Various - Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 69, No. 424, February 1851

"Giacomo!" exclaimed the father reproachfully, and his voice seemed to choke him. Riccabocca turned away, and walked restlessly to and fro the terrace; then, lifting his arms with a wild gesture as he still continued his long irregular strides, he muttered, "Yes, heaven is my witness that I could have borne reverse and banishment without a murmur, had I permitted myself that young partner in exile and privation. Heaven is my witness that, if I hesitate now, it is because I would not listen to my own selfish heart. Yet never, never to see her again – my child! And it was but as the infant that I beheld her! O Friend, friend – " (and, stopping short with a burst of uncontrollable emotion, he bowed his head upon his servant's shoulder;) "thou knowest what I have endured and suffered at my hearth, as in my country; the wrong, the perfidy, the – the – " His voice again failed him; he clung to his servant's breast, and his whole frame shook.

"But your child, the innocent one – think now only of her!" faltered Giacomo, struggling with his own sobs.

"True, only of her," replied the exile, raising his face – "only of her. Put aside thy thoughts for myself, friend – counsel me. If I were to send for Violante, and if, transplanted to these keen airs, she drooped and died – look, look – the priest says that she needs such tender care; or if I myself were summoned from the world, to leave her in it alone, friendless, homeless, breadless perhaps, at the age of woman's sharpest trial against temptation, would she not live to mourn the cruel egotism that closed on her infant innocence the gates of the House of God?"

Giacomo was appalled by this appeal; and indeed Riccabocca had never before thus reverently spoken of the cloister. In his hours of philosophy, he was wont to sneer at monks and nuns, priesthood and superstition. But now, in that hour of emotion, the Old Religion reclaimed her empire; and the sceptical world-wise man, thinking only of his child, spoke and felt with a child's simple faith.

"But again I say," murmured Jackeymo scarce audibly, and after a long silence, "if the Padrone would make up his mind – to marry!"

He expected that his master would start up in his customary indignation at such a suggestion – nay, he might not have been sorry so to have changed the current of feeling; but the poor Italian only winced slightly, and mildly withdrawing himself from his servant's supporting arm, again paced the terrace, but this time quietly and in silence. A quarter of an hour thus passed. "Give me the pipe," said Dr Riccabocca, passing into the Belvidere.

Jackeymo again struck the spark, and, wonderfully relieved at the Padrone's return to his usual adviser, mentally besought his sainted namesake to bestow a double portion of soothing wisdom on the benignant influences of the weed.

Dr Riccabocca had been some little time in the solitude of the Belvidere, when Lenny Fairfield, not knowing that his employer was therein, entered to lay down a book which the Doctor had lent him, with injunctions to leave on a certain table when done with. Riccabocca looked up at the sound of the young peasant's step.

"I beg your honour's pardon – I did not know – "

"Never mind; lay the book there. I wish to speak with you. You look well, my child; this air agrees with you as well as that of Hazeldean?"

"Oh yes, sir."

"Yet it is higher ground, more exposed?"

"That can hardly be, sir," said Lenny; "there are many plants grow here which don't flourish at the Squire's. The hill yonder keeps off the east wind, and the place lays to the south."

"Lies, not lays , Lenny. What are the principal complaints in these parts?"

"Eh, sir?"

"I mean what maladies, what diseases?"

"I never beard tell of any, sir, except the rheumatism."

"No low fevers? – no consumption?"

"Never heard of them, sir."

Riccabocca drew a long breath, as if relieved.

"That seems a very kind family at the Hall."

"I have nothing to say against it," answered Lenny bluntly. "I have not been treated justly. But as that book says, sir, 'It is not every one who comes into the world with a silver spoon in his mouth.'"

Little thought the Doctor that those wise maxims may leave sore thoughts behind them. He was too occupied with the subject most at his own heart to think then of what was in Lenny Fairfield's.

"Yes; a kind, English, domestic family. Did you see much of Miss Hazeldean?"

"Not so much as of the Lady."

"Is she liked in the village, think you?"

"Miss Jemima? Yes. She never did harm. Her little dog bit me once – she did not ask me to beg its pardon, she asked mine! She's a very nice young lady; the girls say she's very affable; and," added Lenny with a smile, "there are always more weddings going on when she's down at the Hall."

"Oh!" said Riccabocca. Then, after a long whiff, "Did you ever see her play with the little children? Is she fond of children, do you think?"

"Lord, sir, you guess everything! She's never so pleased as when she's playing with the babies."

"Humph!" grunted Riccabocca. "Babies – well, that's womanlike. I don't mean exactly babies, but when they're older – little girls."

"Indeed, sir, I daresay; but," said Lenny primly, "I never as yet kept company with the little girls."

"Quite right, Lenny; be equally discreet all your life. Mrs Dale is very intimate with Miss Hazeldean – more than with the Squire's lady. Why is that, think you?"

"Well, sir," said Leonard shrewdly, "Mrs Dale has her little tempers, though she's a very good lady; and Madam Hazeldean is rather high, and has a spirit. But Miss Jemima is so soft: any one could live with Miss Jemima, as Joe and the servants say at the Hall."

"Indeed! Get my hat out of the parlour, and – just bring a clothesbrush, Lenny. A fine sunny day for a walk."

After this most mean and dishonourable inquisition into the character and popular repute of Miss Hazeldean, Signore Riccabocca seemed as much cheered up and elated as if he had committed some very noble action; and he walked forth in the direction of the Hall with a far lighter and livelier step than that with which he had paced the terrace.

"Monsignore San Giacomo, by thy help and the pipe's, the Padrone shall have his child!" muttered the servant, looking up from the garden.

Yet Dr Riccabocca was not rash. The man who wants his wedding-garment to fit him must allow plenty of time for the measure. But, from that day, the Italian notably changed his manner towards Miss Hazeldean. He ceased that profusion of compliment in which he had hitherto carried off in safety all serious meaning. For indeed the Doctor considered that compliments, to a single gentleman, were what the inky liquid it dispenses is to the cuttle-fish, that by obscuring the water sails away from its enemy. Neither did he, as before, avoid prolonged conversations with that young lady, and contrive to escape from all solitary rambles by her side. On the contrary, he now sought every occasion to be in her society; and, entirely dropping the language of gallantry, he assumed something of the earnest tone of friendship. He bent down his intellect to examine and plumb her own. To use a very homely simile, he blew away that froth which there is on the surface of mere acquaintanceships, especially with the opposite sex; and which, while it lasts, scarce allows you to distinguish between small beer and double X. Apparently Dr Riccabocca was satisfied with his scrutiny – at all events, under that froth there was no taste of bitter. The Italian might not find any great strength of intellect in Miss Jemima, but he found that, disentangled from many little whims and foibles – which he had himself the sense to perceive were harmless enough if they lasted, and not so absolutely constitutional but what they might be removed by a tender hand – Miss Hazeldean had quite enough sense to comprehend the plain duties of married life; and if the sense could fail, it found a substitute in good old homely English principles and the instincts of amiable kindly feelings.