IDA NICOLARI

BY

EGLANTON THORNE

AUTHOR OF "THE OLD WORCESTER JUG," "IT'S ALL REAL TRUE," "IN LONDON FIELDS," "THE TWO CROWNS," ETC.

THE RELIGIOUS TRACT SOCIETY

56 PATERNOSTER ROW, 65 ST. PAUL'S CHURCHYARD AND 164 PICCADILLY

PRINTED BY SPOTTISWOODE AND CO., NEW-STREET SQUARE LONDON

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER

I. PSYCHE

II. HER MOTHER'S FRIEND

III. THE SCULPTOR'S PUPIL

IV. GERALDINE SEABROOK

V. A SORE DREAD

VI. VISITORS TO THE STUDIO

VII. IDA BEGINS TO KNOW HERSELF

VIII. A VISIT FROM THEODORE TREGONING

IX. TREGONING'S "HOBBY"

X. ANXIETY

XI. BLIND!

XII. PATIENT ENDURANCE

XIII. AT ST. ANGELA'S

XIV. AN ALARMING SUGGESTION

XV. BETROTHED

XVI. THE GOOD SHEPHERD

XVII. AN EVENING AT MRS. ORMISTON'S

XVIII. WOUNDED

XIX. THEODORE TREGONING IN TROUBLE

XX. THE WEDDING DAY DRAWS NEAR

XXI. ANTONIO GOES AWAY TO FULFIL HIS DESTINY

XXII. FATHERLESS

XXIII. IDA SHOWS HERSELF A TRUE FRIEND

XXIV. A MEETING AND A PARTING

XXV. A CANCELLED DEBT

IDA NICOLARI.

CHAPTER I.

PSYCHE.

"THERE, child, you are free. The light is going too rapidly for me to attempt more this afternoon. How is it that the days seem to get shorter, although we are long past the shortest?"

The speaker was Antonio Nicolari, a sculptor who had won a high place in the world of art. That his fame had not been won without long-continued pains, his grizzled locks and worn, furrowed face revealed. His best years had been spent in toil apparently fruitless, uncheered by success or animated by much hope, stimulated only by the intense devotion to his art which distinguishes the master-spirit. He was standing now in his studio, at the back of his roomy old house in Chelsea, gazing with earnest, loving gaze on the clay image he was loth to leave, yet dared not risk spoiling. But he was not so rapt in contemplation of his work as to be heedless of a soft sigh breathed forth at his elbow. His look and voice grew tender as he turned to his daughter with the inquiry:

"Have I tired you, Ida?"

"No, father, I am not tired," the girl replied in a clear, sweet voice, as she moved from the spot where she had been standing posed as her father's model for the statue of Psyche he had in hand.

Ida Nicolari was not unworthy to personify the beautiful maiden whom Cupid loved. Her slender, slightly moulded form was the perfection of grace and beauty, whilst her face was faultlessly classical in its symmetry. She had the oval contour, the delicate brows, the rippling waves of hair upon a low, broad forehead, the straight, chiselled nose, the beautiful mouth, with short, curved upper lip, which we are wont to associate chiefly with statuary, so rarely are they seen in life. There was, however, no statuesque coldness nor lack of character visible in the girl's face. Her liquid dark eyes looked from beneath the delicately arched brows with the open, vivid gaze of childhood. She was pale, but it was with a warm, healthy paleness, and her lips were like coral, and when parted showed such perfect teeth as it would be no hyperbole to liken to pearls. She wore a specially designed Grecian dress. The loose vest was gathered in graceful folds about her neck, not hiding the shapely throat, and leaving bare her beautiful arms.

Looking on her as she moved with light, quick step across the studio floor, one might have thought of Pygmalion, and fancied that one of the sculptor's statues had been endowed with life.

Not that there was one of all the statues that crowded the artist's studio which could compare in beauty with this living loveliness. Behind the spot where the sculptor had been working rose a crowd of pale forms, most of them the duplicates of statues long since executed for the benefit of the public. In the background were colossal figures, such as might have walked the earth in the days when there were giants. In front of these were busts representing strange diversities of character and circumstance, but placed together with a disregard for social distinctions which would hardly have been tolerated by some of the originals. The bust of a royal duke shouldered the effigy of a city alderman's wife, whose commonplace features the sculptor had rendered with strict accuracy; the stately repose of a bishop's countenance was set off by the rough, homely contour of a popular Nonconformist divine; the form of a renowned soldier looked down on that of a peace-loving statesman; and the head of a Quaker philanthropist paired with that of a famous comedian.

But the studio held more beautiful work. There were ideal statues, personifying the ideas both of remote and of modern times. Here was a laughing, vine-wreathed Bacchus, and there Diana, with her bow and arrows. There were sportive nymphs and sweet childish forms and fair maidens to represent the Seasons or the Graces. The studio had no furniture save such as pertained to the work there pursued. The shelves running round the walls held models of all descriptions, from the small clay "sketch" which was the germ of a greater work to the delicately finished miniature statue. Numerous casts—arms and hands and feet, horses' heads and hoofs, birds and flowers and fruit—lay to hand for use as required. At first sight the confusion of forms was bewildering, yet it was a confusion not without beauty.

Ida Nicolari caught up a shawl and wrapped it about her, as she moved away from the spot where she had been standing motionless for what seemed to her a long time. The air of the studio was chill, and the stove only cast a little warmth about the limited space in which the sculptor worked.

"I believe you are lazy, father," the girl exclaimed, as she stepped slowly backwards, that she might the better survey his half-formed model; "it is still quite light. You worked later than this yesterday, though the sky was not so clear as it is to-day."

"And came near spoiling my work," he said; "the atmosphere is always more or less charged with fog after three o'clock in this gloomy climate."

"There is no fog to-day," said his daughter. "It was lovely on the Embankment this morning. I could see a long way down the river."

"Then the mist is in my eyes," he said slowly; and the sadness of his tone did not escape his daughter's ears.

A look of trouble clouded her face for a moment as she glanced at him. He had taken off his spectacles, and was carefully wiping the glasses with his silk handkerchief. Ida divined the meaning of his grave, sad look.

"It is because you have tired your eyes, father," she said; "you forget that the oculist told you to avoid fatigue. You must rest them now. Shall we go for a walk? You can wear your smoke-coloured glasses, you know; or would you rather sit quietly in your chair and let me read to you?"

"I would rather rest at home," he said, and his tone was that of one cast down in spirit. "It seems to me, Ida, that there will be nothing but rest for me soon."

"What do you mean?" she asked, giving him a frightened glance. Then with a swift change of tone she said lightly: "Now don't worry about your eyes, father, they will get right in time. You know that the oculist said that you must have patience; he could not promise you a cure all at once."

"I think I have had patience," said the old man wearily; "you forget that it is nearly three months since I saw the oculist, and my sight has not improved in the least. Indeed, it grows worse—I am sure it grows worse."

"No, no, father!" cried the girl, quickly. "The light is not so good as it was, and I daresay it is later than I think."

So saying she ran into the room beyond the studio. Here there was more of the dust and litter of a workshop, though here, too, were many pieces of fine sculpture. At the end of the room stood a workman, engaged in reducing a block of marble to the proportions of the clay model placed conveniently at hand. He was an elderly man, with a grave, earnest face, the strong features of which were well set off by his close-fitting workman's cap. He was so intent upon his task that he was not aware of the young lady's entrance till she addressed him.

"Can you tell me the time, Fritz?" she said.

The man merely glanced up at the skylight ere he replied: "It can hardly be more than three and a quarter, Miss Ida."

"Do you call the light bad this afternoon?" she asked.

"Bad, Miss Ida?" he repeated. "Nay, the sun is kind to us to-day. We do not often have so good a light at this hour."

The girl sighed. She stood still for a few minutes, her eyes resting lovingly on the clay model before her. She thought it one of the most beautiful forms that had ever come from her father's hands. It represented Apollo as a shepherd lad. There was great beauty in the form and pose of the boyish figure, as he stood half leaning on his shepherd's crook, his lute beneath one arm, whilst at his side nestled a lamb.

"Fritz," said Ida, "my father has done nothing more beautiful than this."

"But the master's next work will surpass it," replied Fritz, looking at the young lady with reverential admiration. "The Pysche will be even more beautiful than the Apollo with which it is to pair."

Ida only smiled and shook her head. She knew that good, faithful old Fritz meant to compliment her, and she valued the affection which she believed prompted his words. But she cared little to be told that she was beautiful. Vanity was no component of her character, and she was strangely indifferent to the fact of her beauty, being too simple and guileless to know how great a value others would set on it.

"Do you not think that my father's work looks better in the clay than in the finished marble?" she asked, as she continued to study the Apollo.

"How can that be, Miss Ida?" returned the man. "Surely the spotless stone must be more beautiful than the brown clay!"

"Ah! You do not understand," she said. "The clay is warm from his hand; he seems to have put his own soul into it. How lifelike, how noble is that face! I could fancy that my father's face wore such an expression when he was young."

She was turning away when she caught sight of an unfinished bust over which a cloth had been lightly flung. With a look of interest she lifted the cloth to peep at the work beneath.

"Ah!" she said with a smile, "Wilfred has not done much to this since last I saw it."

"Master Wilfred will never injure himself with overwork," said Fritz, laconically.

"No, indeed," replied Ida, shaking her head. "I wish he were more industrious. It vexes my father to see him so idle."

She passed back into the inner room. At that moment a servant entered the studio by the door communicating with the house, and handed the sculptor the card of a visitor who had arrived. With a look of annoyance Antonio took up the card, but his face changed as he read the name it bore. Ida was watching him, and she was struck by the sudden change. Why did he look so startled and agitated?

"Who is it, father?" she asked.

"Mrs. Tregoning," he said absently; "Mrs. Tregoning."

"Who is she?" asked Ida. "I have never heard that name."

"An old friend," he said slowly, "an old friend of your mother, Ida. I have not seen her since you were born."

Then Ida understood why he was so moved by this visitor's unexpected arrival.

"Stay, father," she said, as he was about to leave the studio; "you must change your coat before you see this lady; and I will send some tea into the dining-room."

"Do so, my dear," he said, "but do not come yourself unless I send for you. We shall have many things to talk about that you would not understand."

"Very well, father," said Ida, dutifully. Yet his words caused her disappointment, for she felt a strong desire to see one who had known intimately the mother whose life had been given as the price of her own.

CHAPTER II.

HER MOTHER'S FRIEND.

IN the dining-room awaiting the sculptor's entrance stood a tall, graceful woman some fifty years of ago. Her very pale complexion looked the whiter in contrast to her black hair and dark eyes. She had regular features. Her small, thin-lipped month was firmly compressed, and she held herself with much natural dignity, whilst yet her looks betrayed some feminine timidity. She was dressed in mourning—not the deep sable that denotes a recent bereavement, but in simple unobtrusive black, the style of which, however, would to a woman's eye have suggested widowhood.

She glanced carefully about the room, as though desirous of reading all it might reveal of the life that was lived in it. She saw a square, sombre apartment, furnished with heavy-looking mahogany and leather. There were many pictures on the walls—oil-paintings set in heavy, tarnished gilt frames. Some handsome bronzes stood on the mantelshelf, and were reflected in the inevitable mirror. So far everything was ordinary, but the object on which Mrs. Tregoning's eyes rested almost immediately on entering was not such as could be seen in many rooms.

A little to the left of the window, and so placed that the light fell full upon it, there stood upon a pedestal a marble bust representing a female head of rare grace and dignity. The strongly-marked features were not strictly beautiful, but the Minerva-like repose of the expression was grand. Here was the sculptor's most living work. Into it he had poured all his soul. When he took up his tools again after his wife's death, it was to work at this. He had executed the bust rapidly, under the passionate promptings of his love and grief. The wild anguish with which his heart was riven had been relieved by this endeavour to show in marble the beauty and worth of the wife he had tenderly loved, and the work had saved him from madness or despair.

Instinctively Mrs. Tregoning guessed what forces had wrought in the production of that marble form, which so vividly recalled to memory the friend of her girlhood, the object of as strong and lasting an attachment as ever passed by the name of friendship.

Tears sprang to Mrs. Tregoning's eyes as she gazed on the placid face. Her love for her friend was not dead. Can true love die because the loved one has passed within the veil of death? For Mrs. Tregoning such a change was impossible. It was her love for her friend which had brought her to the sculptor's house this day.

"How lovely! How exactly like her! Ah, my sweet Ida!" sighed Mrs. Tregoning.

About the pedestal were placed some handsome ferns in pots, and on a small table before the bust stood a little glass basket containing white violets, whose fragrance filled the room.

As her eyes fell on these, Mrs. Tregoning said to herself: "Then her child lives, for surely it is her hand that has arranged these flowers and ferns about her mother's image."

She looked round the room again. There were other traces of feminine taste—some snowdrops in slender vases amongst the bronzes on the mantelshelf, an embroidered "couvre pied" on the dark leathern sofa, some quaint dark blue plates hung here and there beneath the heavy picture-frames. But ere Mrs. Tregoning could observe more, the door opened, and Antonio Nicolari stood before her.

"Mrs. Tregoning," he said, bowing low, "it is many years since last we met."

"You may well say that," she replied, as she gave him her hand; "half my life seems to have gone by since then. I was almost afraid to come, lest my coming should seem an intrusion, after so long an interval."

"You had no right to fear that," he said; "how could I be other than glad to see one who was her friend?"

By a slight but reverent bend of the head, he indicated his wife's bust as he spoke.

"Then he has not married again, as I half expected," thought Mrs. Tregoning, though she could hardly have given a logical demonstration of her method of arriving at this conclusion.

She had known comparatively little of her friend's husband, having seen Ida Nicolari but twice since her marriage. She herself had been married several years earlier, and at the time of her friend's marriage, her mind had been possessed by anxiety on account of her husband's health, which had broken down so completely that the only chance of prolonging his existence lay in removal to a more genial climate. Ida had been but a bride of a few weeks when Mrs. Tregoning started with her husband for Australia.

Yet Mrs. Tregoning had retained a distinct impression of Antonio Nicolari. She was surprised to see how much he had altered. When she made his acquaintance, he was a man in mature life. But the years of trouble and toil and whole-souled devotion to Art which he had passed since she saw him had aged him more than their mere number justified. Yet there was that in the worn, lined face that called forth her admiration. It was the face of an artist, and every line told of deep thought and earnest toil. There were patience and strength and penetrative insight in the calm gaze of the large grey, deep-sunken eyes, overhung by such shaggy eyebrows. The strong iron-grey hair was parted in straight lines above a forehead of grand proportions, cleft and furrowed with lines that gave witness to the constant working of the artist mind. Yet there was more of melancholy than of hope in the expression of the countenance.

But of this Mrs. Tregoning was hardly aware. In her way she was observant, but she had not the sympathetic intuition that can penetrate below the surface of another's life. She only knew that she liked the look of Antonio's grave, thoughtful face, and that it inspired her with confidence in him as a good and trustworthy man.

"Thank you," she said gently, in response to his words, as she turned again to look at the bust; "I should not have doubted. How vividly that recalls her! I need not ask if it is your work."

"Yes, it is mine," he said with a sigh, "but it is not what I could wish. I look upon it as a failure."

"Surely it is not that," she replied, "but I understand. I cannot tell you what a grief it was to me when, in my distant home, I heard the news of your loss. It did not reach me till long after the event. I thought of writing to you, but so many months had passed that I feared my words might reopen the wound that was beginning to close. Besides, it is not easy for me to put my deepest feelings on paper. The written words seem so cold and conventional."

"I thank you that you did not write," said Antonio, quietly; "I should have had cause for thankfulness had all my friends been as discreet. When one's heart is bleeding, words do but torture."

"I know what you must have suffered," said Mrs. Tregoning, tremulously. "It was bitter grief to me to know that my friend had passed from earth, but for you it meant utter desolation. Such a pure and gentle spirit was Ida's!"

"Yes," said the sculptor, sadly, "she was too pure to breathe long the gross air of earth. 'Whom the gods love die young.'"

"There is a question I am longing to ask," said Mrs. Tregoning; "I hope you can answer it without pain. The newspaper in which I read that most sad news informed me also of the birth of Ida's daughter. Has the child lived?"

"I am thankful that I can answer that question in the affirmative," said Antonio, his face softening as he spoke. "My daughter is the light of my life; it would be dreary indeed without her, despite my loved art."

"And is she like her mother?" asked Mrs. Tregoning, eagerly. "Why, she can hardly be a child now—it is eighteen years since dear Ida passed away."

"You are right," he said sadly. "The fifth of this month was the eighteenth anniversary of that dark day. Eighteen years! And yet sometimes it seems as if it were but yesterday."

"You have not yet told me whether your daughter resembles her mother," urged Mrs. Tregoning.

"Resembles her? Yes, verily, but she is cast in a more delicate mould, my little Ida. Her beauty is purely Grecian. She has inherited some of the lineaments of my father's mother—you know that I am of Greek descent?"

"I did not know it," said Mrs. Tregoning; "I fancied you were of Italian birth."