Chapter VI: Front Matter (6)

LORENZO.
Oh, celestial vision!
What brush may reproduce those magic tints,
Those lines ethereal?--

MARIA (turns suddenly).
Is it not marvellous,
Signor Lorenzo? I would draw the curtain,
But, gazing, I forgot.
You are the first,
After the master and myself, to look
Upon this wonder.

LORENZO (with enthusiasm, looking for he first time at the picture).
Ah, what an answer this
For envious minds that would restrict his power
To writhing limbs and shrivelled flesh! Repose,
Beauty, and large simplicity are here.
Yes, that is art! Before such work I stand
And feel myself a dwarf.

MARIA.
There, you are wrong.
My father even, who knows his proper worth,
Before his best achievements I have seen
In like dejection; 't is the curse of genius.
Oft have I heard the master grace your name
With flattering addition.

LORENZO.
'T is your goodness,
And not the echo of his praise, that speaks.
My work was worthless--'t was your generous voice
Alone secured the master's second glance.

MARIA.
Nay, signor, frankly, he esteems your talent.
Because you are of well-assured means
And gentle birth, he will be rude to you.
Not without base is the deep grudge he owes
To riches and prosperity.

LORENZO.
Signora,
Why do I bear such harsh, injurious terms
As he affronts me with? Why must I seem
In mine own eyes a craven? Spiritless,
Dishonorably patient? 'T is not his fame,
His power, his gift, his venerable years
That bind me here his willing slave. Maria,
'T is thou, 't is thou alone! 'T is that I love thee,
And exile hence is death!
[A pause. He kneels at her feet. She looks at him kindly but
makes no reply.]
At thy dear feet
I lay my life with its most loyal service,
The subject of thy pleasure.

MARIA (tenderly).
You are too humble.

LORENZO.
Too humble! Do you seek mine utter ruin,
With words whose very tone is a caress?
I say all. I love you!--you have known it.
Why should I tell you? Yet, to-day you seem
Other than you have been. A milder light
Beams from your eyes--a gentler grace is throned
Upon your brow--your words fall soft as dew
To melt my fixed resolve.

MARIA.
You find me, signor,
In an unguarded mood. I would be true
To you; and to myself; yet, know no answer.
Anon, I will be calm; pray you withdraw.

LORENZO.
Till when? Remember what mad hopes and fears
Meantime will riot in my brain.

MARIA.
To-morrow--
Farewell, farewell.

LORENZO (kisses her hand).
Farewell.
[Exit.]

MARIA.
A faithful heart,
A name untainted, a fair home--yea, these
Are what I need. Oh, lily soul in heaven,
Who wast on earth my mother, guide thy child!

While MARIA sits rapt in thought, enter from behind her, ANNICCA,
who bends over her and kisses her brow.

ANNICCA.
What, sister! lost in dreams by daylight? Fie!
Who is the monarch of thy thoughts?

MARIA (starting).
Annicca!
My thoughts are bounden to no master yet;
They fly from earth to heaven in a breath.
Now are they all of earth. Hast heard the tidings?

ANNICCA.
Yea--of the Prince's ball? We go together.
Braid in thy hair our mother's pearls, and wear
The amulet ingemmed with eastern stones;
'T will bring good fortune.

MARIA.
Tell me, ere we go,
What manner of man is John of Austria?

ANNICCA.
Scarce man at all--a madcap, charming boy;
Well-favored--you have seen him--exquisite
In courtly compliment, of simple manners;
You may not hear a merrier laugh than his
From any boatman on the bay; well-versed
In all such arts as most become his station;
Light in the dance as winged-foot Mercury,
Eloquent on the zither, and a master
Of rapier and--

MARIA.
A puppet could be made
To answer in all points your praise of him.
Hath he no substance as of a man?

ANNICCA.
Why, sister,
What may that be to us?

MARIA.
He is our Prince.

ANNICCA.
The promise of his youth is to outstrip
The hero of Lepanto; bright and bold
As fire, he is the very soul, the star
Of Spanish chivalry; his last achievement
Seems still the flower of his accomplishments.
Musician, soldier, courtier, yea, and artist.
"He had been a painter, were he not a prince,"
Says Messer Zurbaran. The Calderona,
His actress-mother, hath bequeathed to him
Her spirit with her beauty, and the power
To win and hold men's hearts.

MARIA.
I knew it, sister!
His eye hath a command in it; his brow
Seems garlanded with laurel.

ANNICCA.
What is this?
You kindle with his praise, your whole heart glows
In light and color on your face, your words
Take wing and fly as bold as reckless birds.
What! can so rash a thought, a dream so wild,
So hopeless an ambition, tempt your soul?

MARIA.
Pray you, what thought, what dream, and what ambition?
I knew not I had uttered any such.

ANNICCA.
Nor have you in your speech; your eyes now veiled,
Where the light leaped to hear me voice his fame,
Your blushes and your pallor have betrayed
That which should lie uncounted fathom deep--
The secret of a woman's foolish heart.

MARIA.
And there it lies, my sibyl sister, still!
Your plummet hath not reached it. Yes, 't is love
Flaunts his triumphant colors in my cheek,
And quickens my lame speech--but not for him,
Not for the Prince--so may I vaunt his worth
With a free soul.

ANNICCA.
Say on.

MARIA.
A gentleman,
Favored of earth and heaven, true and loving,
Hath cast his heart at my imperial feet;
And if to-morrow find me as to-day,
I will e'en stoop and raise it to mine own.

ANNICCA.
Signor Vitruvio?

MARIA.
Not he, indeed!
Did not I say favored of earth and heaven?
That should mean other gifts than bags of gold,
Or a straight-featured mask. Nor will it be
Any you name, though you should name him right.
Must it not lie--how many fathom deep--
The secret of a woman's foolish heart?

ANNICCA.
Kiss me, Maria. You are still a child.
You cannot vex me, wilful as you be.
Your choice, I fear not, doubtless 't will prove wise,
Despite your wild wit, for your heart is pure,
And you will pause with sure deliberate judgment
Before you leave our father.

MARIA.
Does love steal
So gently o'er our soul? What if he come
A cloud, a fire, a whirlwind, to o'erbear
The feeble barriers wherewith we oppose him,
And blind our eyes and wrest from us our reason?
Fear not, Annicca, for in no such guise
He visits my calm breast; but yet you speak
Somewhat too sagely. Did such cautious wisdom
Guide your own fancy?

ANNICCA.
Jest no more, Maria.
Since I became a wife, is much made clear,
Which a brief year ago was dark and vague.
Tommaso loves me--we are happier
Then I had dreamed; yet matching now with then,
I see his love is not that large, rich passion
Our father bore us.

MARIA.
You regret your home?

ANNICCA.
No, no! I have no wish and no regret.
I speak for you. His is a sovereign soul,
And all his passions loom in huger shape
Than lesser men's. He brooks no rivalry
With his own offspring, and toward me his love
Hath ebbed, I mark, to a more even flow,
While deeper, stronger, sets the powerful current
Toward you alone. Consider this, Maria,
Nor wantonly discrown that sacred head
Of your young love to wreathe some curled boy's brow.

MARIA.
Think you his wish were that I should not wed?

ANNICCA.
Nay, that I say not, for his pride aspires
To see you nobly mated.

MARIA (after a pause).
Him will I wed
Whose name is ancient, fair, and honorable,
As the Ribera's is illustrious--
Him who no less than I will venerate
That white, divine old head. In art his pupil,
In love his son; tender as I to watch,
And to delay the slow extinguishing
Of that great light.

ANNICCA.
There spake his darling child!

MARIA.
What is't o'clock? If he should sleep too late--
He bade me rouse him--

ANNICCA.
Haste to seek him, then.
'T is hard on sunset, and he looks for thee
With his first waking motion. Till to-night.
[Exeunt severally.]

SCENE II.

A hall in RIBERA'S house. Enter LUCA and FIAMETTA.

FIAMETTA.
But did you see her?

LUCA.
Nay, I saw her sister, Donna Annicca.

FIAMETTA.
Tush, man! never name her beside my lady Maria-Rosa. You have lost
the richest feast in the world for hungry eyes. Her gown of cloth
o' silver clad her, as it were, with light; there twinkled about
her waist a girdle stiff with stones--you would have said they
breathed. Mine own hands wreathed the dropping pearls in her hair,
and pearls again were clasped around her throat. But no, I might
tell thee every ornament--her jeweled fan, her comb of pearls, her
floating veil of gauze, and still the best of all would escape us.

LUCA.
Thou speakest more like her page than her handmaiden.

FIAMETTA.
Thou knowest not woman truly, for all thy wit. I speak most like a
woman when I weigh the worth of beauty and rich apparel. Heigh-ho!
I have felt the need of this. Thou, good Luca, who might have
been my father, canst understand me? HE was poor as thou. Why
shouldst thou be his lackey, his slave? My hand were as dainty as
hers, if it could but be spared its daily labor.

LUCA.
Yes, poor child, I understand thee, and yet thou art wrong. He is
more slave to pride than I am to him. I know him well, Fiametta,
after so many years of service, and to-day I pity him more than I
fear him. Why, girl, my task is sport beside his toil! If my
limbs be weary, I sleep; but I have seen him sit before his canvas
with straining eyes and the big beads standing on his brow. When
at last he gave o'er, and I have smoothed his pillow, and served
and soothed him, what sleep could he snatch? His brain is haunted
with evil visions, whereof some be merely of his own imaginings,
and others the phantoms of folk who are living or have lived, and
who rouse his jealousy or mayhap his remorse, God only knows! If
that be genius--to be alive to pain at every pore, to be possessed
of a devil that robs you of your sleep and grants no space between
the hours of grinding toil--I thank the saints I am a simple man!

FIAMETTA.
I grant thee thou mayst be right concerning him; he hath indeed a
strange, sour mien. I shudder when he turns suddenly, as his wont
is, and bends his evil eyes on me. The holy father tells me such
warnings come from God. No matter how slight the service he asks
of me, my flesh creeps and my limbs refuse to move, till I have
whispered an Ave. But what of Lady Maria-Rosa? Both heaven and
earth smile upon her. To-night she wears a poor girl's dowry, a
separate fortune, on her head, her neck, her hands, yes, on her
little jeweled feet. One tiny shoe of hers would make me free to
wed my lad.

LUCA.
If he have but eyes, I warrant thee he finds jewels enough in thy
bright face. Tell me his name.

FIAMETTA.
Nay, that is my secret.

LUCA.
He must be a poor-souled lad if he will wait till thou hast earned
a dowry.

FIAMETTA.
A poor-souled lad! my good Vicenzo--ah! but no matter; thou knowest
him, Luca, my Lord Lorenzo's page. There!--is he poor, or mean, or
plain, or dull? He claims no dowry, he--but I have my pride, as well
as the great ones.

LUCA.
May the saints preserve thee from such as theirs! I am heartily glad
of thy good fortune. I am not sure whether thou or Lady Marie-Rosa
be the most favored. Well, the end proves all.
[Exeunt.]

Enter on one side ANNICCA and DON TOMMASO, attired for the ball;
on the other side, RIBERA.

RIBERA.
What do ye here, my children? Haste away!
Maria waits you for the ball; folk say
'T will be the bravest show e'er seen in Naples.
I warrant you the Spagnoletto brings
The richest jewels--what say'st thou, my son?

DON TOMMASO.
I who have robbed you of one gem, need scarce
Re-word, sir, how I prize it.

RIBERA.
Why, 't is true.
Robbed me, thou sayst? So hast thou. She was mine--
The balanced beauty of her flesh and spirit,
That was my garland, and I was her all,
Till thou, a stranger, stole her heart's allegiance,
Suborned--Forgive me, I am old, a father,
Whose doting passions blind. I am not jealous,
Believe me, sir. When we Riberas give,
We give without retraction or reserve,
Were it our life-blood. I rejoice with thee
That she is thine; nor am I quite bereft,
I have some treasure still. I do repent
So heartily of my discourteous speech,
That I will crave your leave before I kiss
Your wife's soft palm.

ANNICCA (kissing him repeatedly).
Why, father, what is this?
Can Don Tommaso's wife so soon forget
She is the Spagnoletto's child?

RIBERA.
Enough.
I can bear praise, thou knowest, from all save thee
And my Maria. My grave son, I fear,
Will mock these transports. Pray go in with me.
No one of us but has this night a triumph.
Let us make ready.
[Exeunt.]