Diary of Marie Bashkirtseff
CZENUKFR

Thursday 2 March 1876

Maman has made a muddle of things — she let our apartment be let and we are obliged to move to the second floor. It is raining; we go to the Porta Pia, but we meet Plowden, who is turning back — the hunt has already set off. "I knew you would come," he says, "that is why I came." The weather clears and we go to look for lodgings.
Around five o'clock we go out and stop to listen to the Pincio band. Plowden was coming down, but having seen us he turns back and comes to the carriage. O Gioia! Bruschetti, who was about to approach, retreats on catching sight of this gentleman. A thousand thanks. Plowden! But no — he comes over all the same, may the plague choke him! Oh, how I hate him, how he disgusts me! My God, rid me of this man! I will not listen to anything, I shall send him away. It will be kinder, and I shall be less tormented. He adores me — I can see it, I know it — and I detest him with all my heart, with all my soul!
Why must nature be thus! A mystery of the human heart that wretched I shall never fathom. I do not speak to him; I speak to the Englishman, who pays me no end of compliments.
"There is your adoration — your adorer, I mean to say," he says, when the cardinalino arrives, for arrive he does — I can scarcely believe my eyes.
He remains with Bruschetti at Maman's carriage door, then comes
to mine. I have the greatest difficulty in convincing him that the pink domino was not I. I say that I was at the ball, but in black, in a third-tier box, and that I saw him with a red domino and with a pink domino.
To persuade him more effectively I say that the one at the Capitoline was me. It seems Plowden was greatly intrigued by the hood trimmed with silver; it seems I spoke to him at the Capitoline. He calls me the white rose.
"Word of honour," I say to Antonelli, regarding the masked ball.
"The word of an hour, yes," he replies.
I eat violets and suffer through Bruschetti's presence. At last he goes. Phew!
He is revolting — detest him, I beg you, have done with him! I cannot bear him! Lord have mercy!
The band ceased playing long ago and still we are here!
When the others had gone, Antonelli came back.
"Give me two violets," he says, "I am hungry now."
And he takes two violets from the bouquet at my bodice. We arrange to meet that evening at the Opera.
Altamura, who was supposed to leave, stays on for the theatre. And indeed we all find ourselves there. Antonelli remains with us the whole time.
The one I had been calling Cesaro is no more Cesaro than I am — he is the Marquis or Count Zucchini.
"He is married," says Pietro, "but his wife has gone — she refused to stay with him."
Zucchini — his name, his face — have the singular privilege of making me laugh. I succeed at last in fully convincing Antonelli that the pink domino was not I.
"I am very glad of it," he says, "for she said things to me..."
"Wicked things? How could you believe for a moment that I am capable of saying..."
"Oh no, not wicked, but..."
"Disagreeable."
"Yes."
He explains that he does nothing at all, and Maman lectures him. He says that today at the Pincio he had been waiting for us since two o'clock.
"I should very much like to occupy myself with business," he says later, "but Papa gives me nothing. Charming, that."
O malediction! There is Bruschetti. To avoid being obliged to talk to him I tell him I am tired, in bad humour, that my heart is travelling through unknown countries and will never stop. And the brute stands there, sighs, perspires, and makes my nerves scream!
I have the excellent habit of looking into men's shirt cuffs and through the gap in the shirt that sometimes falls open at the chest when one leans forward. And what did I see on Bruschetti! Heaven and earth! A flannel undershirt — tartan!!
Antonelli leaves, Altamura too; I stay another ten minutes and then we go. A little more and I would have collapsed in a nervous fit. This Bruschetti poisons everything for me! He puts us into the carriage! I climb our staircase howling like a wounded dog. If only this infamous Italian could die — for I shall not send him away; he must come to Nice, and there I shall refuse him my heart and everything else, in the presence of all the dogs of the city.
Let us drop, let us drop this maddening subject!
I believe Antonelli is toying with me. I am mad about him just now and I am dying to hear him say that he is mad about me.
He is a child — he speaks like a child and tells things in a naïve and charming manner, while being a thoroughgoing rogue. I like him too much to have any ill intentions toward him. No, truly my intentions are entirely honourable.
What is one to do with a woman who cannot live without love! It is a perpetual fever. I only hope I shall have no trouble with the cardinalino. I am already afraid — after all, I have learned my lesson on that score.
Now my room and the drawing room are quite separate from the other rooms. Left alone I fell to dreaming of Antonelli. Does he dream of me? How degrading! Well, well — these are old refrains.
Never the one I want! In Nice it was Galula, here it is Bruschetti. There are nine letters in Audiffret and nine in Antonelli. Both names begin with A. It has been a long time since I last wrote to Brother Émile of penury and rope. May the devil take him. Saint Peter is a great deal grander than a simple monk.
I am a girl.

Notes

O Gioia! — Italian: "Oh Joy!" In the original. ↩
Domino — a masquerade costume consisting of a loose cloak and half-mask, common at Carnival balls. ↩