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قراءة كتاب Donna Teresa
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“His sister!” repeated Donna Teresa, shocked. “Do you mean that he murdered her?”
“Murdered! ma che!” said the woman indignantly. “He loved her. He was an excellent brother. As for her”—she shrugged her shoulders—“she was no good, and would not listen, so he shot her—and him. Only, unluckily, he was not killed.”
Teresa, feeling that she was suddenly rubbing shoulders with a tragedy, had forgotten her own annoyance and herself. She asked quickly—
“But why was not this Cesare punished?”
“For what, madama? He was an excellent brother.”
“And my husband said they made the court ring when he was acquitted,” chimed in the second woman.
There was a momentary silence before Teresa became aware of a voice at her elbow—
“Hadn’t we better—”
“Why does he pick pockets? Is he so poor?” she demanded abruptly, paying no attention.
“Oh, it was not he, madama,” said the younger woman, with a laugh; “it was not he. Probably he picked it up; what did he say? As for being poor—yes. But he would not steal, not Cesare!”
Donna Teresa, asking no more questions, walked, frowning, towards the church. Wilbraham, relieved that this part of the episode was ended, remarked—
“You won’t find Miss Brodrick.”
She stopped with a laugh.
“I had forgotten. I suppose I was walking mechanically. Where is she then?”
“She drove away with a lady, and asked me to look after you. I wish I had reached you a little earlier.”
“Oh, it did well enough,” said the marchesa absently.
“I hope you didn’t lose much?”
“What you would call nothing. I ought to have been more careful, for the churches swarm with pickpockets, and the police are quite useless, as you saw.”
“Well, certainly they couldn’t be called energetic.”
“I thought you took their view of the case?” But the instant she had shot her little dart she looked at him, and laughed frankly again. “Perhaps it was as well. Perhaps he didn’t take it, after all.”
“I fancied you were quite sure?”
“Oh—sure? You were all so lukewarm,” retorted Teresa. “Besides, I have just heard his history. Not long ago he shot his sister.”
“Accidentally?”
“No; deliberately.”
“The villain!” said Wilbraham. “And is still unhung!”
“Those women considered him a hero. I am afraid she wasn’t very nice.”
There was a silence, which he broke by saying—
“I should think that had disposed of your scruples.”
“I believe, on the contrary, it has set them going,” said Donna Teresa, gazing reflectively at the ground. She exclaimed impetuously the next moment—“Do you really believe that any man who had shared in such an awful tragedy could go about the world picking pockets? Think what he must carry with him! Think what his thoughts must be! Though he was acquitted, it wasn’t from any doubt that he did the deed. And even if he is able to persuade himself that he was right, he can’t believe it always; there must be dark dreadful hours when her face comes between him and everything he looks at. At the best, to have been her executioner! I wish—oh, I do wish I had not felt so certain he was the man!”
Her voice trembled slightly, and Wilbraham’s face grew a little hard.
“I should expect the greater to include the less,” he returned shortly; “and I wouldn’t waste my compunctions if I were you.”
She glanced at him with a change of expression.
“You believe I was right in my first idea?”
“Undoubtedly.”
She stopped.
“Then what are you going to do?”
“I’m off to the police office, the questura, or whatever you call it.”
“Do you want me?”
“Good heavens, no!” exclaimed Wilbraham, who had just been congratulating himself on having got her out of the scrimmage.
“Very well,” she returned, looking at him with a smile he did not understand. “Then you must turn down that street. But don’t be too hard on Cesare.”
Chapter Two.
Donna Teresa walked thoughtfully along the Quattro Fontane. Had she been asked for her thoughts, she would have said they were wondering how Wilbraham, left to himself, would thread the difficulties of the questura, but, in truth, her mind was filled with problematic questionings as to Cesare and his character. Her eye, trained to observation, held his features pretty faithfully. He was young—probably no older than she herself—and pale, with a long face, drooping nose, and thin resolute jaw. The head was wide across the forehead, the brows reached closely towards each other, and between them that slight wrinkle was already graven which usually comes only to older men. Teresa thought, and her thought hesitated. There rose within her, as there often rose, a vast pity for the poor of Italy, over-taxed, miserable, and sometimes desperate. Italy is not the only country where bribery and corruption help the rich, and leave the poor defenceless, but in other countries the effect is not, perhaps, as yet so apparent, and as yet there seems no such awakening of the national conscience as might give hope for the future. There is revolt seething in the lower classes, the revolt of misery. What is far more dangerous is the apparent absence of the sense of righteous justice in the upper. An upright man is apt to end by being kicked out of his department.
Teresa knew something of these matters; her emotions were swift and impulsive; she had many times been reproached for them, and it was true that they had so often led her into pitfalls that she dreaded their guidance. This fear it was which gripped her when speaking to Wilbraham, and induced her to resign matters into his hand. He, she reflected, was a man, had common-sense—it looked out all over him—he had better do what he considered to be right, and she had better stand aside and let him do it. And yet if she were wrong?
She passed the great block of the Barberini, and the piazza with the Triton, went along the Sistina, and, turning up the Porta Pinciana hill, presently reached her own door. Neither entrance nor stairs were inviting, for the house was old, and had not kept pace with the general embellishment of Rome; but the porter, old also, made up in smiles what he wanted in tidiness, and now hastened to assure her that the signora and signorina were both at home. Teresa was still grave as she climbed the weary stairs, but when she had turned the key of their flat, her face grew suddenly radiant. The wonder and joy of finding herself with her own people, the intimate delight of owning something which was, to all intents and purposes, home, the exhilaration of liberty, were as strong as, or stronger than, they had been in the first breathless moments of possession, strong enough to sweep all else out of her mind.
An old lady, very small and slight, sat in a low chair knitting. She had a charming face, sweet and yet shrewd, with clear blue eyes, a rose-blush complexion, and wavy white