Gambara | Page 8

invited every one for the evening, poor
things. Being New Year's Day, I am treating the company to a dish in
which I believe I have surpassed myself."
Signor Giardini's voice was drowned by the noisy greetings of the

guests, who streamed in two and two, or one at a time, after the manner
of tables-d'hote. Giardini stayed by the Count, playing the showman by
telling him who the company were. He tried by his witticisms to bring a
smile to the lips of a man who, as his Neapolitan instinct told him,
might be a wealthy patron to turn to good account.
"This one," said he, "is a poor composer who would like to rise from
song-writing to opera, and cannot. He blames the managers, music-
sellers,--everybody, in fact, but himself, and he has no worse enemy.
You can see--what a florid complexion, what self-conceit, how little
firmness in his features! he is made to write ballads. The man who is
with him and looks like a match-hawker, is a great music celebrity--
Gigelmi, the greatest Italian conductor known; but he has gone deaf,
and is ending his days in penury, deprived of all that made it tolerable.
Ah! here comes our great Ottoboni, the most guileless old fellow on
earth; but he is suspected of being the most vindictive of all who are
plotting for the regeneration of Italy. I cannot think how they can bear
to banish such a good man."
And here Giardini looked narrowly at the Count, who, feeling himself
under inquisition as to his politics, entrenched himself in Italian
impassibility.
"A man whose business it is to cook for all comers can have no
political opinions, Excellenza," Giardini went on. "But to see that
worthy man, who looks more like a lamb than a lion, everybody would
say what I say, were it before the Austrian ambassador himself. Besides,
in these times liberty is no longer proscribed; it is going its rounds
again. At least, so these good people think," said he, leaning over to
speak in the Count's ear, "and why should I thwart their hopes? I, for
my part, do not hate an absolute government. Excellenza, every man of
talent is for depotism!
"Well, though full of genius, Ottoboni takes no end of pains to educate
Italy; he writes little books to enlighten the intelligence of the children
and the common people, and he smuggles them very cleverly into Italy.
He takes immense trouble to reform the moral sense of our luckless
country, which, after all, prefers pleasure to freedom,--and perhaps it is
right."
The Count preserved such an impenetrable attitude that the cook could
discover nothing of his political views.

"Ottoboni," he ran on, "is a saint; very kind-hearted; all the refugees are
fond of him; for, Excellenza, a liberal may have his virtues. Oho! Here
comes a journalist," said Giardini, as a man came in dressed in the
absurd way which used to be attributed to a poet in a garret; his coat
was threadbare, his boots split, his hat shiny, and his overcoat
deplorably ancient. "Excellenza, that poor man is full of talent, and
incorruptibly honest. He was born into the wrong times, for he tells the
truth to everybody; no one can endure him. He writes theatrical articles
for two small papers, though he is clever enough to work for the great
dailies. Poor fellow!
"The rest are not worth mentioning, and Your Excellency will find
them out," he concluded, seeing that on the entrance of the musician's
wife the Count had ceased to listen to him.

On seeing Andrea here, Signora Marianna started visibly and a bright
flush tinged her cheeks.
"Here he is!" said Giardini, in an undertone, clutching the Count's arm
and nodding to a tall man. "How pale and grave he is poor man! His
hobby has not trotted to his mind to-day, I fancy."
Andrea's prepossession for Marianna was crossed by the captivating
charm which Gambara could not fail to exert over every genuine artist.
The composer was now forty; but although his high brow was bald and
lined with a few parallel, but not deep, wrinkles; in spite, too, of hollow
temples where the blue veins showed through the smooth, transparent
skin, and of the deep sockets in which his black eyes were sunk, with
their large lids and light lashes, the lower part of his face made him still
look young, so calm was its outline, so soft the modeling. It could be
seen at a glance that in this man passion had been curbed to the
advantage of the intellect; that the brain alone had grown old in some
great struggle.
Andrea shot a swift look at Marianna, who was watching him. And he
noted the beautiful Italian head, the exquisite