from the Xystine chimney. The affair was very mysterious! What combinations behind those white walls! [Pg 90] [Pg 90] Inside the basilica, there were thousands of expectant people, officials of the Vatican, cardinalitial familiars, prelates, penitentiaries, beneficiaries, who had not been immured in the Conclave. Also there were lords and ladies of eminent quality belonging to the Black (or clerical) Party, who had been admitted with meticulous secrecy (in broad day-light and in face of all Rome) by a privy door. Every day for weeks, they had come and waited, hoping to be among the first to salute the Pope. To go to St. Peter's in the morning before dinner, and in the evening before supper, had become the mode in a society which has few and futile dissipations of its own and to which the comity of the Quirinale and White Society is forbidden fruit. Some, who were near the great doorway, thought they heard faint tappings in the gallery over-head. Rumour protruded her tongue: certainly there were tappings, more ponderous, more insistent. Certainly the balcony was being opened. Then the crashing ceased. In the hush, surmises were born; and stifled: or nurtured. A loose Benedictine with a face of a flesher, who was leaning against one of the great piers, suddenly asseverated that the tapping had begun again: but in another place—further away, he said. An honorary decurial chamberlain-of-the-cloak-and-sword sniffed long-nosedly, picking a vandyke beardlet; and stuttered, "They're n-n-never o-opening the outer b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-balcony." That notion resembled the spark between negative and positive poles. It vibrated and glittered; and fell upon a heap of human combustibles. "Then what are we waiting here for?" shouted Prince Clenalotti; and he made a dash at the door by which he had entered. Naturally he led a stampede. The crowd in the Square stood obliquely to the church, with all its eyes directed to the Vatican: when, round from Via della Sagrestia poured a stream of half-wild creatures, shooting instant glances at the vacant balcony, and bringing amazing news. The two[Pg 91] crowds flew together, thronging the wide stone steps and the open space beneath. The military rigesced to attention. The special correspondents (as one man) made for the obelisk in the centre, or the basins of the fountains, and set-up portable pairs of steps. And, of course, motor-cars and cabs, and Caio and Tizio and also Sempronio, not to mention Maria and Elena and Yolanda and also Margherita, began to issue from every Borgo avenue.
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