A STORY OF WHAT MIGHT HAVE BEEN
BY ENRICO CASTELNUOVO
Translated by Florence MacIntyre Tyson.
Professor Attilio Cernieri, distinguished Egyptologist, Senator of the Kingdom, commander of numerous orders, active member of the Lincei, Corresponding Fellow of an infinite number of Italian and foreign societies and academies, was having his servant, Pomponio, open two cases of books arrived the evening before from Padua.
The books were the residue of a library that he had gathered at Padua when, twenty years before, he had filled the chair of neo-Latin in that university. Afterward he had traveled much for scientific purposes, had been called successively to the institute of higher learning in Florence, to the University of Naples, and finally the Ministry had solicited his presence in Rome, at the Sapienza, creating a chair especially for him, and offering him high emoluments.
For some time, during the Professor’s peregrinations, the library, packed up and left with a colleague, had remained undisturbed at Padua. Then Cernieri had sent for a part of it when he was in Florence; another part later on when in Naples. Now having to come to Rome, with the intention of fixing there his permanent residence, he had determined to send for the two last cases.
To be sure, these books were not absolutely necessary to a man who, besides having recently refurnished his own library, had at his disposition the public and private libraries of the capital.
We live in a century in which everything proceeds by steam, even science. What is true to-day can readily be false to-morrow; and a volume runs the risk of being useless over night.
But in spite of its ten years of life, the monograph in which our hero had demonstrated, with ponderous arguments, relegated to the Finnish Family a group of roots hitherto believed to be of Celtic origin, had not grown old. The book, small in weight, but heavy in thought, had been translated into all the languages of Europe, and the genial information had placed our professor “at the top of the scientific pyramid,” to quote the words of an enthusiastic disciple, by the side of the principal living philologist, the famous Lowenstein of the University of Upsala. But whether because the top of a pyramid is an uncomfortable place for two or not, Cernieri and Lowenstein had at first offered the interesting spectacle of two contestants who are vigorously striving to throw one another off, until, finally convinced of the uselessness of their struggles, they had changed rivalry into friendship.
The two learned men were, of course, two strugglers in the scientific arena, but instead of struggling with each other, they struggled with the world at large. If by chance any mortal could be found rash enough to raise this crest and dare to endeavor to seat himself, too, on the top of the famous pyramid; had it been possible to penetrate the depths of the minds of the two “chers confrères,” as they styled themselves in correspondence, it would probably have been discovered that each placed a very moderate estimate upon the virtues of the other. Lowenstein had very little faith in the Finnish roots; and Cernieri believed still less in the revolution brought about by Lowenstein in the study of the Hindu-Persian.
But let us leave Lowenstein in peace in distant Norway and turn our attention entirely to our illustrious compatriot. And, to begin with, upon the afternoon in which Pomponio is opening the case of books, the Professor was but forty, though looking much older.
He was slightly stoop-shouldered and his ample forehead was seamed with premature wrinkles; his near-sighted eyes were hidden behind glasses, and were generally half-closed, like those of a sleepy pussy-cat. His hair was thin and gray, his beard straggling, ill-cared for, and nearly white. When he was young, Cernieri used to shave; but after it had happened several times that he in his absent-mindedness had shaved but half his face, and in that unusual condition had entered his classes, he had thought best to leave well enough alone. For the rest, the abstraction of professors is proverbial, and need not be dwelt on here, though upon one occasion he had lost his train by persisting in looking through the whole station at Bologna for a package he had in his hand.
Absent-minded people are generally very good-natured, but our professor was an exception to the rule. Ordinarily his lips were visited but by the scientific smile, made up of the superiority and commiseration with which a learned man hears of the absurdities committed by a brother colleague or the world at large. In society, upon the rare occasions he forced himself to enter it, he preferred standing aside, avoiding women with horror, for he had not the faintest idea what to say to them, and the dear creatures themselves were equally at a loss what to say to him, though five or six years ago, owing to the scarcity of husbands in this vale of tears, more than one mother had cast her eyes over him as a convenient parti for one of her daughters.
So at one time the Countess Pastori had been brave enough to invite him to dinner, hoping to make him marry her second daughter, who had bad teeth and weak eyes, and had not found any one who would have her. The young girl, properly coached, had received the professor with marked deference, had prepared with her own hand an exquisite peach marmalade, and had even gone to the length of evincing interest in Finnish roots. Cernieri, however, did not take the bait; but, at once on guard, shortened his visit and was careful never to set foot inside the doors of the Pastori mansion until the little Countess was betrothed to an importer of salt fish, who joined the cultivation of salmon with veneration for the titled nobility.
So warned by experience, he became gruffer than before, and more than ever inaccessible to any ideas of gallantry.
Every man has in the book of his life a secret page that a woman has made joyous or gloomy; as far as Professor Cernieri was concerned, this page had remained a blank. At least so his friends said; so would he have answered himself had he been asked, and he would have spoken in good faith. Absorbed as he was in research, he forgot things near at hand. Oh, why must he be made to remember the distant past?
“Mercy on us!” exclaimed Pomponio, who had begun to take the books out of the box. “Mercy on us, what a dust!” Then added: “Really, it would be much better if you would let me take them all downstairs, and dust them there.”
But the Professor vigorously opposed the proposition. He wished it all to take place in his study, under his own eyes. He wanted, after they were dusted, himself to put the books in a case ready for their reception. And Pomponio, resigned to the inevitable, continued taking them out, dusting them as best he could, and handing them to his master, who, having glanced at the title, put them in place.
The air was surcharged with dust, which covered the furniture, penetrated the pores, making both master and servant cough and sneeze constantly. “There is a spider’s web on this,” said Pomponio as he lifted a large folio. It proved to be an antique atlas of the world, printed at Gotha by Justus Perthès; and it so happened that while the man was dusting it a little square envelope, yellowed with age, dropped from its leaves and fell upon the floor.
“Gracious, what is that?” said Pomponio. “It looks like a letter.” And putting down the atlas, he stooped to pick it up.
But the Professor had anticipated him, and, half-dazed, was turning the letter round and round. Without doubt it was a letter, and one of his own at that, still sealed, the stamp uncanceled, addressed in his own writing; the heavy, weighty writing of a man born to be a cavaliere of many orders; a fellow of many societies. It was a too distinct hand, giving assurance that the letter should reach its destination if it had been mailed!
“Alla gentile Signorina Maria Lisa Altavilla, Firenze, Via dei Servi, No. 25—1 Floor.”
That name appearing so unexpectedly under his eyes carried Professor Cernieri back twenty years, forcing from the mists of oblivion a slender, graceful girl, whose lovely countenance was crowned with an expression of rare sweetness. For her alone had his heart ever quickened. For her sake alone had he once for one day, for an hour, thought seriously of taking a wife. And then?—
Pomponio, who was consumed with curiosity, had noiselessly approached the professor and murmured: “But how in the world did it get hidden in that book?”
Cernieri turned briskly—“What business have you here? Leave the room.”
“Shall I not go on?”
“No, not now. Go away.”
“Has anything happened?”
“Nothing. If I need you, I will ring.”
Pomponio reluctantly retired. He would have given anything to know what sort of a letter that was which had so disturbed his employer.
When he was gone, the Professor sat down in his great armchair, and, with trembling fingers, broke the seal that Maria Lisa Altavilla had never been allowed to do. And this was what he had written in Padua, October 15, 1875:
“Cara Signorina—I have just received the sad announcement, and hasten to assure you of my sincere sympathy in your great grief. Last July, when I had the honor in Venice of being often with your father and yourself, I was a witness of your solicitude for that precious, highly esteemed soul.
“Do you remember (I can never forget it) that morning’s trip to the sea? We had first visited San Lazzaro, where he had been good enough to listen with interest to my explanation in regard to the mummy, preserved in the Museum of the Mechitaristi Fathers; then having crossed to Sant’ Elizabeth on the Lido, we repaired to the baths lately established there. Your father, feeling rather tired, remained in the hotel with a friend while we went to walk on the beach.
“The day was deliciously balmy, the sun’s rays tempered behind little clouds, so that you closed your red silk umbrella. The wavelets lapped the shore softly at our feet where our footprints marked the sand. You confided to me that for several years your father’s Health seemed to grow worse; how the various doctors, who had been called in, had suggested this remedy and that without being at all able to arrest the course of the disease, which was overwhelming you with terror. You told me of the tender affection that led him to hide his suffering from you; he who had never before concealed anything. Growing more confidential, you told me of your happy home life, of the full accord of your mutual thoughts and feelings, of your deep love each for the other, cemented by sorrow; for, from a large family, there now remained but you two in the world. Then, overcome by emotion, you ceased speaking, your eyes full of tears.
“What words struggled for utterance on my part! I can not express all that was in my heart. I am naturally timid, and I will acknowledge a great horror of anything that will distract me from my studies or interfere with my habits; but I feel sure I made you understand, Signorina, how deeply I sympathized with you. I know I told you I was at your service whenever you might choose to call upon me. ‘Thanks,’ you murmured gently while your hand trembled in mine. Then you insisted upon going back to your father.
“We spoke no word as we went, but it seemed to me that our souls understood one another. In a day or two you had quitted Venice without my having the opportunity of seeing you again alone.
“Now, Signorina, the greatest of sorrows has come to you. Now is the time for you to test the true value of your friends.
“I would wish to come myself to Florence, but I am forced to leave in a few hours for London, in order to be present at the Congress of Orientalists, which opens there on the 19th inst.
“From England I may possibly start on a long journey out of Europe. My movements will depend upon you; one word from you will take me back to Italy. In any event, I shall be in London all October, and I beg you will let me have a line from you, Poste Restante. Think that I, too, and for a much longer period than you, have been alone in the world. Believe me always,
Yours sincerely,
Attilio Cernieri.”
Twice the Professor read the four pages through, forcing himself to recall the day, the hour, the place in which he had written it; seeking to explain to himself how he could have forgotten to post it, as well as that the absolute silence of Maria Lisa Altavilla had not aroused some suspicion in his mind; why he had never written again to make sure. And this is what he remembered.
The mortuary notice had arrived one morning as he was in the midst of packing, and his thoughts had turned persistently to the young girl he had known three months before in Venice, and who had shown such perfect confidence in him. All day he had debated within himself whether he should merely send her his condolences or if he ought to say something more in regard to the sentiments with which she had inspired him, in which perhaps she shared. She was not an ordinary girl, this Maria Lisa. She seemed created to be the companion of a scholar.
Had she not been her father’s secretary and could she not be his? To learn two or three languages so that she might help him; to take notes for him; to keep his work in order; to correct printer’s proofs, and when he was leaving for a congress or scientific mission, to pack his trunks and accompany him to the station; perhaps sometimes go along to look after the nuisance of tickets, to treat with hotel proprietors, cabmen, et cetera. Viewed in this light, matrimony did not seem such a terrible abyss; but a tranquil port, in which to take shelter from storms. And that evening, at the same time with other letters, he had written that one to Maria Lisa; had written with an expansion and an abandon that had filled him with wonder; even now he was amazed, as he felt once again the unaccustomed sweetness of the thing.
Once again he was in his little room in his apartment at Padua; on the table an oil lamp was burning; spread out before him lay the atlas of Menke at the page that told of “Egyptus ante Cambysii tempus.” He had been consulting it before answering his friend Morrison of the University of Edinburgh, who was insisting that they should together visit the ruins of Thebes in Upper Egypt, and he leaving his decision until after the Congress had, on the chance of the journey, corrected and amplified the itinerary to take in Ithaca, Apollonapolis, Syene, and then Cernieri remembered his landlady had knocked at his door to tell him the carriage was there and that she had already put his luggage, his plaid, and his umbrella in. He had shut the atlas and put it back upon the shelf hurriedly, hurriedly he had pushed the letters already stamped into his pocket; hurriedly had rushed down and thrown himself into the cab.
By what strange fate had one of the letters been shut in the atlas? By what carelessness, in putting the rest in the mail-box, had he not noticed that one was missing, the most important of all, was an enigma the learned professor was unable to solve? He was ready to swear that never for an instant had the thought occurred to him that he had not posted the letter; indeed, he remembered, how for a number of days he was dumbfounded at his own rashness.
Why had he not considered the matter more fully? Why, with one of those words which can not be taken back, had he run the risk of sacrificing that greatest of blessings—independence? Why had he played all his future on one card? He was a man of honor; had he received a favorable reply from Maria Lisa, nothing would have induced him to draw back. If she said no, then he had invited a needless repulse.
Dio buono, what madness had taken possession of him? It was more than likely that a girl, who was not beautiful and hadn’t a penny of dot, would remain single for two or three years at least and then he could have sought opportunities of seeing her and knowing her better, and of weighing the pros and cons.
So during the first week in London, while the temptation was increasing for the journey to the Orient with Morrison and a young “docente” from Heidelberg, who had offered himself as a companion, he was upset and nervous, and trembled at every distribution of letters, not knowing what he wished or feared. Then as time passed and he read his two theses, and became absorbed in the work of the Congress and drawn within the circle of illustrious scholars, who were greeting him as a new luminary in the world of science, the image of the poor absent orphan faded gradually away and a secret hope sprang up in his heart that he had regained his liberty through the continued silence of Maria Lisa without the humiliation of a refusal.
He could always remember he had done his duty; it was not his fault if his offer had not been accepted.
So one day, early in November, he could exclaim with Julius Cæsar:
“Alea jacta est.”
A rapid flight through Europe brought him with his companions to Brindisi, whence they embarked for Alexandria. Two years were passed in Upper Egypt and Abyssinia in the study of hieroglyphics and ruins, and in sending learned treatises to the principal European Reviews. Magazines, journals, letters from men of science, elections to academies poured in from Italy, from France, from Germany; some silly letters even came from his landlady in Padua. From Florence, from Maria Lisa Altavilla not a word. Then when he got home, he almost forgot all about her. Only two years had passed, but they were worth a century to him, and preceding events assumed to his eyes a vague, nebulous distance. So when he had heard that three months before Maria Lisa had married a “Pretore residente” in an out-of-the-way corner of Sicily, he had not troubled himself more than he could help about it. He had to choose from the various offers of the Ministry, he had to write an article for the “Edinburgh Review” on Assyrian Antiquities; finally, he had to finish a weighty thesis on those Finnish and Celtic roots, for whose sake he had resolved to devote himself entirely to philology at the expense of everything else.
Maria Lisa was so small in comparison and matrimony might have been such a nuisance. Only some time afterward, as he was on the point of accepting a Chair in Florence, he was assailed with scruples.
Suppose through the changing of her husband’s jurisdiction the lady were now in Tuscany? How ought he to act? To seem indifferent and pretend not to recognize her, or to reproach her with the rudeness with which she had treated him?
Alas! the professor was soon relieved of all doubts.
La Maria Lisa Altavilla? the daughter of the Chevalier Altavilla? Who had married the pretore Carlucci? Poor thing! she had died in Sicily of malarial fever before she had been married more than ten months.
Dead! Attilio Cernieri felt penetrated through with pity and regret. Dead, so young; she, who might have been his wife! Then he would now be alone with his life all wrecked about him! Ah! it was indeed a thousand times better that Maria Lisa had not answered him! Better not to have gotten into habits that would now have to be broken! Better not to have grown accustomed to having a woman by his side. Those who know declare it is difficult to do without them then.
In a word, Cernieri had not been slow to comfort himself. And then, too, Time had fulfilled her part, spreading a thick veil over the fleeting episode; covering even the name of Maria Lisa with oblivion.
Now the old letter found within the pages of the ancient atlas had brought it all back. Before the middle-aged man, grown old in study, hardened with egotism, rose an enchanting picture of youth, clothed in shining colors, full of intangible sweetness. Pressing the poor, little yellow sheet between his hands, he beheld once more Maria Lisa’s sweet face. As she sadly gazed at him she seemed to say: “Why in my hour of need did you not send me a word of sympathy? Chance acquaintances pitied my grief; thou, who hadst let me believe didst love me, alone remained mute and insensible. I called upon thee too. Ah! wretched indeed is she who trusts in a man!”
Cernieri seemed to hear Maria Lisa’s voice pronounce the words.
And she had died without hearing his vindication, without knowing the truth. It is indeed, “Sorrow’s crown of sorrow,” to be faded with the irrevocable, to be tormented with wrongs that can not be repaired, with misunderstandings that can not be removed.
But the letter, which the grave professor continued to hold unfolded before him, told, not only that Maria Lisa was dead, believing him worse than he deserved, but also that in his life there had been a moment of poetry, of abandon, and of love, and that that moment had remained barren. Never again could life bring him such another. Never again would his heart quicken for a woman’s sake. Never again could flow from his pen words which might seem to us cold and conventional, but to him seemed burning with ardor and love. And he asked himself: “Suppose the letter had gone, had arrived at its destination and Maria Lisa had answered: ‘I understand what thou wishest; I consent. I love thee and am willing to be thine. Come.’” Then certainly, he should not have undertaken his great journey to Egypt and Assyria. Would not have deciphered hieroglyphics or interpreted the language of the ruins. Perhaps, though, he would have had sons of his own. Perhaps domestic cares might have retarded his fame, his activity might have been clogged and honors and decorations might not have fallen so abundantly upon his head. He might not even have made his luminous discovery about the Finnish roots. Perchance another would now occupy his enviable position on the very top of the scientific pyramid by the side of Lowenstein of the University of Upsala. If all that might have happened, a man like Professor Attilio Cernieri ought to rejoice that it had not. And still—and still!—A persistent, hungry doubt would not allow him to quiet his soul with this philosophic consolation. Would it not have been better to have sacrificed a little glory to have had a little love?
The Professor Attilio Cernieri lacked courage to tear or destroy the letter. He placed it in his desk, recalled Pomponio, and desired him to resume his interrupted labor.
But that evening in his study, the temptation to again behold those words of twenty years ago overcame him anew. And afterward there did not pass a day in which he did not take the poor little worn sheet from its envelope and read it over and over.
Then he would look at the envelope, at the stamp, upon which the Post had impressed no mark and murmur once more:
“If the letter had only gone!”