Massimilla Doni | Page 8

room, and discovered the Prince's trousers hanging
over a chair at the foot of the bed.
"Clarina, I will not ring!" cried the Duke, in a shrill voice of fury. "I
will not play the violin this evening, nor tomorrow, nor ever again--"
"Ta, ta, ta, ta!" sang Clarina, on the four octaves of the same note,
leaping from one to the next with the ease of a nightingale.
"In spite of that voice, which would make your patron saint Clara
envious, you are really too impudent, you rascally hussy!"
"You have not brought me up to listen to such abuse," said she, with
some pride.
"Have I brought you up to hide a man in your bed? You are unworthy
alike of my generosity and of my hatred--"
"A man in my bed!" exclaimed Clarina, hastily looking round.
"And after daring to eat our supper, as if he were at home," added the
Duke.
"But am I not at home?" cried Emilio. "I am the Prince of Varese; this
palace is mine."
As he spoke, Emilio sat up in bed, his handsome and noble Venetian
head framed in the flowing hangings.
At first Clarina laughed--one of those irrepressible fits of laughter
which seize a girl when she meets with an adventure comic beyond all
conception. But her laughter ceased as she saw the young man, who, as
has been said, was remarkably handsome, though but lightly attired; the
madness that possessed Emilio seized her, too, and, as she had no one
to adore, no sense of reason bridled her sudden fancy--a Sicilian
woman in love.
"Although this is the palazzo Memmi, I will thank your Highness to
quit," said the Duke, assuming the cold irony of a polished gentleman.
"I am at home here."
"Let me tell you, Monsieur le Duc, that you are in my room, not in your
own," said Clarina, rousing herself from her amazement. "If you have
any doubts of my virtue, at any rate give me the benefit of my crime--"
"Doubts! Say proof positive, my lady!"
"I swear to you that I am innocent," replied Clarina.

"What, then, do I see in that bed?" asked the Duke.
"Old Ogre!" cried Clarina. "If you believe your eyes rather than my
assertion, you have ceased to love me. Go, and do not weary my ears!
Do you hear? Go, Monsieur le Duc. This young Prince will repay you
the million francs I have cost you, if you insist."
"I will repay nothing," said Emilio in an undertone.
"There is nothing due! A million is cheap for Clara Tinti when a man is
so ugly. Now, go," said she to the Duke. "You dismissed me; now I
dismiss you. We are quits."
At a gesture on Cataneo's part, as he seemed inclined to dispute this
order, which was given with an action worthy of Semiramis,--the part
in which la Tinti had won her fame,--the prima donna flew at the old
ape and put him out of the room.
"If you do not leave me in quiet this evening, we never meet again. And
my never counts for more than yours," she added.
"Quiet!" retorted the Duke, with a bitter laugh. "Dear idol, it strikes me
that I am leaving you agitata!"
The Duke departed.
His mean spirit was no surprise to Emilio.
Every man who has accustomed himself to some particular taste,
chosen from among the various effects of love, in harmony with his
own nature, knows that no consideration can stop a man who has
allowed his passions to become a habit.
Clarina bounded like a fawn from the door to the bed.
"A prince, and poor, young, and handsome!" cried she. "Why, it is a
fairy tale!"
The Sicilian perched herself on the bed with the artless freedom of an
animal, the yearning of a plant for the sun, the airy motion of a branch
waltzing to the breeze. As she unbuttoned the wristbands of her sleeves,
she began to sing, not in the pitch that won her the applause of an
audience at the Fenice, but in a warble tender with emotion. Her song
was a zephyr carrying the caresses of her love to the heart.
She stole a glance at Emilio, who was as much embarrassed as she; for
this woman of the stage had lost all the boldness that had sparkled in
her eyes and given decision to her voice and gestures when she
dismissed the Duke. She was as humble as a courtesan who has fallen
in love.

To picture la Tinti you must recall one of our best French singers when
she came out in Il Fazzoletto, an opera by Garcia that was then being
played by an Italian company at the theatre in the Rue Lauvois. She
was so beautiful