pinched his neck with her soft hot fingers. “Save your silver tongue for the audience. Don’t speak horrors to me.”
And resting back against the chair, he felt the first soft sensuous strokes of her little brush on his face, the pull of her comb, the heat of her touch.
When he rose at last and turned to the mirror, he felt that familiar and no less alarming loss. Where was Tonio in this hourglass of dark red satin? Where was the boy behind these darkly painted eyes, these rouged lips, and this flowing white hair that ran in deep waves back from the forehead and in full long curls down the back?
It seemed he was drifting as he stared at her in the glass, and she whispered his name to him, and then drew back like some phantom on the other side who might suddenly take life away from him as he himself stood still.
He touched the bare skin of his shoulders with his gloved fingers; he shut his eyes and felt the familiar bones of his own face.
And then he realized that Signora Bianchi had withdrawn from him as she sometimes did. It was as if she herself were startled by the final effect. And when he turned to her very slowly, he had the distinct impression she was frightened.
It seemed in some other distant world a roar had arisen from the crowd. Old Nino said they had lighted the great chandelier; the theater was overflowing. And there was yet so much time….
He looked down at Signora Bianchi. Her face showed no pleasure, and her little squinting eyes darted over him anxiously as she appeared to shrink away.
“What is it?” he whispered. “Why do you look at me that way?”
“Darling one…” Her voice became mechanical. “You are magnificent. You could fool even me….”
“No, no…why do you look at me that way?” he whispered again, certain no one living could have told it was not a woman’s whisper.
She didn’t answer.
And suddenly he advanced all of a piece like a doll gliding towards her and she backed up suddenly and let out a little cry.
He was glaring at her.
“Tonio, stop it!” she said, biting her lip.
“Then what is it?” he demanded again.
“All right, then, you are like a demon, a perfect woman who is larger, larger than life! You are delicate and beautiful all over; but you are too large! And you frighten me as if the angel of God were to come into this room, now, and fill it up with his wings, knocking the feathers out of them so that they were tumbling down through the air, even as you heard a scraping of his wings against the ceiling. And his head was bigger and his hands were bigger…well, that is what you are…. You are beautiful and perfect, yet you are a…”
“A monster, my dearest,” he whispered. And on impulse he took her face in both hands and gave her another deep kiss.
She held her breath, her eyes closed, her mouth open, and then her heavy breasts heaved with a sigh.
“You belong out there….” she murmured. And then she opened her eyes. For a long time, she just looked at him and then her face crinkled with pleasure and pride and she threw her arms about his waist.
“Do you love me?” he asked.
“Ah!” She backed away. “What do you care about me! All of Rome is about to love you, all of Rome is about to fall at your feet! And you ask do I love you? Who am I?”
“Yes, yes, but I want you to love me, in this room, now.”
“Oh, so soon it starts.” She smiled. She lifted her hands to caress the white waves of hair, to slip a long jeweled pin in place. “The endless vanity”—she sighed—“with its endless greed.”
“Is that what it is?” he asked softly. She stopped.
“You’re afraid,” she whispered.
“A little, Signora, a little.” He smiled.
“But, darling…” she started.
But the door had flown open, and a breathless Paolo, his hair wet and rumpled, came into the room.
“Tonio, you should hear them, the trash! They’re saying Ruggerio paid you more than Bettichino, and they’re spoiling for a fight. And the place is full of Venetians, Tonio, they’ve come all the way just to hear you sing. There’ll be a fight all right, but, Tonio, they’re not going to give you a chance!”
14
THERE WAS NO MORE TIME. Twenty-five years of trudging steadily towards this moment, then it was down to a couple of years, then