‘I shall not go boating today,’ said George to Venetia; ‘it is my last day. Mr. Herbert and Plantagenet talk of going to Lavenza; let us take a stroll together.’
Nothing can be refused to those we love on the last day, and Venetia immediately acceded to his request. In the course of the morning, therefore, herself and George quitted the valley, in the direction of the coast towards Genoa. Many a white sail glittered on the blue waters; it was a lively and cheering scene; but both Venetia and her companion were depressed.
‘I ought to be happy,’ said George, and sighed. ‘The fondest wish of my heart is attained. You remember our conversation on the Lago Maggiore, Venetia? You see I was a prophet, and you will be Lady Cadurcis yet.’
‘We must keep up our spirits,’ said Venetia; ‘I do not despair of our all returning to England yet. So many wonders have happened, that I cannot persuade myself that this marvel will not also occur. I am sure my uncle will do something; I have a secret idea that the Bishop is all this time working for papa; I feel assured I shall see Cherbury and Cadurcis again, and Cadurcis will be your home.’
‘A year ago you appeared dying, and Plantagenet was the most miserable of men,’ said Captain Cadurcis. ‘You are both now perfectly well and perfectly happy, living even under the same roof, soon, I feel, to be united, and with the cordial approbation of Lady Annabel. Your father is restored to you. Every blessing in the world seems to cluster round your roof. It is selfish for me to wear a gloomy countenance.’
‘Ah! dear George, you never can be selfish,’ said Venetia.
‘Yes, I am selfish, Venetia. What else can make me sad?’
‘You know how much you contribute to our happiness,’ said Venetia, ‘and you feel for our sufferings at your absence.’
‘No, Venetia, I feel for myself,’ said Captain Cadurcis with energy; ‘I am certain that I never can be happy, except in your society and Plantagenet’s. I cannot express to you how I love you both. Nothing else gives me the slightest interest.’
‘You must go home and marry,’ said Venetia, smiling ‘You must marry an heiress.’
‘Never,’ said Captain Cadurcis. ‘Nothing shall ever induce me to marry. No! all my dreams are confined to being the bachelor uncle of the family.’
‘Well, now I think,’ said Venetia, ‘of all the persons I know, there is no one so qualified for domestic happiness as yourself. I think your wife, George, would be a very fortunate woman, and I only wish I had a sister, that you might marry her.’
‘I wish you had, Venetia; I would give up my resolution against marriage directly.’
‘Alas!’ said Venetia, ‘there is always some bitter drop in the cup of life. Must you indeed go, George?’
‘My present departure is inevitable,’ he replied; ‘but I have some thoughts of giving up my profession and Parliament, and then I will return, never to leave you again.’
‘What will Lord —— say? That will never do,’ said Venetia. ‘No; I should not be content unless you prospered in the world, George. You are made to prosper, and I should be miserable if you sacrificed your existence to us. You must go home, and you must marry, and write letters to us by every post, and tell us what a happy man you are. The best thing for you to do would be to live with your wife at the abbey; or Cherbury, if you liked. You see I settle everything.’
‘I never will marry,’ said Captain Cadurcis, seriously.
‘Yes you will,’ said Venetia.
‘I am quite serious, Venetia. Now, mark my words, and remember this day. I never will marry. I have a reason, and a strong and good one, for my resolution.’
‘What is it?’
‘Because my marriage will destroy the intimacy that subsists between me and yourself, and Plantagenet,’ he added.
‘Your wife should be my friend,’ said Venetia.
‘Happy woman!’ said George.
‘Let us indulge for a moment in a dream of domestic bliss,’ said Venetia gaily. ‘Papa and mamma at Cherbury; Plantagenet and myself at the abbey, where you and your wife must remain until we could build you a house; and Dr. Masham coming down to spend Christmas with us. Would it not be delightful? I only hope Plantagenet would be tame. I think he would burst out a little sometimes.’
‘Not with you, Venetia, not with you,’ said George ‘you have a hold over him which nothing can ever shake. I could always put him in an amiable mood in an instant by mentioning your name.’
‘I wish you knew the abbey, George,’ said Venetia. ‘It is the most interesting of all old places. I love it. You must promise me when you arrive in England to go on a pilgrimage to Cadurcis and Cherbury, and write me a long account of it.’
‘I will indeed; I will write to you very often.’
‘You shall find me a most faithful correspondent, which, I dare say, Plantagenet would not prove.’
‘Oh! I beg your pardon,’ said George; ‘you have no idea of the quantity of letters he wrote me when he first quitted England. And such delightful ones! I do not think there is a more lively letter-writer in the world! His descriptions are so vivid; a few touches give you a complete picture; and then his observations, they are so playful! I assure you there is nothing in the world more easy and diverting than a letter from Plantagenet.’
‘If you could only see his first letter from Eton to me?’ said Venetia. ‘I have always treasured it. It certainly was not very diverting; and, if by easy you mean easy to decipher,’ she added laughing, ‘his handwriting must have improved very much lately. Dear Plantagenet, I am always afraid I never pay him sufficient respect; that I do not feel sufficient awe in his presence; but I cannot disconnect him from the playfellow of my infancy; and, do you know, it seems to me, whenever he addresses me, his voice and air change, and assume quite the tone and manner of childhood.’
‘I have never known him but as a great man,’ said Captain Cadurcis; ‘but he was so frank and simple with me from the very first, that I cannot believe that it is not two years since we first met.’
‘Ah! I shall never forget that night at Ranelagh,’ said Venetia, half with a smile and half with a sigh. ‘How interesting he looked! I loved to see the people stare at him, and to hear them whisper his name.’
Here they seated themselves by a fountain, overshadowed by a plane-tree, and for a while talked only of Plantagenet.
‘All the dreams of my life have come to pass,’ said Venetia. ‘I remember when I was at Weymouth, ill and not very happy, I used to roam about the sands, thinking of papa, and how I wished Plantagenet was like him, a great man, a great poet, whom all the world admired. Little did I think that, before a year had passed, Plantagenet, my unknown Plantagenet, would be the admiration of England; little did I think another year would pass, and I should be living with my father and Plantagenet together, and they should be bosom friends. You see, George, we must never despair.’
‘Under this bright sun,’ said Captain Cadurcis, ‘one is naturally sanguine, but think of me alone and in gloomy England.’
‘It is indeed a bright sun,’ said Venetia; ‘how wonderful to wake every morning, and be sure of meeting its beam.’
Captain Cadurcis looked around him with a sailor’s eye. Over the Apennines, towards Genoa, there was a ridge of dark clouds piled up with such compactness, that they might have been mistaken in a hasty survey for part of the mountains themselves.
‘Bright as is the sun,’ said Captain Cadurcis, ‘we may have yet a squall before night.’
‘I was delighted with Venice,’ said his companion, not noticing his observation; ‘I think of all places in the world it is one which Plantagenet would most admire. I cannot believe but that even his delicious Athens would yield to it.’
‘He did lead the oddest life at Athens you can conceive,’ said Captain Cadurcis. ‘The people did not know what to make of him. He lived in the Latin convent, a fine building which he had almost to himself, for there are not half a dozen monks. He used to pace up and down the terrace which he had turned into a garden, and on which he kept all sorts of strange animals. He wrote continually there. Indeed he did nothing but write. His only relaxation was a daily ride to Piraeus, about five miles over the plain; he told me it was the only time in his life he was ever contented with himself except when he was at Cherbury. He always spoke of London with disgust.’
‘Plantagenet loves retirement and a quiet life,’ said Venetia; ‘but he must not be marred with vulgar sights and common-place duties. That is the secret with him.’
‘I think the wind has just changed,’ said Captain Cadurcis. ‘It seems to me that we shall have a sirocco. There, it shifts again! We shall have a sirocco for certain.’
‘What did you think of papa when you first saw him?’ said Venetia. ‘Was he the kind of person you expected to see?’
‘Exactly,’ said Captain Cadurcis. ‘So very spiritual! Plantagenet said to me, as we went home the first night, that he looked like a golden phantom. I think him very like you, Venetia; indeed, there can be no doubt you inherited your face from your father.’
‘Ah! if you had seen his portrait at Cherbury, when he was only twenty!’ said Venetia. ‘That was a golden phantom, or rather he looked like Hyperion. What are you staring at so, George?’
‘I do not like this wind,’ muttered Captain Cadurcis. ‘There it goes.’
‘You cannot see the wind, George?’
‘Yes, I can, Venetia, and I do not like it at all. Do you see that black spot flitting like a shade over the sea? It is like the reflection of a cloud on the water; but there is no cloud. Well, that is the wind, Venetia, and a very wicked wind too.’
‘How strange! Is that indeed the wind?’
‘We had better return home,’ said Captain Cadurcis I wish they had not gone to Lavenza.’
‘But there is no danger?’ said Venetia.
‘Danger? No! no danger, but they may get a wet jacket.’
They walked on; but Captain Cadurcis was rather distrait: his eye was always watching the wind; at last he said, ‘I tell you, Venetia, we must walk quickly; for, by Jove, we are going to have a white squall.’
They hurried their pace, Venetia mentioned her alarm again about the boat; but her companion reassured her; yet his manner was not so confident as his words.
A white mist began to curl above the horizon, the blueness of the day seemed suddenly to fade, and its colour became grey; there was a swell on the waters that hitherto had been quite glassy, and they were covered with a scurfy foam.
‘I wish I had been with them,’ said Captain Cadurcis, evidently very anxious.
‘George, you are alarmed,’ said Venetia, earnestly. ‘I am sure there is danger.’
‘Danger! How can there be danger, Venetia? Perhaps they are in port by this time. I dare say we shall find them at Spezzia. I will see you home and run down to them. Only hurry, for your own sake, for you do not know what a white squall in the Mediterranean is. We have but a few moments.’
And even at this very instant, the wind came roaring and rushing with such a violent gush that Venetia could scarcely stand; George put his arm round her to support her. The air was filled with thick white vapour, so that they could no longer see the ocean, only the surf rising very high all along the coast.
‘Keep close to me, Venetia,’ said Captain Cadurcis; ‘hold my arm and I will walk first, for we shall not be able to see a yard before us in a minute. I know where we are. We are above the olive wood, and we shall soon be in the ravine. These Mediterranean white squalls are nasty things; I had sooner by half be in a south-wester; for one cannot run before the wind in this bay, the reefs stretch such a long way out.’
The danger, and the inutility of expressing fears which could only perplex her guide, made Venetia silent, but she was terrified. She could not divest herself of apprehension about her father and Plantagenet. In spite of all he said, it was evident that her companion was alarmed.
They had now entered the valley; the mountains had in some degree kept off the vapour; the air was more clear. Venetia and Captain Cadurcis stopped a moment to breathe. ‘Now, Venetia, you are safe,’ said Captain Cadurcis. ‘I will not come in; I will run down to the bay at once.’ He wiped the mist off his face: Venetia perceived him deadly pale.
‘George,’ she said, ‘conceal nothing from me; there is danger, imminent danger. Tell me at once.’
‘Indeed, Venetia,’ said Captain Cadurcis, ‘I am sure everything will be quite right. There is some danger, certainly, at this moment; but of course, long ago, they have run into harbour. I have no doubt they are at Spezzia at this moment. Now, do not be alarmed; indeed there is no cause. God bless you!’ he said, and bounded away. ‘No cause,’ thought he to himself, as the wind sounded like thunder, and the vapour came rushing up the ravine. ‘God grant I may be right; but neither between the Tropics nor on the Line have I witnessed a severer squall than this! What open boat can live in this weather Oh! that I had been with them. I shall never forgive myself!’
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