CHAPTER VII

“IN A GONDOLA”

The consequence of the morning’s adventure was that Miss Cavendish hurried away from Florence before these dangerous meetings should be repeated, and although Gabriella would like to have protested she confided to Sidney that she had not the face to do so.

“I have no business to give Gem frights when she is doing all this for me. It is very hard for me to behave myself with your perfect decorum, Sid, and though I was having a lovely time with Taffy, I could not say a word, for Gem feels responsible to mamma for me.” This was whispered confidentially during the journey while Miss Cavendish was absorbed in her Baedeker.

Venice was reached in the evening. Miss Cavendish had written ahead for rooms, and they stepped into the gondola they had selected, with pleasant anticipation of looking out from their windows, that night, directly upon the Grand Canal.

“Isn’t it perfectly delicious?” said Sidney. “Don’t you feel as if you were in a dream? We are actually in a gondola, Gabriella, and we are in Venice.”

“Don’t speak to me,” said the girl; “you might wake me up. I am perfectly happy, and I want to do this for the rest of my life. Oh, how queer it is to go threading our way along these narrow little waterways. Ah-h, this must be the Grand Canal, and here are the palaces, and oh, the color and the wonder of it all. You have given the gondolier our address, Gem?”

“Yes, and I think we shall find we have a good situation.”

The gondola drew up by the side of a tall gloomy building which Miss Cavendish remarked, must have been at one time a palace.

“And to what base uses has it come; harboring American tourists,” said Gabriella. “What ho, there! Do you see anyone about, Gem?”

All was silent and unresponsive, but at last, after repeated summons, the proprietor appeared. He spoke French readily. He was grieved to assure the ladies that not a room in his establishment was unoccupied.

“But I wrote ahead,” explained Miss Cavendish.

“But madame, the letter was never received.”

“I don’t believe a word of it,” said Miss Cavendish as they pushed away. “He had my first letter all right, for he answered that. He probably had a chance of renting his rooms before we arrived and would not miss the opportunity of making a little extra money. Fortunately it is not the only place.” She gave the gondolier another address, and the gondola slipped along through the green waters until another halt was made.

“No room” was the report brought to them.

“Never mind; we do not need to be discouraged; I have six addresses here,” Miss Cavendish assured the girls, “and we shall have more of this delightful way of getting about.”

But Venice, like Rome, was overcrowded, and each time they were turned away they became a little more anxious till Miss Cavendish, at the end of her addresses, turned to the gondolier appealingly. It was growing darker and darker. The tall palaces loomed up each side, gloomy and silent. Lights from the large hotels flashed out upon the water. Black gondolas glided by, dusky, shadowy forms.

“I feel as if this were the river Styx and Charon were at the prow,” whispered Gabriella.

Sidney, subdued and troubled, turned to Miss Cavendish. “Do let us go to one of the larger hotels just for the night,” she begged.

“We shall have to, if no other place can be found,” was the answer. “I told our gondolier that we should have to sleep in the gondola unless he could get us lodgings, and he assured me that we need give ourselves no anxiety; he would find something.”

But place after place was left behind, and the gondolier, himself, became eager to settle his passengers. He was a pleasant young fellow, graceful and picturesque. He knew a little French and ventured a remark now and then, smiling at the worried ladies and bidding them take courage, he, Antonio, would not leave them till they were housed. There were rooms in abundance, but it took time to go from one house to another.

At last they turned from the Grand Canal into the broader Giudecca. Antonio ran lightly up the steps of his first stopping-place and in a few minutes returned, snatched up the luggage, and bade the ladies to follow him. Up the walk of a tiny garden their guide preceded them. A woman with a candle appeared at the door. She led the way upstairs to a dingy room which seemed in every way unattractive.

Miss Cavendish turned helplessly to the girls. “I don’t know about this,” she said. “I am a little afraid. It seems queer and out of the way and-- Are you sure it is safe, good, well?” she asked Antonio. He responded emphatically that it was all things that it should be. He had discovered them lodgings, and evidently considered that he had done his duty. Miss Cavendish felt herself disarmed.

She meekly thanked him, paid him, and let him go. Then she turned to their hostess. Not one word did she speak of any language but Italian. But she was quick to understand that they wished another room, and led them to what appeared to Miss Cavendish as the very dingiest and most unattractive of little rooms at the back of the very small house. It seemed ill-smelling, and by the light of the one candle it looked bare of comforts.

“It will never do in the world,” decided Miss Cavendish. “I cannot let either of you girls sleep there; it is away off from the other room, and I am not willing to be separated from you.”

“It seems almost as if it might be the haunt of bandits, doesn’t it?” whispered Gabriella, her eyes big with anxiety. “Don’t let us stay here, Gem. I am afraid we shall all be murdered in our beds by morning.”

They returned to the front room, and Miss Cavendish viewed the possibilities. “If a bed were put up in this hallway, or whatever it is, opening out of this room, we could all be together, and if we locked all the doors, you see there is one at each end of the passageway, I think we could feel safe.” She made known her desires to the _padrona_, who, anxious to please, agreed to everything. A bed was set up in the little hallway; it was further furnished with a wash-stand and chair, and the tired travellers took possession, though it is safe to say that no one slept much, although the beds were comfortable, and they were undisturbed except by their own fears.

The next morning disclosed to their view a broad canal upon whose waters lay many ships, a stretch of land beyond showed domes and spires glittering in the sunlight, and above all was the bluest of skies. Below the window appeared a small garden where a woman, with a baby by her side, was gathering flowers. Miss Cavendish smiled at her fears. What had appeared at night to be ill-conditioned and forbidding, by daylight proved to be only unpretentious simplicity. The little house was old, the furniture dingy, but everything was very clean and the mother’s voice as she talked to the child had a caressing softness that dissipated Miss Cavendish’s last fears.

“Get up, get up, girls,” she cried. “We are not in the house of a bandit, but in the simple home of poor, but kindly people. There are flowers in the garden and a dear little prattling baby. I saw his mother’s face and I know she couldn’t do us harm.”

Here the _padrona_ came in with _aqua calde_. She was very solicitous for the welfare of her guests. She gathered up skirts and shoes, returning with them well brushed. A little later she brought the breakfast tray; flowers adorned it, the linen was spotless, the coffee fragrant and well made, the butter fresh and sweet, the bread tender and delicious. Never was a more willing, devoted, anxious hostess. The three, whose alarms had kept them awake half the night, smiled at each other shamefacedly. And when at noon, a table was set for them out of doors under the vines, and such a dainty meal was served as they had seldom tasted, they concluded that Antonio was wiser than they.

“And we thought that dear, good little _padrona_ with her big brown eyes and her wistful smile was a robber witch,” said Gabriella.

“And we were going to look for other quarters the first thing in the morning,” said Sidney. “I vote we stay.”

“Stay? Why of course we’ll stay,” said Miss Cavendish, “for I have learned from that nice looking Englishwoman with whom I was talking, when you came down, that our host has been cook to a prince, that he is one of the best in all Venice, that he has lost his savings by a bad investment and that he has begun life again in this small way, hoping to retrieve his fortunes. He is honest as the day, though very poor. I couldn’t have the heart to leave even if we were less comfortable.”

And indeed, as the days passed, they were more and more convinced that they had fallen on their feet, for never were more delicious meals served a party of appreciative females; never was more devoted service, never more real kindliness exhibited.

“I simply love the _padrona_,” said Gabriella. “I shall hate to leave her. She has so much sweetness and modesty, with a certain dignity which makes her gratitude to us pathetic.”

“And how delightfully quiet and away from crowds it is here,” commented Sidney. “I shall hate to leave this homelike little place. I like it much better than on the Grand Canal. We have our sky and garden if we are not in a palace.”

“And goodness knows, it is cheap enough,” put in Miss Cavendish.

“And there are no porters and waiters and maids to catch the unwary,” said Gabriella. “The dear little _padrona_ is the only one who serves. It makes us wonderfully free, doesn’t it?”

“I feel as if I were one of the people,” said Sidney. “All I want is a black shawl. I have already begun to imitate the arrangement of hair practised by the Venetian women. I hope you notice it.”

“I do,” Gabriella told her, “and I congratulate you upon the change. Do get the shawl, Sid; it would be so funny to see you parade it at home in all its funereal simplicity.”

“I’ll get it to-day. Why is it, I wonder, that black gondolas and black shawls seem charming in Venice when anywhere else they would be too depressing for words.”

“It is because they are the accent in this riot of color. Everything here in Venice is in such a high key, that the touches of black are a relief rather than the opposite,” said Gabriella, who was quick to perceive and analyze effects.

“When our hungry souls have been sufficiently fed on the glories of San Marco and when we have gone again to the little bead shop on the San Moise; when we have seen the Santa Barbara and have taken another trip to the Lido, I suppose you girls will be ready to go on,” said Miss Cavendish.

“I shall never be ready to go on,” responded Gabriella. “We have hardly stopped in a place where I have not longed to linger for months. I am yet sighing for Sorrento while I adore Venice, and I pine for Florence while I have not had half enough of Rome. I want to go to San Marco at least a hundred times more, and I shall never get all the beads I want till I buy out the entire shop. Then there are the lace factories and the glass works to see; though I think we would better leave you at home, Gem, when we go to see the laces; you have nearly ruined yourself buying them as it is.”

“I think I have spent more in laces than Gem,” put in Sidney.

“One doesn’t have such a chance every day,” Miss Cavendish returned apologetically, “and it is so hard to resist beautiful lace. You know I bought very little jewelry in Florence, while you girls were actually spendthrifty.”

“We must have one more night in a gondola,” said Sidney; “it would never do to go away feeling that we might have had that pleasure and deliberately set it aside. No, Gem, we must stay a little longer. We may never find a place where we can be so delightfully free. Nobody knows us and we know no one; it is very lucky that it has happened so. We are sufficient for each other. We don’t have to bother about our goings and comings, our toilets, or, in fact, any of the usual conventionalities. We can sit on the steps of Santa Maria della Salute, and watch the gondolas and the sky and all the rest of it, with the working class, and nobody cares; or we can gather around our little table under the vines and discuss personalities with no one to comment. Oh, it suits me down to dots.”

“A gondola and moonlight,” murmured Gabriella, “does suggest other than female companionship.”

“You are thinking of roses and San Miniato,” Sidney declared. “I prophesy that your culminating romance must be connected with a rose. By the way, what has become of our military friend? Wasn’t he coming here? Have we been so happy as to escape him?”

“I hope so,” returned Gabriella. “We certainly saw enough of him in Rome. It seemed to me that we never turned a corner but his blue cloak was in evidence.”

“Who shall say that all girls are daffy over uniforms?” exclaimed Sidney. “Though I am sorry he can’t be here to make a romance for the gondola, since you require the masculine element. Gem and I can get along without it, and to-night we shall be happy while you will feel an aloofness because of an unfilled want.”

“You don’t suppose I am such a lunatic as not to get as much pleasure out of such a trip as you,” exclaimed Gabriella. “Am I to be accused of being blasé at this late hour? I, who have simply simmered and bubbled and boiled over with enthusiasm all the way?”

Sidney laughed. She had succeeded by her sly effort in arousing Gabriella’s indignation, and was satisfied.

Nevertheless the moonlight ride was not predestined to be lacking the masculine element, for, as the three were standing on the quay by the Accademia, who should step up to them with a joyous exclamation, but Signor Rondinelli, who, with his blue cloak thrown gracefully over his shoulders, looked extremely picturesque, so much so that Gabriella, with true artistic insight, decided that he made a most fitting accompaniment to the evening’s entertainment. He was eager in his polite attention, as if, having come up to the “fleeting joy,” he did not intend letting it escape him again. As the gondola drifted out upon the silent waters, glistening undulating ribbons of light were thrown waveringly from the windows of the palaces across the canal, slipping down from the golden brown of Gabriella’s hair to the shining beads around her neck, and then gliding off into the water. Miss Cavendish and Sidney spoke seldom, preferring the dreamlike quiet, but the steady murmur of low-voiced conversation came from the other two. Once in a while Gabriella’s light joyous laughter chimed out upon the night. From other gondolas came strains of music; the tinkle of a mandolin, a man’s mellow baritone in some gondolier; a woman’s soprano piercingly sweet in a pathetic love-song. At intervals the weird warning cry of the gondoliers added to the effect, and when at last they drew near their landing place, even Gabriella had hushed her chatter.

[Illustration: “THE GONDOLA DRIFTED OUT UPON THE SILENT WATERS.”]

It was but a few steps to their lodgings and the girl peremptorily dismissed her cavalier at the steps of the quay. She watched the gondola glide away, then turned with a half sigh. “He is a dream in that blue cloak,” she said. “If every night were moonlight and if one might forever drift in a gondola it might do, but alas, there would be the gondolier to pay, and who would do it?”

“Why these enigmas, Gabriella?” asked Miss Cavendish.

She laughed a little amused laugh, in which there was a tinge of regret, too. “Only because Signor Rondinelli has made the mistake of thinking I was that boon to the impecunious nobility, an American heiress. He actually thought it was I and not Sidney who carried bags of ducats around with me, and--and--”

“And--what? There is an interesting emphasis on that conjunctive,” said Miss Cavendish.

“I was obliged to disabuse him of his impression, when he came to making love too violently. I can assure you I rather enjoyed the unwonted position until he offered me his hand and his honored name. So, Sidney, be on your guard; he will probably turn his attentions to you.”

“You didn’t tell him that I was an heiress,” said Sidney in dismay.

“No, but some one has told him that one of us is. Perhaps he thinks it is Gem. You’d better have a care, Isabella Cavendish, or you will yet occupy an Italian villa and possess beautiful old furniture and pictures, and perhaps all the Venetian point you can wear.”

“Not until I can buy it with my own hard money. Certainly not if an impecunious nobleman goes with the other goods and chattels.”

“Like a statement I saw once, where a man returning to Europe after a long residence in America, was said to have taken all his household goods, including the body of his mother,” remarked Sidney.

This took them laughing into the house, to be met by the little _padrona_, candle in hand to light them to their rooms.

But the influence of the night still lay upon Gabriella, and after she was ready for bed, she leaned from the window, her hands clasped, as she rested her arms upon the balcony rail. “And to-morrow we leave,” she said, as she felt Miss Cavendish’s presence at her side. “Must we go, Gem? How can I leave Italy thinking that I may never, never come back again? It hurts; it really hurts. I didn’t suppose I could feel so about anything less than a creature, an individual of humankind, but Italy does not seem a country; it seems a goddess upon whose breast we lie while she whispers tales of mystery and romance. She speaks in her pictures, her sky, her lovely land, her childlike people. She is something more than a place on a map. Don’t you feel so?”

“Yes,” sighed Miss Cavendish. “I, too, go with reluctant steps, for I have found the land of youth renewed and dreams fulfilled.”