, Clare, for my part I don't understand your Signor Donati. If he is the sort of man he seems to be, why does he live such a useless life?" said Kate, with the severity of three-and-twenty.

"He may have many reasons which we don't understand," said Clare. "However, I candidly confess that I wish he would leave the stage. He looks to me terribly delicate."

"He is far too good for that company," said Mr. Britton. "I shouldn't be at all surprised if he did leave the stage before long. I hope he may--I hope he may! There's something about him which quite fascinates one, though I do wish he could have been an Englishman."

The laughter evoked by this truly British remark was only checked by the warning clock, which made Clare and the younger girls beat a hasty retreat to the schoolroom, and sent Kate to read to her invalid grandmother, and to moralize in her own mind over Carlo's mistake in choosing so unworthy a profession.