BEPPO, THE CONSCRIPT.
BY T. ADOLPHUS TROLLOPE.
CHAPTER V. SIGNOR SANDRO BARTOLDI.
As soon as the three seniors had been thus left to themselves, sitting over the table, at which they had been dining, and which continued covered with the cloth that had excited Sir Sandro’s admiration, the attorney prepared to enter at once on the subject of his visit. The glasses and flasks were still upon the table; and the farmer and the priest replenished theirs yet once again; but the more abstemious townsman, less accustomed to deep potations, and who had been really in earnest when he said that farmer Vanni’s wine was of a quality that made it necessary to count the glasses, declined to drink any more, though strongly forced to do so by his two companions.
Signor Alessandro Bartoldi, the well-known attorney of Fano, was a good sort of man enough in his way. He had long been a widower, and lived only for his one daughter. He had very little comprehension of living for her, or doing anything for her in any other way, than by increasing the handsome fortune which he had already accumulated for her. Though too much disposed to be all things to all men, to be called a perfectly honest man in the largest sense of the word,—he was thoroughly such in the more restricted and ordinarily understood signification of the term. He was strictly honest in his professional avocation, and in his pursuit of wealth; being genuinely persuaded that for that purpose, at least in his department of the world’s affairs, honesty was the best policy. A veritable Vicar of Bray in politics, he had quite sense enough to understand, that the recent changes were calculated to increase the material prosperity of the country; and was, therefore, well disposed towards the new government. But, not being at all of the stuff of which martyrs are made, he had felt no disposition to risk getting himself into trouble by taking any part in the extrusion of the old order of things. He never talked politics, nor got into the way of hearing them talked if he could help it. He always obeyed the law; and was one of those men, who may take oaths of allegiance to a dozen different governments in succession, without being justly chargeable with any false swearing; for his allegiance was sincerely rendered to every ruler as long as he was in power; and he most assuredly never contemplated promising it for an hour longer. Besides, and after his daughter, the only thing he cared for in the world was his collection of ancient documents, charters, grants, contracts, and such like, which was noted as the most important collection of the kind in that part of Italy, and by means of which he purposed some day illustrating a work on the history of Romagna and the March of Ancona.
He was a little, alert, brisk old gentleman, with a small, round, closely and always cleanly shaven face, a florid complexion, a shrewd twinkling eye, a benevolent expression of features, an almost entirely bald head, and a forehead deeply marked with a whole series of horizontal furrows, the result probably of a life-long habit of raising his eyebrows and assuming an expression intended to suggest that there was a great deal to be said on both sides, which he always resorted to whenever any difference of opinion or difficulty of any sort was mooted before him. If that little pantomime was found insufficient to set the matter at rest, as far as he was concerned, he would, if sitting down, nurse one leg laid over the knee of the other, handling it with the greatest tenderness, as if it represented the question in hand; or, if standing up, stick his thumbs into the arm-holes of his waistcoat, throw his head back, and enunciate the ejaculation, “Per—r—r Bac—co!” or, sometimes, if the case were a grave one, “Per—r—din—ci Bac—co!” uttering the words very slowly and with a long-drawn breath, and following it up with three or four raisings and depressions of his chin, executed with a slow uniform motion like the working of a steam-engine piston.
Signor Alessandro Bartoldi was no fool withal; but these little peculiarities constituted the arms, offensive and defensive, which he had found most available for making his way and holding his own in a somewhat disjointed world, and in difficult times.
“I wanted to speak to you to-day, my esteemed friend,” said the attorney, addressing the farmer, “on a little matter, in which it has seemed to me that I might be able to be of use to you. I know I may speak freely before his reverence; for I am aware of the friendship that unites him to your family. Indeed, I am fortunate in having an opportunity of profiting by his valuable counsel in the matter;—though it is a bit of good fortune that I did not anticipate.”
The priest gave a little bow, but said nothing. Signor Alessandro Bartoldi was no favourite of his; for Don Evandro was a politician of the class, whose members consider every one against them who is not with them; and he knew what to expect from Sandro in that matter. Although the project of a marriage between Beppo Vanni and Lisa Bartoldi had been first set on foot by him, the idea had not arisen out of any personal intimacy between him and the attorney, but had first been suggested to him by a brother priest of Fano, who was anxious to secure the attorney’s wealth to the good cause; which Don Evandro had thought effectually to do by conferring it, with Lisa’s hand, on the submissive son of his eminently right-minded parishioner and intimate friend, old Farmer Vanni.
Honest little Sandro, on the other hand, did