Benvenuto would have returned to Paris the same evening, but the king was so persistent that he could not avoid remaining at the château until the following morning.
With the rapidity of conception and promptness of decision which were characteristic of him, he determined to arrange for the next day the dénouement of a transaction which he began long before. It was a collateral matter which he wished to have off his hands altogether before devoting himself entirely to Ascanio and Colombe.
He remained at the château to supper on that evening and until after breakfast on the Friday, and not until noon did he set out on his return journey, accompanied by little Jehan, after taking leave of the king and Madame d'Etampes.
Both were well mounted, and yet, contrary to his wont, Cellini did not urge his horse. It was evident that he did not wish to enter Paris before a certain hour, and it was seven o'clock in the evening when he alighted at Rue de la Harpe.
Furthermore, instead of betaking himself at once to the Hôtel de Nesle, he called upon one of his friends named Guido, a physician from Florence; and when he had made sure that his friend was at home, and could conveniently entertain him at supper, he ordered little Jehan to return alone, to say that he had remained at Fontainebleau and would not return until the next day, and to be ready to open the door when he should knock. Little Jehan at once set out for the Hôtel de Nesle, promising to abide by his instructions.
The supper was served,—but before they took their places at the table Cellini asked his host if he did not know some honest and skilful notary whom he could send for to prepare a contract that could not be assailed. He recommended his son-in-law, who was immediately summoned.
He arrived as they were finishing their supper, some half-hour later. Benvenuto at once left the table, closeted himself with him, and bade him draw up a marriage contract leaving the names in blank. When they had read and re-read the contract, as drawn up, to make sure that there was no flaw in it, Benvenuto paid him handsomely, put the contract in his pocket, borrowed from his friend a second sword of just the length of his own, put it under his cloak, and, as it had become quite dark, started for the Hôtel de Nesle.
When he reached his destination, he knocked once; but though he knocked very gently, the door immediately opened. Little Jehan was at his post.
Cellini questioned him: the workmen were at supper and did not expect him until the morrow. He bade the child maintain the most absolute silence as to his arrival, then crept up to Catherine's room, to which he had retained a key, entered softly, closed the door, concealed himself behind the hangings, and waited.
After a short time, he heard a light footstep on the staircase. The door opened a second time, and Scozzone entered, lamp in hand; she took the key from the outside, locked the door, placed the lamp on the chimneypiece, and sat down in a large arm-chair, so placed that Benvenuto could see her face.
To his vast astonishment, that face, formerly so open and joyous and animated, was sad and thoughtful. The fact was that poor Scozzone was in the throes of something very like remorse.
We have seen her when she was happy and thoughtless: then Benvenuto loved her. So long as she was conscious of that love, or rather of that kindly feeling in her lover's heart, so long as the hope of becoming the sculptor's wife some day was present like a golden cloud in all her dreams, so long she maintained herself at the level of her anticipations, and made atonement for her past by her love. But as soon as she discovered that she had been deceived by appearances, and that what she had mistaken for passion on Cellini's part was at most a mere whim, she descended the ladder of hope round by round. Benvenuto's smile, which had made that faded heart blossom anew, was taken from her, and the heart lost its freshness once more.
With her childish light-heartedness her childish purity had gradually vanished; her old nature, powerfully assisted by ennui, gently recovered the upper hand. A newly painted wall keeps its colors in the sun and loses them in the rain: Scozzone, abandoned by Cellini for some unknown mistress, was no longer held to him save by a remnant of her pride. Pagolo had long paid court to her: she spoke to Cellini of his love, thinking that his jealousy would be aroused. Her expectation was not realized: Cellini, instead of losing his temper, began to laugh, and, instead of forbidding her to see Pagolo, actually ordered her to receive him. Thereafter she felt that she was entirely lost; thereafter she abandoned her life to chance with her former indifference, and let it blow about in the wind of circumstances like a poor, fallen withered leaf.
Then it was that Pagolo triumphed over her indifference. After all was said, Pagolo was young; Pagolo, aside from his hypocritical expression, was a handsome youth; Pagolo was in love, and was forever repeating to her that he loved her, while Benvenuto had long since ceased to tell her so. The words, "I love you," are the language of the heart, and the heart always feels the need of speaking that language more or less ardently with some one.
Thus, in a moment of idleness, of anger, perhaps of illusion, Scozzone had told Pagolo that she loved him; she had told him so without really loving him; she had told him so with Cellini's image in her heart and his name upon her lips.
Then it immediately occurred to her that the day might come when Cellini, weary of his mysterious, unavailing passion, would return to her, and, if he found her constant, notwithstanding his express orders, would reward her devotion, not by marriage, for the poor girl had lost her last illusion in that regard, but by some remnant of esteem and compassion which she might take for a resurrection of his former love.
It was such thoughts as these which made Scozzone sad and thoughtful, and caused her to feel remorse.
In the midst of her silent reverie, she started and raised her head. She heard a light step on the stairway, and the next moment a key was rapidly turned in the lock, and the door opened.
"How did you come in? Who gave you that key, Pagolo?" she cried, rising from her chair. "There are only two keys to that door,—one is in my possession and the other in Cellini's."
"Ah! my dear Catherine," laughed Pagolo, "you're a capricious creature: sometimes you open your door to a fellow, and again you keep it closed; and when one attempts to enter by force, even though you have given him a right to do it, you threaten to call for help. So you see I had to resort to stratagem."
"Oh yes! tell me that you stole the key from Cellini, without his knowledge; tell me that he doesn't know you have it, for if he gave it to you I should die of shame and chagrin."
"Set your mind at rest, my lovely Catherine," said Pagolo, locking the door, and sitting down near the girl, whom he forced to a seat beside him. "No, Benvenuto doesn't love you, it is true: but he's like those misers who have a treasure of which they make no use themselves, but which they won't allow anybody else to touch. No, I made the key myself. He who can do great things can do small things. Tell me if I love you, Catherine, when my hands, which are accustomed to making pearls and diamonds bloom on golden stalks, consented to shape an ignoble piece of iron. It is true, wicked one, that the ignoble piece of iron was a key, and that the key unlocked the door of paradise."
With that, Pagolo would have taken Catherine's hand, but, to the vast amazement of Cellini, who did not lose a word or a gesture of this scene, Catherine repulsed him.
"Well, well," said Pagolo, "is this whim likely to last long, pray?"
"Look you, Pagolo," said Catherine, in a melancholy tone, which went to Cellini's heart; "I know that when a woman has once yielded she has no right to draw back afterward; but if the man for whom she has been so weak has a generous heart,—when she says to him that she was acting in good faith at the time, because she had lost her reason, but that she was mistaken,—it is that man's duty, believe me, not to take an unfair advantage of her momentary error. Well, Pagolo, I tell you this: I yielded to you, and yet I did not love you; I loved another, and that other Cellini. Despise me you may,—indeed you ought,—but torment me no more, Pagolo."
"Good!" exclaimed Pagolo, "good! you arrange the matter marvellously well, upon my word! After the time you compelled me to wait for the favor with which you now reproach me, you think that I will release you from a definite engagement which you entered into of your own free will? No, no! And when I think that you are doing all this for Benvenuto, for a man who is twice your age or mine, for a man who doesn't love you, for a man who despises you, for a man who treats you as a courtesan!"
"Stop, Pagolo, stop!" cried Scozzone, blushing with shame and jealousy and rage. "Benvenuto doesn't love me any more, that is true; but he did love me once, and he esteems me still."
"Very good! Why doesn't he marry you, as he promised to do?"
"Promised? Never. No, Benvenuto never promised to make me his wife; for if he had promised, he would have done it. I aspired to mount so high as that: the aspiration led me to hope that it might be so; and when the hope had once taken shape in my heart, I could not confine it there, it overflowed, and I boasted of a mere hope as if it were a reality. No, Pagolo, no," continued Catherine, letting her hand fall into the apprentice's with a sad smile,—"no, Benvenuto never promised me aught."
"Then, see how ungrateful you are, Scozzone!" cried Pagolo, seizing her hand, and mistaking what was simply a mark of dejection for a return to him; "you repulse me, who have promised you and offered you all that Benvenuto, by your own admission, never promised or offered you, while I am convinced that if he were standing there—he who betrayed you—you would freely make to him the confession you so bitterly regret having made to me, who love you so dearly."
"Oh if he were here!" cried Scozzone, "if he were here, Pagolo, you would remember that you betrayed him through hatred, while I betrayed him because I loved him, and you would sink into the ground!"
"Why so?" demanded Pagolo, bold as a lion because he believed Benvenuto to be far away; "why so, if you please? Hasn't every man the right to win a woman's love when that woman doesn't belong to another? If he were here, I would say to him: 'You abandoned Catherine,—poor Catherine, who loved you so well. She was in despair at first, until she fell in with a kind-hearted, worthy fellow, who appreciated her at her true worth, who loved her, and who promised her what you would never promise her,—to make her his wife. He has inherited your rights, and that woman belongs to him.' Tell me, Catherine, what reply your Cellini could make to that?"
"None at all," said a stern, manly voice behind the enthusiastic Pagolo,—"absolutely none at all."
At the same instant a powerful hand fell upon his shoulder, nipped his eloquence in the bud, and threw him to the floor, as pale and terrified as he had been boastful and rash a moment before.
It was a strange picture: Pagolo on his knees, bent double, with colorless cheeks, and deadly terror depicted on his features; Scozzone, half risen from her chair, motionless and dumfounded, like a statue of Astonishment; and lastly, Benvenuto standing with folded arms, a sword in its sheath in one hand, a naked sword in the other, with an expression in which irony and menace struggled for the mastery.
There was a moment of awful silence, Pagolo and Scozzone being equally abashed beneath the master's frown.
"Treachery!" muttered Pagolo, "treachery!"
"Yes, treachery on your part, wretch!" retorted Cellini.
"You asked to see him, Pagolo," said Scozzone; "here he is."
"Yes, here he is," said the apprentice, ashamed to be thus treated before the woman he was so anxious to please; "but he is armed, and I have no weapon."
"I have brought you one," said Cellini, stepping back, and throwing down the sword he held in his left hand at Pagolo's feet.
Pagolo looked at the sword, but made no movement.
"Come," said Cellini, "pick up the sword and stand up yourself. I am waiting."
"A duel?" muttered the apprentice, whose teeth were chattering with terror; "am I able to fight a duel on equal terms with you?"
"Very well," said Cellini, passing his weapon from one hand to the other, "I will fight with my left hand, and that will make us equal."
"I fight with you, my benefactor?—you, to whom I owe everything? Never! never!"
A smile of profound contempt overspread Benvenuto's face, while Scozzone recoiled without seeking to conceal the disgust which showed itself in her expression.
"You should have remembered my benefactions before stealing from me the woman I intrusted to your honor and Ascanio's," said Benvenuto. "Your memory has come back to you too late. On guard, Pagolo! on guard!"
"No! no!" murmured the coward, falling back upon his knees.
"As you refuse to fight like an honest man," said Benvenuto, "I propose to punish you as a scoundrel."
He replaced his sword in its sheath, drew his dagger, and walked slowly toward the apprentice without the slightest indication either of anger or compassion upon his impassive features.
Scozzone rushed between them with a shriek; but Benvenuto, without violence, with a motion of his arm as irresistible as that of a bronze statue endowed with life, put her aside, and the poor girl fell back half dead upon her chair. Benvenuto walked on toward Pagolo, who receded as far as the wall. There the master overtook him, and said, putting his dagger to his throat,—
"Commend your soul to God: you have five minutes to live."
"Mercy!" cried Pagolo in an inarticulate voice; "do not kill me! mercy! mercy!"
"What!" said Cellini, "you know me, and, knowing me, seduced the woman who belonged to me. I know all, I have discovered everything, and you hope that I will spare you! You are laughing at me, Pagolo, you are laughing at me."
Benvenuto himself laughed aloud as he spoke; but it was a strident, terrible laugh, which made the apprentice shudder to his marrow.
"Master! master!" cried Pagolo, as he felt the point of the dagger pricking his throat; "it was she, not I: yes, she led me into it."
"Treachery, cowardice, and slander! I will make a group of those three monsters some day," said Benvenuto, "and it will be a hideous thing to see. She led you into it, you reptile! Do you forget that I was here and heard all that you said?"
"O Benvenuto," murmured Catherine, "you know that he lies when he says that, do you not?"
"Yes, yes," said Benvenuto, "I know that he lies when he says that, as he lied when he said that he was ready to marry you; but never fear, he shall be punished for the double lie."
"Yes, punish me," cried Pagolo, "but be merciful: punish me, but do not kill me."
"You lied when you said that she led you into it?"
"Yes, I lied; yes, I am the guilty one. I loved her madly; and you know, master, what love will lead a man to do."
"You lied when you said that you were ready to marry her?"
"No, no, master; then I didn't lie."
"So you really love Scozzone?"
"Oh, yes, indeed I love her!" replied Pagolo, realizing that the only way of lessening his guilt in Cellini's eyes was to attribute his crime to the violence of his passion; "yes, I love her."
"And you say again that you were not lying when you proposed to marry her?"
"I was not lying, master."
"You would have made her your wife?"
"If she had not belonged to you, yes."
"Very well, then, take her: I give her to you."
"What do you say? You are joking, are you not?"
"No, I never spoke more seriously: look at me if you doubt it."
Pagolo glanced furtively at Cellini, and saw plainly in his face that the judge might at any moment give place to the executioner; he bowed his head, therefore, with a groan.
"Take that ring from your finger, Pagolo, and put it on Catherine's."
Pagolo passively obeyed the first portion of the order, and Benvenuto motioned to Scozzone to draw near. She obeyed.
"Put out your hand, Scozzone," continued Benvenuto.
Again she obeyed.
"Now do the rest."
Pagolo placed the ring upon Scozzone's finger.
"Now," said Benvenuto, "that the betrothal is duly accomplished, we will pass to the marriage."
"Marriage!" muttered Pagolo; "we can't be married in this way; we must have notaries and a priest."
"We must have a contract," rejoined Benvenuto, producing the one prepared under his orders. "Here is one all ready, in which the names only need to be inserted."
He placed the contract upon a table, took up a pen and handed it to Pagolo.
"Sign, Pagolo," said he, "sign."
"Ah! I have fallen into a trap," muttered the apprentice.
"Eh? what's that?" exclaimed Benvenuto, without raising his voice, but imparting to it an ominous accent. "A trap? Where is the trap in this? Did I urge you to come to Scozzone's room? Did I advise you to tell her that you wished to make her your wife? Very good! make her your wife, Pagolo, and when you are her husband our rôles will be changed; if I come to her room, it will be your turn to threaten, and mine to be afraid."
"Oh, that would be too absurd!" cried Catherine, passing from extreme terror to hysterical gayety, and laughing aloud at the idea which the master's words evoked.
Somewhat reassured by the turn Cellini's threats had taken, and by Catherine's peals of laughter, Pagolo began to look at matters a little more reasonably. It became plain to him that Cellini wished to frighten him into a marriage for which he felt but little inclination: he considered, therefore, that would be rather too tragic a termination of the comedy, and that he might perhaps, with a little resolution, make a better bargain.
"Yes," he muttered, translating Scozzone's gayety into words, "yes, it would be very amusing, I agree, but unfortunately it cannot be."
"What! it cannot be!" cried Benvenuto, as amazed as a lion might be to find a fox demurring to his will.
"No, it cannot be," Pagolo repeated; "I prefer to die: kill me!"
The words were hardly out of his mouth when Cellini was upon him. Pagolo saw the dagger gleaming in the air, and threw himself to one side, so swiftly and successfully that the blow which was intended for him simply grazed his shoulder, and the blade, impelled by the goldsmith's powerful hand, penetrated the wainscoting to the depth of several inches.
"I consent," cried Pagolo. "Mercy! Cellini, I consent; I am ready to do anything." And while the master was withdrawing the dagger, which had come in contact with the wall behind the wainscoting, he ran to the table where the contract lay, seized the pen, and wrote his name. The whole affair had taken place so rapidly that Scozzone had no time to take part in it.
"Thanks, Pagolo," said she, wiping away the tears which terror had brought to her eyes, and at the same time repressing an inclination to smile; "thanks, dear Pagolo, for the honor you consent to confer upon me; but it's better that we should understand each other thoroughly now, so listen to me. Just now you would have none of me, and now I will have none of you. I don't say this to mortify you, Pagolo, but I do not love you, and I desire to remain as I am."
"In that case," said Benvenuto, with the utmost coolness, "if you won't have him, Scozzone, he must die."
"Why," cried Catherine, "it is I who refuse him."
"He must die," rejoined Benvenuto; "it shall not be said that a man insulted me, and went unpunished. Are you ready, Pagolo?"
"Catherine," cried the apprentice, "Catherine, in Heaven's name take pity on me! Catherine, I love you! Catherine, I will love you always! Sign, Catherine! Catherine be my wife, I beg you on my knees!"
"Come, Scozzone, decide quickly," said Cellini.
"Oh!" said Catherine, pouting, "tell me, master, don't you think you are rather hard on me, who have loved you so dearly, and who have dreamed of something so different? But," cried the fickle child, passing suddenly from melancholy to merriment once more, "Mon Dieu! Cellini, see what a piteous face poor Pagolo is making! Oh, for Heaven's sake, put aside that lugubrious expression, Pagolo, or I will never consent to take you for my husband! Really, you are too absurd!"
"Save me first, Catherine," said Pagolo; "then we will laugh, if you choose."
"Oh well! my poor boy, if you really and truly wish it—"
"Yes, indeed I do!"
"You know what I have been, you know what I am?"
"Yes, I know."
"You are not deceived in me?"
"No."
"You will not regret it?"
"No! no!"
"Then give me your hand. It's very ridiculous, and I hardly expected it; but, no matter, I am your wife."
She took the pen and signed, as a dutiful wife should do, below her husband's signature.
"Thanks, Catherine, thanks!" cried Pagolo; "you will see how happy I will make you."
"If he is false to that promise," said Benvenuto, "write to me, Scozzone, and wherever I may be I will come in person to remind him of it."
As he spoke, Cellini slowly pushed his dagger back into its sheath, keeping his eyes fixed upon the apprentice; then he took the contract, folded it neatly, and put it in his pocket, and said to Pagolo, with the withering sarcasm which was characteristic of him:—
"Now, friend Pagolo, although you and Scozzone are duly married according to the laws of men, you are not in God's sight, and the Church will not sanctify your union until to-morrow. Until then your presence here would be in contravention of all laws, divine and human. Good night, Pagolo."
Pagolo turned pale as death; but as Benvenuto pointed imperatively to the door, he backed out of the room.
"No one but you, Cellini, would ever have had such an idea as that," said Catherine, laughing as if she would die. "Hark ye, my poor Pagolo," she said, as he opened the door, "I let you go because the law requires it; but never fear, Pagolo, I swear by the Blessed Virgin, that when you are my husband no man, not even Benvenuto himself, will find me anything but a virtuous wife.
"O Cellini!" she added, gayly, when the door was closed, "you give me a husband, but relieve me of his presence for to-day. It is so much time gained: you owed me this reparation."