CHAPTER XIV. THE AVOWAL
She next day she said to herself that she would reply to Robert. It was
raining. She listened languidly to the drops falling on the terrace.
Vivian Bell, careful and refined, had placed on the table artistic
stationery, sheets imitating the vellum of missals, others of pale
violet powdered with silver dust; celluloid pens, white and light, which
one had to manage like brushes; an iris ink which, on a page, spread a
mist of azure and gold. Therese did not like such delicacy. It seemed
to her not appropriate for letters which she wished to make simple and
modest. When she saw that the name of “friend,” given to Robert on
the first line, placed on the silvery paper, tinted itself like
mother-of-pearl, a half smile came to her lips. The first phrases were
hard to write. She hurried the rest, said a great deal of Vivian Bell
and of Prince Albertinelli, a little of Choulette, and that she had seen
Dechartre at Florence. She praised some pictures of the museums, but
without discrimination, and only to fill the pages. She knew that Robert
had no appreciation of painting; that he admired nothing except a little
cuirassier by Detaille, bought at Goupil’s.
She saw again in her mind this cuirassier, which he had shown to her
one day, with pride, in his bedroom, near the mirror, under family
portraits. All this, at a distance, seemed to her petty and tiresome.
She finished her letter with words of friendship, the sweetness of which
was not feigned. Truly, she had never felt more peaceful and gentle
toward her lover. In four pages she had said little and explained less.
She announced only that she should stay a month in Florence, the air of
which did her good. Then she wrote to her father, to her husband, and to
Princess Seniavine. She went down the stairway with the letters in her
hand. In the hall she threw three of them on the silver tray destined
to receive papers for the post-office. Mistrusting Madame Marmet, she
slipped into her pocket the letter to Le Menil, counting on chance to
throw it into a post-box.
Almost at the same time Dechartre came to accompany the three friends
in a walk through the city. As he was waiting he saw the letters on the
tray.
Without believing that characters could be divined through penmanship,
he was susceptible to the form of letters as to elegance of drawing. The
writing of Therese charmed him, and he liked its openness, the bold and
simple turn of its lines. He looked at the addresses without reading
them, with an artist’s admiration.
They visited, that morning, Santa Maria Novella, where the Countess
Martin had already gone with Madame Marmet. But Miss Bell had reproached
them for not observing the beautiful Ginevra of Benci on a fresco of the
choir. “You must visit that figure of the morning in a morning light,”
said Vivian. While the poetess and Therese were talking together,
Dechartre listened patiently to Madame Marmet’s conversation, filled
with anecdotes, wherein academicians dined with elegant women, and
shared the anxiety of that lady, much preoccupied for several days by
the necessity to buy a tulle veil. She could find none to her taste in
the shops of Florence.
As they came out of the church they passed the cobbler’s shop. The good
man was mending rustic shoes. Madame Martin asked the old man whether he
was well, whether he had enough work for a living, whether he was happy.
To all these questions he replied with the charming affirmative of
Italy, the musical si, which sounded melodious even in his toothless
mouth. She made him tell his sparrow’s story. The poor bird had once
dipped its leg in burning wax.
“I have made for my little companion a wooden leg out of a match, and he
hops upon my shoulder as formerly,” said the cobbler.
“It is this good old man,” said Miss Bell, “who teaches wisdom to
Monsieur Choulette. There was at Athens a cobbler named Simon, who wrote
books on philosophy, and who was the friend of Socrates. I have always
thought that Monsieur Choulette resembled Socrates.”
Therese asked the cobbler to tell his name and his history. His name was
Serafino Stoppini, and he was a native of Stia. He was old. He had had
much trouble in his life.
He lifted his spectacles to his forehead, uncovering blue eyes, very
soft, and almost extinguished under their red lids.
“I have had a wife and children; I have none now. I have known things
which I know no more.”
Miss Bell and Madame Marmet went to look for a veil.
“He has nothing in the world,” thought Therese, “but his tools, a
handful of nails, the tub wherein he dips his leather, and a pot of
basilick, yet he is happy.”
She said to him:
“This plant is fragrant, and it will soon be in bloom.”
He replied:
“If the poor little plant comes into bloom it will die.”
Therese, when she left him, placed a coin on the table.
Dechartre was near her. Gravely, almost severely, he said to her:
“You know...”
She looked at him and waited.
He finished his phrase:
“... that I love you?”
She continued to fix on him, silently, the gaze of her clear eyes, the
lids of which were trembling. Then she made a motion with her head that
meant Yes. And, without his trying to stop her, she rejoined Miss Bell
and Madame Marmet, who were waiting for her at the corner.