“It certainly is some size,” I admitted, eyeing the creation ruefully.
“No, no! The whole thing, I mean! Arsenio himself! Oh, how I should like to tell them the truth!”
“The funeral too was—tremendous,” I remarked. “But I suppose Amedeo’s told you?”
“Yes, he has! Also Father Garcia, who paid me a visit of condolence. And a number of Arsenio’s noble friends have sent condolences by stately, seedy menservants. Oh, and those trustees have left their cards, of course! Panizzi and the others!”
All this time we had been standing arm in arm, opposite the portentous monument of grief, gratitude, and homage. Now Lucinda withdrew her hand from my arm, and sank into a chair.
“I’m having fame thrust upon me! I’m being immortalized. The munificent widow of the munificent Arsenio Valdez! I’m becoming a public character! Oh, he is having his revenge on me, isn’t he? Julius, I can’t stand it! I must fly from Venice!”
My attention stuck on the monstrous wreath. “What are you going to do with that?”
“I wonder if there would ever be a dark enough night to tie a flat-iron to it, steal out with it round our necks, and drop it in the Grand Canal!” Lucinda speculated wistfully.
“AND did a dark enough night ever come, Julius?” Sir Paget asked with a chuckle.
It was late summer. I had arrived that day to pay him a visit and, incidentally, to complete the transaction by which Waldo was to convey to me the reversion to Cragsfoot. My uncle and I sat late together after dinner, while I regaled him with the story of the last days of Arsenio Valdez—of his luck, his death, and his glorification.
“Alas, sir, such things can’t actually happen in this world. They’re dreams—Platonic ideas laid up in heaven—inward dispositions towards things which can’t be literally translated into action! We did it in our souls. But, no; the wreath doesn’t, in bare and naked fact, lie at the bottom of the Grand Canal. It hangs proudly in the hall of Palazzo Valdez, the apple of his eye to fat old Amedeo, with whom Lucinda left it in charge—a pledge never likely to be demanded back—when she leased the _palazzo_ to him. He undertakes the upkeep and expenses, pays her about two hundred a year for it, and expects to do very well by letting out the apartments. He considers that the wreath will add prestige to the place and enhance its letting value. Besides, he’s genuinely very proud of it, and the Valdez legend loses nothing in his hands, I assure you.”