The Gadfly by E. L. Voynich (latest novels to read .txt) 📖

whispered softly; and then,

closing the window, sat down again upon the sill.

 

“I’m afraid,” he said in his airy manner, “that

I have interrupted you, gentlemen. I was l-looking

at the variety show; it is s-such a p-pretty sight.”

 

“Sacconi was asking you a question,” said Martini

gruffly. The Gadfly’s behaviour seemed to

him an absurd piece of affectation, and he was

annoyed that Gemma should have been tactless

enough to follow his example. It was not like her.

 

The Gadfly disclaimed all knowledge of the state

of feeling in Pisa, explaining that he had been

there “only on a holiday.” He then plunged at

once into an animated discussion, first of agricultural

prospects, then of the pamphlet question;

and continued pouring out a flood of stammering

talk till the others were quite tired. He seemed

to find some feverish delight in the sound of his

own voice.

 

When the meeting ended and the members of

the committee rose to go, Riccardo came up to

Martini.

 

“Will you stop to dinner with me? Fabrizi

and Sacconi have promised to stay.”

 

“Thanks; but I was going to see Signora Bolla

home.”

 

“Are you really afraid I can’t get home by

myself?” she asked, rising and putting on her

wrap. “Of course he will stay with you, Dr. Riccardo;

it’s good for him to get a change. He doesn’t go out

half enough.”

 

“If you will allow me, I will see you home,” the

Gadfly interposed; “I am going in that direction.”

 

“If you really are going that way–-”

 

“I suppose you won’t have time to drop in here

in the course of the evening, will you, Rivarez?”

asked Riccardo, as he opened the door for them.

 

The Gadfly looked back over his shoulder,

laughing. “I, my dear fellow? I’m going to see

the variety show!”

 

“What a strange creature that is; and what an

odd affection for mountebanks!” said Riccardo,

coming back to his visitors.

 

“Case of a fellow-feeling, I should think,” said

Martini; “the man’s a mountebank himself, if ever

I saw one.”

 

“I wish I could think he was only that,” Fabrizi

interposed, with a grave face. “If he is a mountebank

I am afraid he’s a very dangerous one.”

 

“Dangerous in what way?”

 

“Well, I don’t like those mysterious little pleasure

trips that he is so fond of taking. This is the

third time, you know; and I don’t believe he has

been in Pisa at all.”

 

“I suppose it is almost an open secret that it’s

into the mountains he goes,” said Sacconi. “He

has hardly taken the trouble to deny that he is

still in relations with the smugglers he got to

know in the Savigno affair, and it’s quite natural

he should take advantage of their friendship to

get his leaflets across the Papal frontier.”

 

“For my part,” said Riccardo; “what I wanted

to talk to you about is this very question. It

occurred to me that we could hardly do better than

ask Rivarez to undertake the management of our

own smuggling. That press at Pistoja is very

inefficiently managed, to my thinking; and the

way the leaflets are taken across, always rolled in

those everlasting cigars, is more than primitive.”

 

“It has answered pretty well up till now,” said

Martini contumaciously. He was getting wearied

of hearing Galli and Riccardo always put the Gadfly

forward as a model to copy, and inclined to

think that the world had gone well enough before

this “lackadaisical buccaneer” turned up to set

everyone to rights.

 

“It has answered so far well that we have been

satisfied with it for want of anything better;

but you know there have been plenty of arrests and

confiscations. Now I believe that if Rivarez undertook

the business for us, there would be less of that.”

 

“Why do you think so?”

 

“In the first place, the smugglers look upon

us as strangers to do business with, or as sheep to

fleece, whereas Rivarez is their personal friend,

very likely their leader, whom they look up to and

trust. You may be sure every smuggler in the

Apennines will do for a man who was in the Savigno

revolt what he will not do for us. In the

next place, there’s hardly a man among us that

knows the mountains as Rivarez does. Remember,

he has been a fugitive among them, and knows

the smugglers’ paths by heart. No smuggler

would dare to cheat him, even if he wished to, and

no smuggler could cheat him if he dared to try.”

 

“Then is your proposal that we should ask him

to take over the whole management of our literature

on the other side of the frontier—distribution,

addresses, hiding-places, everything—or simply

that we should ask him to put the things across

for us?”

 

“Well, as for addresses and hiding-places, he

probably knows already all the ones that we have

and a good many more that we have not. I don’t

suppose we should be able to teach him much in

that line. As for distribution, it’s as the others

prefer, of course. The important question, to my

mind, is the actual smuggling itself. Once the

books are safe in Bologna, it’s a comparatively

simple matter to circulate them.”

 

“For my part,” said Martini, “I am against the

plan. In the first place, all this about his skilfulness

is mere conjecture; we have not actually seen

him engaged in frontier work and do not know

whether he keeps his head in critical moments.”

 

“Oh, you needn’t have any doubt of that!”

Riccardo put in. “The history of the Savigno

affair proves that he keeps his head.”

 

“And then,” Martini went on; “I do not feel

at all inclined, from what little I know of Rivarez,

to intrust him with all the party’s secrets. He

seems to me feather-brained and theatrical. To

give the whole management of a party’s contraband

work into a man’s hands is a serious matter.

Fabrizi, what do you think?”

 

“If I had only such objections as yours, Martini,”

replied the professor, “I should certainly

waive them in the case of a man really possessing,

as Rivarez undoubtedly does, all the qualifications

Riccardo speaks of. For my part, I have not the

slightest doubt as to either his courage, his honesty,

or his presence of mind; and that he knows

both mountains and mountaineers we have had

ample proof. But there is another objection. I

do not feel sure that it is only for the smuggling

of pamphlets he goes into the mountains. I have

begun to doubt whether he has not another purpose.

This is, of course, entirely between ourselves.

It is a mere suspicion. It seems to me

just possible that he is in connexion with some

one of the ‘sects,’ and perhaps with the most dangerous

of them.”

 

“Which one do you mean—the ‘Red Girdles’?”

 

“No; the ‘Occoltellatori.’”

 

“The ‘Knifers’! But that is a little body of

outlaws—peasants, most of them, with neither

education nor political experience.”

 

“So were the insurgents of Savigno; but they

had a few educated men as leaders, and this little

society may have the same. And remember, it’s

pretty well known that most of the members of

those more violent sects in the Romagna are survivors

of the Savigno affair, who found themselves

too weak to fight the Churchmen in open insurrection,

and so have fallen back on assassination.

Their hands are not strong enough for guns, and

they take to knives instead.”

 

“But what makes you suppose Rivarez to be

connected with them?”

 

“I don’t suppose, I merely suspect. In any

case, I think we had better find out for certain

before we intrust our smuggling to him. If he

attempted to do both kinds of work at once he

would injure our party most terribly; he would

simply destroy its reputation and accomplish

nothing. However, we will talk of that another

time. I wanted to speak to you about the news

from Rome. It is said that a commission is to

be appointed to draw up a project for a municipal

constitution.”

 

CHAPTER VI.

 

GEMMA and the Gadfly walked silently along

the Lung’Arno. His feverish talkativeness seemed

to have quite spent itself; he had hardly spoken

a word since they left Riccardo’s door, and

Gemma was heartily glad of his silence. She

always felt embarrassed in his company, and to-day

more so than usual, for his strange behaviour

at the committee meeting had greatly perplexed

her.

 

By the Uffizi palace he suddenly stopped and

turned to her.

 

“Are you tired?”

 

“No; why?”

 

“Nor especially busy this evening?”

 

“No.”

 

“I want to ask a favour of you; I want you to

come for a walk with me.”

 

“Where to?”

 

“Nowhere in particular; anywhere you like.”

 

“But what for?”

 

He hesitated.

 

“I—can’t tell you—at least, it’s very difficult;

but please come if you can.”

 

He raised his eyes suddenly from the ground,

and she saw how strange their expression was.

 

“There is something the matter with you,” she

said gently. He pulled a leaf from the flower in

his buttonhole, and began tearing it to pieces.

Who was it that he was so oddly like? Someone

who had that same trick of the fingers and hurried,

nervous gesture.

 

“I am in trouble,” he said, looking down at his

hands and speaking in a hardly audible voice. “I

—don’t want to be alone this evening. Will you

come?”

 

“Yes, certainly, unless you would rather go to

my lodgings.”

 

“No; come and dine with me at a restaurant.

There’s one on the Signoria. Please don’t refuse,

now; you’ve promised!”

 

They went into a restaurant, where he ordered

dinner, but hardly touched his own share, and

remained obstinately silent, crumbling the bread

over the cloth, and fidgeting with the fringe of

his table napkin. Gemma felt thoroughly uncomfortable,

and began to wish she had refused to

come; the silence was growing awkward; yet she

could not begin to make small-talk with a person

who seemed to have forgotten her presence. At

last he looked up and said abruptly:

 

“Would you like to see the variety show?”

 

She stared at him in astonishment. What had

he got into his head about variety shows?

 

“Have you ever seen one?” he asked before she

had time to speak.

 

“No; I don’t think so. I didn’t suppose they

were interesting.”

 

“They are very interesting. I don’t think anyone

can study the life of the people without seeing

them. Let us go back to the Porta alla Croce.”

 

When they arrived the mountebanks had set up

their tent beside the town gate, and an abominable

scraping of fiddles and banging of drums

announced that the performance had begun.

 

The entertainment was of the roughest kind.

A few clowns, harlequins, and acrobats, a circus-rider

jumping through hoops, the painted columbine,

and the hunchback performing various dull

and foolish antics, represented the entire force of

the company. The jokes were not, on the whole,

coarse or offensive; but they were very tame and

stale, and there was a depressing flatness about

the whole thing. The audience laughed and

clapped from their innate Tuscan courtesy; but

the only part which they seemed really to enjoy

was the performance of the hunchback, in which

Gemma could find nothing either witty or skilful.

It was merely a series of grotesque and hideous

contortions, which the spectators mimicked, holding

up children on their shoulders that the little

ones might see the “ugly man.”

 

“Signor Rivarez, do you really think this

attractive?” said Gemma, turning to the Gadfly,

who was standing beside her, his arm round