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Italy of to-morrow such as he had dreamt of! Even in that disastrous

marriage with Count Prada he tried to see merely a first attempt at

revival which had failed, the modern Italy of the North being over-hasty,

too brutal in its eagerness to love and transform that gentle, belated

Rome which was yet so superb and indolent. But might he not take up the

task? Had he not noticed that his book, after the astonishment of the

first perusal, had remained a source of interest and reflection with

Benedetta amidst the emptiness of her days given over to grief? What! was

it really possible that she might find some appeasement for her own

wretchedness by interesting herself in the humble, in the happiness of

the poor? Emotion already thrilled her at the idea, and he, quivering at

the thought of all the boundless love that was within her and that she

might bestow, vowed to himself that he would draw tears of pity from her

eyes.

But the night had now almost completely fallen, and Benedetta rose to ask

for a lamp. Then, as Pierre was about to take leave, she detained him for

another moment in the gloom. He could no longer see her; he only heard

her grave voice: "You will not go away with too bad an opinion of us,

will you, Monsieur l'Abbe? We love one another, Dario and I, and that is

no sin when one behaves as one ought. Ah! yes, I love him, and have loved

him for years. I was barely thirteen, he was eighteen, and we already

loved one another wildly in those big gardens of the Villa Montefiori

which are now all broken up. Ah! what days we spent there, whole

afternoons among the trees, hours in secret hiding-places, where we

kissed like little angels. When the oranges ripened their perfume

intoxicated us. And the large box-plants, ah, _Dio!_ how they enveloped

us, how their strong, acrid scent made our hearts beat! I can never smell

then nowadays without feeling faint!"

A man-servant brought in the lamp, and Pierre ascended to his room. But

when half-way up the little staircase he perceived Victorine, who started

slightly, as if she had posted herself there to watch his departure from

the _salon_. And now, as she followed him up, talking and seeking for

information, he suddenly realised what had happened. "Why did you not go

to your mistress instead of running off," he asked, "when she called you,

while you were sewing in the ante-room?"

At first she tried to feign astonishment and reply that she had heard

nothing. But her good-natured, frank face did not know how to lie, and

she ended by confessing, with a gay, courageous air. "Well," she said,

"it surely wasn't for me to interfere between lovers! Besides, my poor

little Benedetta is simply torturing herself to death with those ideas of

hers. Why shouldn't they be happy, since they love one another? Life

isn't so amusing as some may think. And how bitterly one regrets not

having seized hold of happiness when the time for it has gone!"

Once alone in his room, Pierre suddenly staggered, quite overcome. The

great box-plants, the great box-plants with their acrid, perturbing

perfume! She, Benedetta, like himself, had quivered as she smelt them;

and he saw them once more in a vision of the pontifical gardens, the

voluptuous gardens of Rome, deserted, glowing under the August sun. And

now his whole day crystallised, assumed clear and full significance. It

spoke to him of the fruitful awakening, of the eternal protest of Nature

and life, Venus and Hercules, whom one may bury for centuries beneath the

soil, but who, nevertheless, one day arise from it, and though one may

seek to wall them up within the domineering, stubborn, immutable Vatican,

reign yet even there, and rule the whole, wide world with sovereign

power!

PART III.

VII.

On the following day as Pierre, after a long ramble, once more found

himself in front of the Vatican, whither a harassing attraction ever led

him, he again encountered Monsignor Nani. It was a Wednesday evening, and

the Assessor of the Holy Office had just come from his weekly audience

with the Pope, whom he had acquainted with the proceedings of the

Congregation at its meeting that morning. "What a fortunate chance, my

dear sir," said he; "I was thinking of you. Would you like to see his

Holiness in public while you are waiting for a private audience?"

Nani had put on his pleasant expression of smiling civility, beneath

which one would barely detect the faint irony of a superior man who knew

everything, prepared everything, and could do everything.

"Why, yes, Monsignor," Pierre replied, somewhat astonished by the

abruptness of the offer. "Anything of a nature to divert one's mind is

welcome when one loses one's time in waiting."

"No, no, you are not losing your time," replied the prelate. "You are

looking round you, reflecting, and enlightening yourself. Well, this is

the point. You are doubtless aware that the great international

pilgrimage of the Peter's Pence Fund will arrive in Rome on Friday, and

be received on Saturday by his Holiness. On Sunday, moreover, the Holy

Father will celebrate mass at the Basilica. Well, I have a few cards

left, and here are some very good places for both ceremonies." So saying

he produced an elegant little pocketbook bearing a gilt monogram and

handed Pierre two cards, one green and the other pink. "If you only knew

how people fight for them," he resumed. "You remember that I told you of

two French ladies who are consumed by a desire to see his Holiness. Well,

I did not like to support their request for an audience in too pressing a

way, and they have had to content themselves with cards like these. The

fact is, the Holy Father is somewhat fatigued at the present time. I

found him looking yellow and feverish just now. But he has so much

courage; he nowadays only lives by force of soul." Then Nani's smile came

back with its almost imperceptible touch of derision as he resumed:

"Impatient ones ought to find a great example in him, my dear son. I

heard that Monsignor Gamba del Zoppo had been unable to help you. But you

must not be too much distressed on that account. This long delay is

assuredly a grace of Providence in order that you may instruct yourself

and come to understand certain things which you French priests do not,

unfortunately, realise when you arrive in Rome. And perhaps it will

prevent you from making certain mistakes. Come, calm yourself, and

remember that the course of events is in the hands of God, who, in His

sovereign wisdom, fixes the hour for all things."

Thereupon Nani offered Pierre his plump, supple, shapely hand, a hand

soft like a woman's but with the grasp of a vice. And afterwards he

climbed into his carriage, which was waiting for him.

It so happened that the letter which Pierre had received from Viscount

Philibert de la Choue was a long cry of spite and despair in connection

with the great international pilgrimage of the Peter's Pence Fund. The

Viscount wrote from his bed, to which he was confined by a very severe

attack of gout, and his grief at being unable to come to Rome was the

greater as the President of the Committee, who would naturally present

the pilgrims to the Pope, happened to be Baron de Fouras, one of his most

bitter adversaries of the old conservative, Catholic party. M. de la

Choue felt certain that the Baron would profit by his opportunity to win

the Pope over to the theory of free corporations; whereas he, the

Viscount, believed that the salvation of Catholicism and the world could

only be worked by a system in which the corporations should be closed and

obligatory. And so he urged Pierre to exert himself with such cardinals

as were favourable, to secure an audience with the Holy Father whatever

the obstacles, and to remain in Rome until he should have secured the

Pontiff's approbation, which alone could decide the victory. The letter

further mentioned that the pilgrimage would be made up of a number of

groups headed by bishops and other ecclesiastical dignitaries, and would

comprise three thousand people from France, Belgium, Spain, Austria, and

even Germany. Two thousand of these would come from France alone. An

international committee had assembled in Paris to organise everything and

select the pilgrims, which last had proved a delicate task, as a

representative gathering had been desired, a commingling of members of

the aristocracy, sisterhood of middle-class ladies, and associations of

the working classes, among whom all social differences would be forgotten

in the union of a common faith. And the Viscount added that the

pilgrimage would bring the Pope a large sum of money, and had settled the

date of its arrival in the Eternal City in such wise that it would figure

as a solemn protest of the Catholic world against the festivities of

September 20, by which the Quirinal had just celebrated the anniversary

of the occupation of Rome.

The reception of the pilgrimage being fixed for noon, Pierre in all

simplicity thought that he would be sufficiently early if he reached St.

Peter's at eleven. The function was to take place in the Hall of

Beatifications, which is a large and handsome apartment over the portico,

and has been arranged as a chapel since 1890. One of its windows opens on

to the central balcony, whence the popes formerly blessed the people, the

city, and the world. To reach the apartment you pass through two other

halls of audience, the Sala Regia and Sala Ducale, and when Pierre wished

to gain the place to which his green card entitled him he found both

those rooms so extremely crowded that he could only elbow his way forward

with the greatest difficulty. For an hour already the three or four

thousand people assembled there had been stifling, full of growing

emotion and feverishness. At last the young priest managed to reach the

threshold of the third hall, but was so discouraged at sight of the

extraordinary multitude of heads before him that he did not attempt to go

any further.

The apartment, which he could survey at a glance by rising on tip-toe,

appeared to him to be very rich of aspect, with walls gilded and painted

under a severe and lofty ceiling. On a low platform, where the altar

usually stood, facing the entry, the pontifical throne had now been set:

a large arm-chair upholstered in red velvet with glittering golden back

and arms; whilst the hangings of the _baldacchino_, also of red velvet,

fell behind and spread out on either side like a pair of huge purple

wings. However, what more particularly interested Pierre was the wildly

passionate concourse of people whose hearts he could almost hear beating

and whose eyes sought to beguile their feverish impatience by

contemplating and adoring the empty throne. As if it had been some golden

monstrance which the Divinity in person would soon deign to occupy, that

throne dazzled them, disturbed them, filled them all with devout rapture.

Among the throng were workmen rigged out in their Sunday best, with clear

childish eyes and rough ecstatic faces; ladies of the upper classes

wearing black, as the regulations required, and looking intensely pale

from the sacred awe which mingled with their excessive desire; and

gentlemen in evening dress, who appeared quite glorious, inflated with

the conviction that they were saving both the Church and the nations. One

cluster of dress-coats assembled near the throne, was particularly

noticeable; it comprised the members of the International Committee,

headed by Baron de Fouras, a very tall, stout, fair man of fifty, who

bestirred and exerted himself and issued orders like some commander on

the morning of a decisive victory. Then, amidst the general mass of grey,

neutral hue, there gleamed the violet silk of some bishop's cassock, for

each pastor had desired to remain with his flock; whilst members of

various religious orders, superiors in brown, black, and white habits,

rose up above all others with lofty bearded or shaven heads. Right and

left drooped banners which associations and congregations had brought to

present to the Pope. And the sea of pilgrims ever waved and surged with a

growing clamour: so much impatient love being exhaled by those perspiring

faces, burning eyes, and hungry mouths that the atmosphere, reeking with

the odour of the throng, seemed thickened and darkened.

All at once, however, Pierre perceived Monsignor Nani standing near the

throne and beckoning him to approach; and although the young priest

replied by a modest gesture, implying that he preferred to remain where

he was, the prelate insisted and even sent an usher to make way for him.

Directly the usher had led him forward, Nani inquired: "Why did you not

come to take your place? Your card entitled you to be here, on the left

of the throne."

"The truth is," answered the priest, "I did not like to disturb so many

people. Besides, this is an undue honour for me."

"No, no; I gave you that place in order that you should occupy it. I want

you to be in the first rank, so that you may see everything of the

ceremony."

Pierre could not do otherwise than thank him. Then, on looking round, he

saw that several cardinals and many other prelates were likewise waiting

on either side of the throne. But it was in vain that he sought Cardinal

Boccanera, who only came to St. Peter's and the Vatican on the days when

his functions required his presence there. However, he recognised

Cardinal Sanguinetti, who, broad and sturdy and red of face, was talking

in a loud voice to Baron de Fouras. And Nani, with his obliging air,

stepped up again to point out two other Eminences who were high and

mighty personages--the Cardinal Vicar, a short, fat man, with a feverish

countenance scorched by ambition, and the Cardinal Secretary, who was

robust and bony, fashioned as with a hatchet, suggesting a romantic type

of Sicilian bandit, who, to other courses, had preferred the discreet,

smiling diplomacy of the Church. A few steps further on, and quite alone,