The Fortnightly Review: No. CCCCLXIII, New Series [‎663v] (217/239)

186
NOSTALGIA.
time since she had been in Rome she caught herself admiring some
thing.
“ Come along! ” said Massimo, arriving hurriedly, and brandishing
a pair of new gloves; “three-fifty they cost me! Woe to Madame
if she doesn’t pay me with some hope! ”
“ I believe you’d be capable of marrying her,” said Regina, with
a gesture of disgust.
She’d like it,” said Arduina.
Shut up! The point is should I like it? ” said the young man.
“I’m not up for sale.”
Passing the Princess’s little garden gate, Massimo said, “ This is
the entrance for Madame’s lovers! ”
But they walked on and rang at the hall door of the villa, or rather
of the villas, for there were two; small but handsome houses, joined
by an aerial terrace or hanging garden.
“ Like two little brothers holding each other’s hands,” said Regina,
with a sigh.
A servant in plain clothes opened the polished door, and dis
closed two great wolves, apparently alive, lying in ambush on the red
rugs of the entrance hall.
The rooms were much overheated. Thick carpets, skins of
bears spread before large low divans, themselves covered with furs,
exhaled what seemed the hot breath of wild beasts sleeping in the
sun an atmosphere wild, voluptuous—noxious. Huge waving
branches of red-berried wild plants rose from tall metal vases. The
Princess, richly but clumsily dressed in black velvet and white lace,
was discoursing in French to two elderly ladies, telling them the
ad\ entures of her aunt, wife of the man who had known Georges
Sand.
“ At that time,” she was saying, “ my aunt was the best dressed
woman in Palis. Georges Sand described one of her costumes in
the Marquis de Villemer. ...”
Beyond the two elderly ladies, an old gentleman, shaven and bald,
his head shining like a bowl of pink china, lolled in an armchair and
listened sleepily.
Marianna, in a low pink dress, ran to the newcomers with her
little rat-like steps, and surveyed Regina inquisitively.
“ You look very well, Madame,” she said; “ is there no news? ”
“ What news do you expect? ” asked Regina.
Marianna giggled, her little eyes shining unnaturally. Regina
could not resist the suspicion that the rat was excited with wine,
and she felt a resurgence of the curious physical disgust with which
the princess and this girl inspired her.
Madame at first paid scant attention to the Venutellis. Other
guests were arriving, the greater number odd looking, elderly ladies
in diesses of questionable freshness and fashion. Arduina soon got
into conversation with an unattractive gentleman whose round eyes
and flat nose surmounted an exaggerated jowl. Massimo followed
in the wake of Marianna, who came and went, running about, frisk-