Part 35

“You had better take yours off too, Emilia,” said the Duchessa.

“Admire masculine foresight,” said the priest. “I took mine off when I came in.”

“Let me hang them up,” said Peter.

It was wonderful to hold her hat in his hand--it was like holding a part of herself. He brushed it surreptitiously against his face, as he hung it up. Its fragrance--which met him like an answering caress, almost--did not lessen his emotion.

Then Marietta brought the tea, with bread-and-butter, and toast, and cakes, and pretty blue china cups and saucers, and silver that glittered in the firelight.

“Will you do me the honour of pouring the tea?” Peter asked the Duchessa.

So she poured the tea, and Peter passed it. As he stood close to her, to take it--oh, but his heart beat, believe me! And once, when she was giving him a cup, the warm tips of her fingers lightly touched his hand. Believe me, the touch had its effect. And always there was that heady fragrance in the air, like a mysterious little voice, singing secrets.

“I wonder,” the old priest said, “why tea is not more generally drunk by us Italians. I never taste it without resolving to acquire the habit. I remember, when I was a child, our mothers used to keep it as a medicine; and you could only buy it at the chemists' shops.”

“It's coming in, you know, at Rome--among the Whites,” said the Duchessa.

“Among the Whites!” cried he, with a jocular simulation of disquiet. “You should not have told me that, till I had finished my cup. Now I shall feel that I am sharing a dissipation with our spoliators.”

“That should give an edge to its aroma,” laughed she. “And besides, the Whites aren't all responsible for our spoliation--some of them are not so white as your fancy paints them. They'd be very decent people, for the most part--if they were n't so vulgar.”

“If you stick up for the Whites like that when I am Pope, I shall excommunicate you,” the priest threatened. “Meanwhile, what have you to say against the Blacks?”

“The Blacks, with few exceptions, are even blacker than they're painted; but they too would be fairly decent people in their way--if they were n't so respectable. That is what makes Rome impossible as a residence for any one who cares for human society. White society is so vulgar--Black society is so deadly dull.”

“It is rather curious,” said the priest, “that the chief of each party should wear the colour of his adversary. Our chief dresses in white, and their chief can be seen any day driving about the streets in black.”

And Peter, during this interchange of small-talk, was at liberty to feast his eyes upon her.

“Perhaps you have not yet reached the time of life where men begin to find a virtue in snuff?” the priest said, producing a smart silver snuff box, tapping the lid, and proffering it to Peter.

“On the contrary--thank you,” Peter answered, and absorbed his pinch like an adept.

“How on earth have you learned to take it without a paroxysm?” cried the surprised Duchessa.

“Oh, a thousand years ago I was in the Diplomatic Service,” he explained. “It is one of the requirements.”

Emilia Manfredi lifted her big brown eyes, filled with girlish wonder, to his face, and exclaimed, “How extraordinary!”

“It is n't half so extraordinary as it would be if it were true, my dear,” said the Duchessa.

“Oh? Non e poi vero?” murmured Emilia, and her eyes darkened with disappointment.

Peter meanwhile was looking at the snuffbox, which the priest still held in his hand, and admiring its brave repousse work of leaves and flowers, and the escutcheon engraved on the lid. But what if he could have guessed the part he had passively played in obtaining it for its possessor--or the part that it was still to play in his own epopee? Mark again the predestination!

“The storm is passing,” said the priest.

“Worse luck!” thought Peter.

For indeed the rain and the wind were moderating, the thunder had rolled farther away, the sky was becoming lighter.

“But there's a mighty problem before us still,” said the Duchessa. “How are we to get to Ventirose? The roads will, be ankle-deep with mud.”

“If you wish to do me a very great kindness--” Peter began.