THE FOOL ERRANT - World eBook Library - World Public Library

"I think your Aurelia lost her little head," said he, "but no worse, I hope. Now, my child, let us have no more talking of
inspiration, and wings, and healing fingers of ladies, and anointings. The Church is chary of deputing these powers, which she
undoubtedly possesses; and few ladies are likely to receive them. At any rate, we may leave Donna Aurelia's claims to them to
the Sacred College, and turn to what is our own immediate concern. Now, come to me and make your confiteor as you ought."
I have always been more quickly moved to good or evil by kindness than by severity, for by nature I am diffident to excess.
Father Carnesecchi had found out that trait in my character, and proved me plastic under his delicate fingers. He did not refuse
me the sacrament; he absolved me and comforted me greatly. It did not become me to be obstinate to one who gave me so
much.
He undertook to accord the differences between Aurelia and her husband, if I on my part would give my word that no act of
mine should endanger their future happiness. If I would bind myself here, he thought, there would be no harm in my seeing her,
but he insisted that this should not be done without his express sanction. He said, "You are one of those young men of your
nation—one of many, I conceive—who come into this country with your minds already made up as to what you will see.
Because you are romantic, you see us so; because you are mystically inclined, you believe us to be a race of seers; because you
are complex natures, you complicate ours. Because our beauty is strange to you, you think us strangely beautiful. Alas! my dear
young friend, you have yet to learn your Italians. There is no such Italy, least of all Tuscany, as you profess to have read of in
Donna Aurelia's simple soul. I don't know the young lady, but I know her kind. She is undoubtedly a good-hearted, shrewd
little housewife, careful of her reputation and honestly proud of it. She will make, I expect, a first-rate, if too fond, mother. You,
of course, try to make a Beatrice of her, quite regardless of the possibility that you are not a Dante, or even a Diotima (which,
thank Heaven, she is not yet), not remembering how far you are from being a Socrates. My dear young man, I shall not forbid
you her society— subject, of course, to her own and her husband's judgment, which, I promise you, I shall obtain beforehand.
Seek it then by all means, but seek it with circumspection. Remember that she will not thrive upon the fine poetry you will make
of her—nor will you, indeed; but that is your own affair. Seek her, therefore, with reasonable care for her future. In two words,
write to her husband, and for once deprive yourself of your luxurious mysteries, and go to work in the light of day. As for your
Virginia—you have a fondness for female society, I fancy—don't trouble your head further with that little parasite."
His injunctions were obeyed, though I could not agree with all his conclusions. I wrote respectfully to my father, candidly to Dr.
Lanfranchi; I wrote on my knees to Aurelia—though, as I now know, Padre Carnesecchi put the letter into his pocket.
Expiatory rites of a religious sort, wisely recommended and cheerfully performed, I omit from this narrative. At their end I was
set entirely at liberty; and there seemed no limit to the benevolence of the Society of Jesus in my regard. Money, clothes, a
servant were found for me, a lodging in the Piazza Santa Maria, introductions into the fashionable world. I took my own rank
once more, I had tutors, books, leisure, the respect of my equals. I went to Court, was made a visiting member of the famous
Delia Cruscan Academy; I was offered a box at the opera, a villa in the hills, a mistress. I made the acquaintance of Count
Giraldi, a gentleman not only in the immediate service of the sovereign but high in the confidence of the heir-apparent, a man of
the world, a traveller, affable, an abundant linguist, no mean philosopher, possessor of a cabinet of antiquities, a fine library, a
band of musicians second to none in Florence. If ever a young man was placed square upon his feet again after a damaging fall
it was I. For this much, at least, I render a solemn act of remembrance to the Society of Jesus, who must not be held
responsible for the series of events which befell me next, and by which it came to pass that the cup of my fortunes went again
and again to the bitter fountain of shame.
I passed, I suppose, some six weeks without news, but not without hope, of Donna Aurelia; and I am ashamed to add that the
pleasures and interests of the world obliterated in me those obligations of gratitude and honour which I owed to the friend of my
misfortunes. But so I have always found it, that the more respect a man has from the world, the less he has to give it in return. It
is as if, knowing his own worth too well, he was able to put a just estimate upon his tributary. I will only say in my defence that I
knew Virginia to be safe from positive danger.
CHAPTER XXI. MY DIVERSIONS: COUNT GIRALDI
My new friend, as I must call him, since so he professed himself a dozen times a week, was Count Amadeo Giraldi, one of the
three members of the Secret Cabinet of the Grand Duke, and the most influential and respectable of the three. He was a
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