The Hill of Venus Read online

  CHAPTER I

  THE WHITE LADY

  The Piazza of St. John Lateran was alive with the rush and roar of avast multitude, which congested the spacious square from the Church ofSanta Croce in Gerusalemme to the distant Esquiline hill, occupyingevery point of vantage, thronging the adjacent thoroughfares, crowdingthe long Via Merulana, and filling the ruins of temples, theinterstices of fallen walls and roofless porticoes as far as the eyecould reach.

  All Rome seemed to be astir, all Rome seemed to have assembled towelcome the advent of the Swabian host, and in the keen delight ofbeholding Conradino, the fair-haired Hohenstauffen come to claim thefair lands of Constanzia, all petty-strife, contentions andparty-rivalry seemed for the nonce to have been forgotten.

  In reality, however, such was not the case.

  So sudden had been Conradino's descent upon Rome that the Pontiff andhis minion, Charles of Anjou, had precipitately fled from the city,ere the first German spear-points gleamed above the heights of Tivoli.

  The Roman Ghibellines, at their head the great and powerful house ofthe Colonna, hated the Vulture of Provence as intensely as did thePontiff, his one time champion, and welcomed with open arms thegrandson of the Emperor Frederick II, their deliverer from aninsufferable yoke, which had been as a blight upon Southern Italy.

  Yet, notwithstanding the absence of the pontifical court, the absenceof the Church militant, the institution which, when Europe wasover-run with barbarian hordes, had preserved the ancientcivilization, the power of the city was in evidence even thoughhuddled affrighted amidst the majesty of imperial ruins. A memory, adream, yet the power of a dream outlasting the ages, Rome stillremained the mystic centre of civilization.--

  With a sickly sense of curiosity not unmingled with awe, Francesco hadmingled with the crowds.

  The dream of his early youth was about to be realized: face to face hewould behold the golden-haired Hohenstauffen,--yet at the thought hisheart sank with a sense of dread. Dull misery had him in its grip. Thekeen pain of a false life, resentment of a fate imposed upon him byanother's will, permeated every fibre of his being. In his dreams hewould see the friends of his youth, pointing to him, the renegade; hewould see Ilaria, standing off motionless, spiritless, regarding himfrom afar. If she at least had kept her faith! He felt himselfencompassed by the folding wings of a great demon of despair.

  This feeling pervaded him with a sickening gloom, in which he walkedwith drooping head and uncertain footsteps,--yet with the resolve toconquer in the end!

  Life was no mere existence with Francesco. He loved light and air andfreedom. To be in the great, real world, to feel its joys, itssunshine, to chafe under no conventional, no restraint, to know thefascination of recklessness,--that to him was life!

  And about him it surged in blinding iridescence.

  Notwithstanding the months of monastic life which lay behind him, hehad not in any formal sense severed himself from the world. Hisrenunciation of the joys of the senses had been not primary, as withthe Franciscans, but, as always with those under Dominican influence,incidental on a choice of higher interests.

  But the conscious choice of a beautiful existence was ever with him,and here, among the thousands giving vent to their joy, restrained byno dogma from voicing their gladness, loneliness crept cold among hisheart-strings.

  The scenes in which he, half absently, half resentfully, mingled,afforded a fine opportunity to study sacerdotal types. Now and then ascholarly countenance detached itself with startling effect from thecoarser elements; now and then among the keen lines of such acountenance played the hovering, unmistakable light of a personalsanctity. There were men of the noblest, gentlest blood, from whomcame the example of courtly manners, of polished speech and refinedtaste. Through the years of desolation and ruin, which war brought inits wake, they preserved art, literature and religion and infused intocivilization the principles of self-sacrifice, charity and chastity.They declared a message that protested against violence and injustice.Francesco saw men among the priests, whose broad shoulders, singularlybrilliant dark faces and magnificent poise formed a striking contrastto those upon whose features had settled the beautiful, soft calm ofspotless seclusion.

  Yet Francesco felt no need of such a refuge.

  The espousals of piety and poverty, the inexplicable mysteries,martyrdoms, ascetic faces and haggard figures, which he hadencountered upon entering the monastic life, the morbid enthusiasm andspiritual frenzy were repellent to him now, as they had been then.Sad-visaged penitents, men scourging themselves, prostrate in prayer,wrestling with demons, waked no responsive chord in his breast.

  A splendid procession, with its gay dresses and colored pennonsgleaming like a rainbow among the sombre garbs of monks and artisans,at this moment emerged from under the frowning portals of a sombrepalace and swept into the sunlit square of St. John Lateran.

  The cavalcade was headed by a cavalier superb in white velvet, ridingabreast of a woman, tall and stately. They were followed by a companyof young nobles, arrayed in festal splendor. The piazza resounded withthe echo of their shouts and mirth, and the multitudes congested onthe steps of the Church of Santa Croce in Gerusalemme shouted loudacclaim, as they passed on their cantering steeds.

  What were those stabbing pangs in Francesco's heart beneath thenoonday brightness of the sky? Why did he wish, almost insanely, thathe had not set foot in Rome?

  The banners of the Frangipani waved proudly in the sun-fraught air,revealing their emblem of "The Broken Loaf," amidst velvet, gilt andtinsel.

  As the cavalcade approached, every word, every tone, every accent wasringing perversely in his ears. The piazza with its maelstrom ofhumanity seemed to whirl and to scintillate about him, and the acclaimof the crowd surged in his ears like the dull roar of distant billows,as the procession came to a sudden stop at the fountain whence he hadviewed its approach.

  Shrinking beneath his cowl, yet unable to avert his gaze, Francescostood leaning on the rim of the fountain.

  He heard the voice of Ilaria as, dismounting without the aid of hercompanion, she requested a cup, having taken a sudden fancy to drinkof the sparkling water.

  The cup having been brought, she put her lips to it, then swiftlytossed the bright drops towards the sky, singing a little melody asshe did so.

  She had apparently not noted Francesco's presence, though his eyes hadbeen riveted upon her from under the cowl, and his face was deadlypale. Hemmed in as he was by the crowds, he could not have receded,had he wished to;--thus he stood, looking upon the face of the womanhe loved better than anything on earth, forgetting heaven and earth indoing so.

  Stooping, she filled the cup once more and looked up at her companionswith a smile.

  "Who shall drink after me?" she laughed merrily.

  Many a merry voice called out, as they eagerly crowded about her.

  "Who but myself?" exclaimed Raniero Frangipani with a laugh, brushingthe others away with perhaps a little more decision than was needed.

  But suddenly Ilaria turned and deliberately advanced to the spot whereFrancesco stood, his cowl drawn deeply over his face.

  "All men do my bidding to-day," she said in her low, vibrant voice,offering him the cup, while her eyes flung him a glittering challenge.

  It was her most winsome self that looked at him, as she said:

  "Drink to me!"

  Dazed, he took the cup from her. In doing so, he touched her soft,white skin. The cold draught seemed to burn like fire as he sipped theclear water. Then, surprised by impulse, he flashed the drops upward,as he had seen her do.

  Her laughter sounded shrill and high as broken glass, as thedislocated cowl revealed Francesco's features.

  But she immediately regained her composure, and, without a hint in hervoice of the taunt in the dells of Vallombrosa, she said, nodding, asif well pleased, and as if for his ear alone:

  "The White Lady is well pleased. Is not this her altar?" But anotherhad recognized the monk, when for a moment his cowl fell away
fromhis face; and Raniero Frangipani was regarding him with dark malice.

  As if to leave a sting in the memory of their meeting, Ilaria,returning to Raniero's side, gave the latter a smile so bewitchingthat his scowl vanished. Remounting with his help, she signalled forthe cavalcade to proceed.

  The pain in Francesco's heart rose, suffocating, once more as theprocession swept onward.

  How he had loved her! How he loved her now!

  How shall a man be sure of what is hidden in his heart? He was amonk,--and she the wife of Raniero Frangipani.

  How wondrous fair she was, glowing as a rose in the first flush ofspring-time! How her sweet eyes had gleamed into his, with theirsubdued fire, half hidden under the long silken lashes!

  For a moment he saw and heard nothing.

  All sense of the present seemed to have vanished while the cavalcadefaded from sight.

  Now, from the gates beyond St. John Lateran, there burst forth thepomp and panoply of the North, with a flourish of trumpets, a gleamingof chain-mail, a sparkling of pennons.

  Two heralds, on snow-white chargers, rode slowly through the gate,sounding their fanfares, their standards and particolored garbsdisplaying the Sun-Soaring Eagle of Hohenstauffen.

  Then, on a black stallion, docile to the hand and impatient of thespur, Conradino of Swabia hove into sight, beside the friend of hisyouth, Frederick of Austria.

  They rode in advance of the elite of the army, some two thousand menin gleaming chain-mail. Conrad and Marino Capece followed hard ontheir heels with one thousand heavy infantry and a company of Saracenarchers. Then came Galvano Lancia with the heavy armament, men fromthe North, carrying huge battle-axes in addition to their otherweapons.

  As they slowly advanced through the great square fronting the ancientBasilica, a great shout arose from the thousands who lined thethoroughfares, a counter-blast to the clangor of the clarions.

  Then the whole host shouted, tossed up shield and lance, whiletrumpets and horns shrieked above the din.

  On the steps of houses and churches, in casements, doors and windows,women waved kerchiefs and scarfs, their shrill acclaim mingling withthe sounds of horn and bugle.

  The tramping of thousands of steeds smote the bright air; shields andsurcoats shone and shimmered under the sun-fraught Roman sky.

  All the streets through which the armament passed were hung withgarlands and tapestries, blazing with banners, festooned with flowersand gorgeous ornaments, re-echoing with peals of laughter and ribaldryand roaring music.

  For the fickle Romans gave free rein to their joy of being rid ofAnjou's presence, and the sober and pedantic Northmen viewed withamaze this manifestation of the Southern temperament, the reflex, asit were, of a clime which had lured to perdition so many of their own,who had not withstood the blandishments of the Sorceress.

  And the Romans, revelling in their own exuberant gaiety, forgetful ofyesterday, unmindful of the morrow, hailed with delight theiron-serried cohorts from beyond the Alps,--till the disappearingmenace within their own walls would cause them to turn on theirdeliverers.

  From the summits of his castle on the well-nigh impregnable heights ofViterbo, Pope Clement IV had witnessed the passing of the Swabianhost, and his eyes, undimmed by age, had marked the persons and thequality of the leaders. And, turning to one of his attendants, wholeaned by his side over the ramparts to scan more minutely theNorthern armament, he had spoken the memorable words: "Truly, like twolambs, wreathed for the sacrifice, they are journeying towards theirfate."--

  To the casual observer,--if, indeed, there was such a one in the Romeof those days,--it must indeed have appeared a strange phenomenon thatConradino was surrounded almost entirely by Italians, with theexception of one or two leaders whose contingents the narrow andparsimonious policy of Duke Goerz of the Tyrol had not been able toshake in their loyalty, when he recalled his own contingents for wantof pay.

  But the popular enthusiasm swept everything before it, and Conradino'smarch to the Capitol, where he was to be tendered the keys of the cityby the Senator of Rome, Prince Enrico of Castile, was one continuoustriumph.--

  As one in a dream, Francesco continued to gaze after the imperialcavalcade as it swept past with its gold and glitter and tinsel andthe thunderous hoof-beats of a thousand steeds. As one in a dream, hekept gazing at the gold-embroidered mantles, the flash ofdagger-hilts, the gleam of chain-mail, the waving plumes, the prancingsteeds.

  The procession swept by him, as the phantasmagoria of a dream; but,after it had passed, one apparition continued to stand forth.

  He never forgot that face.

  To him it was all that was beautiful and regal, framed in its soft,golden hair, with its tender blue eyes, its smiling lips. A slenderyouth, barely eighteen years of age, with the eyes of a dreamer,Conradino was possessed of an exaltation which blinded him to theperils of the situation, intoxicating his ambition,--a quaintcombination of the mystic lore of his tunes, of which Francesco felthimself to be his other Ego.

  The crowds had dispersed by degrees, sweeping in the wake of theSwabian host towards the Capitol.

  And Francesco stared motionless into space.

  Was he indeed cast out from the communion of the world, from thecontact of the living?

  Had a mocking fate but cast him on the shores of life, that he mightstand idly by, watching the waves bounding, leaping over each other?

  He felt as one enslaved, his will-power paralyzed.

  Yonder, where the setting sun spun golden vapors round the summits ofthe Capitoline Hill, there was the trend of a high, self-consciouspurpose, as revealed in the impending death-struggle for the highestideals of mankind.

  What had he to oppose it?

  What great aim atoned for the agony of his transformation?

  The restitution of papacy? The glory of the Church? The vindication ofa crime? The toleration of a despot?

  Francesco's passionate nature might have been guided aright by acontrolling affection, such as he could nevermore find in his presentestate.

  Slowly, as one wrapped in a dream, gazing neither right nor left, hepermitted himself to be swept along with the crowds, past monuments,tombs and the desolate grandeur of the Forum, and as one enthralled,began the ascent of the Capitoline Hill.