The Hill of Venus
attention towards the open door of an oratory, Romuald slowly began to
read. While thus engrossed, Francesco's gaze wandered down the dim
vistas of corridors revealed beyond Romuald's chamber, which in the
half-light presented an exceedingly gloomy aspect, reposing in the
uncertain glimmer of stone lamps fixed in niches upon the walls. These
corridors were at intervals crossed by archways, marking the
termination of many flights of stairs leading by galleries to the
upper chambers of the cloisters. A pulpit, supported on a pillar fixed
in the wall, was revealed by the light of five or six stone lamps,
which seemed to intensify rather than to dispel the gloom beyond.
During the reading of Gregorio Villani's letter a sudden change had
come over the Prior's face. Francesco noted it not, engrossed as he
was in scanning his surroundings, silently wondering if he would be
able to strip off the gladness of earth, the joy of youth, the
yearning of the flesh, to become the image of that spiritualized
abnegation which the Prior represented; if his strength would support
his resolve.
Suddenly a scowl darkened Romuald's brow, and from the letter in his
trembling hands his dimmed eyes flashed upon the youth. Francesco
wondered. It was not long before he learned.
Romuald, supporting his right arm on the table, turned to the youth.
"You then are the son of Gregorio Villani! And you think to live here
amongst us, to enjoy the peace and the solitude of these cloisters,
whose life-long enemy your father has been!"
At the Prior's words Francesco had started.
"I know nothing of my father's quarrels, nothing of the quarrels of
the monks," he said.
The Prior nodded absently.
"You were raised at the Court of Avellino?"
"Such was my father's will!"
Romuald looked up at him curiously.
"And now, his will is to make of you a monk, to do penance for his own
transgressions!"
Francesco's head sank.
"The burden is mine to bear!"
A strange light shone in the Prior's eyes.
"Then it is not your own desire?"
Every vestige of color had left Francesco's face.
"It is my wish!"--
There was a brief pause.
"You are loyal to the memory of him who gave you life but to destroy
it," nodded the Prior, as unconsciously he picked up the letter from
the table. Signs of deeper inward emotion were revealed upon his face
as, after regarding the youth with a gloomy interest, he said at last:
"For one raised at court you will find the life of the cloister
arduous enough."
A flood of memories rushed with these words over Francesco.
They left his countenance paler than before,
"I shall learn to bear it."
A sudden gleam of pity seemed to beam from Romuald's passionless eyes.
"It is a brave beginning of the new life,--for I doubt not you must
stay. The word of His Holiness is law. To-night, since collation is
over in the refectory, you will sup with me. To-morrow you shall
exchange this garb for the simpler one."
Sick at heart, Francesco nodded silent acquiescence.
At this moment a monk entered, carrying a platter which he placed upon
a table and, after arranging it according to the Prior's direction,
left the latter alone with his guest.
The collation was by no means traditionally meagre. In truth, it
seemed to Francesco far above what his fancy about monastic life had
led him to expect.
At last when everything upon the trenchers, together with the last
flagon of wine, had been done ample justice to, Francesco, after due
thanksgiving, arose.
Romuald's gaze had never relinquished the youth during the repast.
"Now to St. Benedict's chapel, wherein already the bell is calling,"
he said, rising slowly. "After compline you shall be conducted to your
cell,--one for yourself within the dormitory overhead. This is the
way."
A small door at one side of the Prior's room opened upon a narrow
passage, along which they walked side by side in semi-darkness, till
the light from the chapter house met their eyes. Through this large
room they passed, entering from it the great Church itself, the
further end of which opened into a beautiful chapel consecrated many
years ago to the founder of the cloister, St. Benedict of Nursia.
When the Prior and his companion entered here, the monks were already
assembled. There was many a curious glance cast towards Francesco as
he strode along the kneeling company by the side of the Prior.
So occupied was the newcomer with the novelty of the scene, that the
old and familiar worship, witnessed among different surroundings, did
not pall upon him here.
Mechanically his lips moved, while his eyes wandered over the white
carven screen before the altar and the pillar that rose above it out
of the range of candle-light, to mingle with the shadows above.
Then, by a slight turn of the head, he could see the black, well-like
entrance to the large church, where one or two distant lamps, lighted
by penitent monks before special shrines, flashed like infinitesimal
stars through the gloom. As for the long rows of kneeling monks about
him, they seemed to Francesco to differ not at all from those he had
known and met in the monasteries of Apulia, or those he had seen in
the Augustinian monastery of San Cataldo. They were the same
unsympathetic forms, the same shorn pates, the same dull faces, for
whom the world outside the gates of the cloister was but a country
unredeemed. These were part of the hosts that formed the great army of
the Church, with the aid of which she had slowly but surely obtained
her hold on the heritage of Emperor Frederick the Second; these were
the sentinels of the crusading host of Anjou. They knew no will, save
that of an irate, fanatical pontiff who looked about in vain for means
to rid himself of his dearly beloved son and his rapacious hordes. Of
these he was henceforth to be a part, their loves his loves, their
hates his hates. In vain did he look about for a face idealized by the
life of the cloister, and, as he looked and wondered, the last prayer
was concluded.
In irregular groups, amid a low murmur of conversation, the monks left
their devotions, now ended for another day. Francesco followed them as
they moved down the corridor.
Suddenly a hand was laid upon his shoulder. He turned about and gazed
into the face of the Prior.
"Fra Ambrogio will conduct you to your cell," said Romuald, beckoning
to a long, lean monk who stared awkwardly at the newcomer. "The
last--in the western wing," was the Prior's laconic order, and
Francesco bowed in silence and followed his spectral guide.
He was too weary to care to talk; even to inquire about his horse.
In a short while the son of the Grand Master was alone in his dimly
lighted cell. It was larger than he had anticipated and far more
worthily furnished.
Upon a table had been placed the bundle which held his belongings.
This he unrolled carelessly, intending to take from it only his tunic
for the night. With the movement something from the bundle fell out
upon the stone floor. He stooped to pick it up. It was the little
steel dagger which his hand had gripped on the fatal night of his
return from San Cataldo. Thinking nothing of the omen, he slipped the
forbidden weapon between the leaves of a Missal which he placed on the
table, and there it remained for many a long day.
Then he sat down upon his bed, covering his face with his hands.
Ilaria's name rang in his ears; Ilaria's image filled every atom of
his soul. In the paroxysm of grief which convulsed his frame, he shook
like a storm-swept reed; it was in vain he tried to compose his mind
to the proper attitude for prayer.
The crucifix above his bed swam in a misty cloud before his eyes. It
was only after a long litany, mechanically repeated, that Francesco
succeeded in recalling his wandering imagination to the mystery of the
atonement. At last sheer physical weariness conquered the feverish
agitation of his nerves and he lay down.
The long night passed in unbroken blackness and silence. In the utter
void and absence of all external impressions Francesco gradually lost
consciousness of time. The blackness of night seemed an illimitable
thing with no beginning and no ending; but, when at early dawn he
waked, there were tears in his eyes and the name of Ilaria on his
lips.
CHAPTER II
THE PASSING OF CONRADINO
Days and weeks in the cloisters of Monte Cassino sufficed to convince
Francesco that he was not destined to find any friendships there. The
elder Villani had not seen fit, in an age of implied indulgence, to
keep secret the nature of his transgression, and the curious and
unfriendly glances that met him on every turn had soon proclaimed this
fact to the newcomer, who writhed inwardly, but endured in silence.
The changeless, endless rounds endured by many thousands of human
souls for all years of their lives, added new torture; he felt like
the stray leaf blown from its stem on the sheltering branch; would his
ever be the prayerless peace for evermore?
Thus month passed after month,--in dire, changeless monotony.--
It was a stifling afternoon late in summer.
Few of the monks felt energy enough to go about their usual
half-hearted pastimes, and nearly all had retired to their cells in
comatose languor. Francesco had gone up with the rest; but the sun
streamed brilliantly into his little cell through the western window
and from without there came to his ears the myriad droning of
ephemeral insect life. His mind was weighted with many thoughts that
clamored for analysis.
Gradually he felt immersed in a morbid train of reflections concerning
as ever, the utter emptiness of his own existence, now really more
exiled in loneliness than ever before. For months now he had been in
the cloisters, and not one single word from the outer world concerning
his future had come to him. The time was fast approaching when he must
take the final vows. Had the Pontiff forgotten him? Had his emissary
deceived his father on his death-bed? Or--it was unthinkable--had his
father deceived him, to make him pliable to his wishes? Was he
doomed to remain here till the end of time, severed from the
world,--forgotten?
The very thought was unendurable. These conjectures were worse than
immediate annihilation. No matter which it was to be,--he, the monk,
was utterly powerless. It were far better not to yield himself to
these unwise fears. The Prior had been invisible to him for days. He
alone might, by word or hint, have alleviated his fears; but he had
not spoken.
After brooding over these matters till he thought his brain would
burst, Francesco determined to shake off the oppression of his cell
and to seek solace under the azure vault of Heaven.
Suiting the action to the impulse, he opened the door noiselessly and
stepped into the corridor without.
About him there was absolute silence. He stood at the farthest corner
of the western wing. Nearly all the cells immediately about him were
untenanted. For a moment or two he tarried, undecided. Then, following
an irresistible impulse, he stepped on to the trellised walk without
and decided to ascend the top of the mountain.
Escaping from the court and the cloisters, all hushed in dream-like
stillness, he climbed a green knoll which several ancient pines marked
strangely with their shadows. There, leaning against one of the
trunks, he raised his eyes to the barrier of encircling mountains,
discovered by the quivering sunlight falling directly on the forests
which fringed their acclivities.
The vast woods, the steep descents, the precipices and torrents all
lay extended beneath, softened by a pale-blue haze that alleviated in
a measure the stern prospects of the rocky promontories above. The sky
was of the deepest azure. The hoarse roar of torrents, throwing