A fowl was occasionally dressed for him, simply that the black
poodle, his faithful companion, might have the bones. Bartolommeo
never complained of the noise. If the huntsmen's horns and baying
dogs disturbed his sleep during his illness, he only said, "Ah!
Don Juan has come back again." Never on earth has there been a
father so little exacting and so indulgent; and, in consequence,
young Belvidero, accustomed to treat his father unceremoniously,
had all the faults of a spoiled child. He treated old Bartolommeo
as a wilful courtesan treats an elderly adorer; buying indemnity
for insolence with a smile, selling good-humor, submitting to be
loved.
Don Juan, beholding scene after scene of his younger years, saw
that it would be a difficult task to find his father's indulgence
at fault. Some new-born remorse stirred the depths of his heart;
he felt almost ready to forgive this father now about to die for
having lived so long. He had an accession of filial piety, like a
thief's return in thought to honesty at the prospect of a million
adroitly stolen.
Before long Don Juan had crossed the lofty, chilly suite of rooms
in which his father lived; the penetrating influences of the damp
close air, the mustiness diffused by old tapestries and presses
thickly covered with dust had passed into him, and now he stood
in the old man's antiquated room, in the repulsive presence of
the deathbed, beside a dying fire.
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