Radicals could be had any day; and now, when they came crowding round her, she gently sent them about their business, reminding them with a smile that they need not waste their time on converting her when there were so many tourists in need of instruction.
For her part, she devoted herself to an English M. P. whose sympathies the republican party was anxious to gain; and, knowing him to be a specialist on finance, she first won his attention by asking his opinion on a technical point concerning the Austrian currency, and then deftly turned the conversation to the condition of the Lombardo-Venetian revenue.
The Englishman, who had expected to be bored with small-talk, looked askance at her, evidently fearing that he had fallen into the clutches of a blue-stocking; but finding that she was both pleasant to look at and interesting to talk to, surrendered completely and plunged into as grave a discussion of Italian finance as if she had been Metternich.
When Grassini brought up a Frenchman "who wishes to ask Signora Bolla something about the history of Young Italy," the M. P. rose with a bewildered sense that perhaps there was more ground for Italian discontent than he had supposed.
Later in the evening Gemma slipped out on to the terrace under the drawing-room windows to sit alone for a few moments among the great camellias and oleanders.
The close air and continually shifting crowd in the rooms were beginning to give her a headache.
At the further end of the terrace stood a row of palms and tree-ferns, planted in large tubs which were hidden by a bank of lilies and other flowering plants.
The whole formed a complete screen, behind which was a little nook commanding a beautiful view out across the valley.
The branches of a pomegranate tree, clustered with late blossoms, hung beside the narrow opening between the plants.
In this nook Gemma took refuge, hoping that no one would guess her whereabouts until she had secured herself against the threatening headache by a little rest and silence.
The night was warm and beautifully still; but coming out from the hot, close rooms she felt it cool, and drew her lace scarf about her head.
Presently the sounds of voices and footsteps approaching along the terrace roused her from the dreamy state into which she had fallen.
She drew back into the shadow, hoping to escape notice and get a few more precious minutes of silence before again having to rack her tired brain for conversation.
To her great annoyance the footsteps paused near to the screen; then Signora Grassini's thin, piping little voice broke off for a moment in its stream of chatter.
The other voice, a man's, was remarkably soft and musical; but its sweetness of tone was marred by a peculiar, purring drawl, perhaps mere affectation, more probably the result of a habitual effort to conquer some impediment of speech, but in any case very unpleasant.
"English, did you say?" it asked. "But surely the name is quite Italian.
What was it-- Bolla?"
"Yes; she is the widow of poor Giovanni Bolla, who died in England about four years ago,-- don't you remember?
Ah, I forgot--you lead such a wandering life; we can't expect you to know of all our unhappy country's martyrs--they are so many!"
Signora Grassini sighed.
She always talked in this style to strangers; the role of a patriotic mourner for the sorrows of Italy formed an effective combination with her boarding-school manner and pretty infantine pout.
"Died in England!" repeated the other voice. "Was he a refugee, then?
I seem to recognize the name, somehow; was he not connected with Young Italy in its early days?"
"Yes; he was one of the unfortunate young men who were arrested in
'33--you remember that sad affair?
He was released in a few months; then, two or three years later, when there was a warrant out against him again, he escaped to England.
The next we heard was that he was married there.
It was a most romantic affair altogether, but poor Bolla always was romantic."
"And then he died in England, you say?"
"Yes, of consumption; he could not stand that terrible English climate.
And she lost her only child just before his death; it caught scarlet fever.
Very sad, is it not?
And we are all so fond of dear Gemma!
She is a little stiff, poor thing; the English always are, you know; but I think her troubles have made her melancholy, and----"
Gemma stood up and pushed back the boughs of the pomegranate tree.
This retailing of her private sorrows for purposes of small-talk was almost unbearable to her, and there was visible annoyance in her face as she stepped into the light.
"Ah! here she is!" exclaimed the hostess, with admirable coolness. "Gemma, dear, I was wondering where you could have disappeared to.
Signor Felice Rivarez wishes to make your acquaintance."
"So it's the Gadfly," thought Gemma, looking at him with some curiosity.
He bowed to her decorously enough, but his eyes glanced over her face and figure with a look which seemed to her insolently keen and inquisitorial.
"You have found a d-d-delightful little nook here," he remarked, looking at the thick screen; "and w-w-what a charming view!"
"Yes; it's a pretty corner.
I came out here to get some air."
"It seems almost ungrateful to the good God to stay indoors on such a lovely night," said the hostess, raising her eyes to the stars. (She had good eyelashes and liked to show them.) "Look, signore!
Would not our sweet Italy be heaven on earth if only she were free?
To think that she should be a bond-slave, with such flowers and such skies!"
"And such patriotic women!" the Gadfly murmured in his soft, languid drawl.
Gemma glanced round at him in some trepidation; his impudence was too glaring, surely, to deceive anyone.
But she had underrated Signora Grassini's appetite for compliments; the poor woman cast down her lashes with a sigh.
"Ah, signore, it is so little that a woman can do!