The Bravo, James Fenimore Cooper [best book reader .txt] 📗

not fail to heighten.

When this portion of his duty was ended, the Carmelite entered the oratory. With steady hands he lighted the candles of the altar, and made the other dispositions for the mass. During this interval Don Camillo was at the side of his mistress, whispering with the warmth of a triumphant and happy lover. The governess stood near the door, watching for the sound of footsteps in the antechamber. The monk then advanced to the entrance of the little chapel, and was about to speak, when a hurried step from Donna Florinda arrested his words. Don Camillo had just time to conceal his person within the drapery of a window, before the door opened and Annina entered.

When the preparations of the altar and the solemn countenance of the priest first met her eye, the girl recoiled with the air of one rebuked. But rallying her thoughts, with that readiness which had gained her the employment she filled, she crossed herself reverently, and took a place apart, like one who, while she knew her station, wished to participate in the mysteries of the holy office.

"Daughter, none who commence this mass with us, can quit the presence ere it be completed,", observed the monk.

"Father, it is my duty to be near the person of my mistress, and it is a happiness to be near it on the occasion of this early matin."

The monk was embarrassed. He looked from one to the other, in indecision, and was about to frame some pretence to get rid of the intruder, when Don Cainillo appeared in the middle of the room.

"Reverend monk, proceed," he said; "'tis but another witness of my happiness."

While speaking, the noble touched the handle of his sword significantly with a finger, and cast a look at the half petrified Annina, which effectually controlled the exclamation that was about to escape her. The monk appeared to understand the terms of this silent compact, for with a deep voice he commenced the offices of the mass. The singularity of their situation, the important results of the act in which they were engaged, the impressive dignity of the Carmelite, and the imminent hazard which they all ran of exposure, together with the certainty of punishment for their daring to thwart the will of Venice, if betrayed, caused a deeper feeling than that which usually pervades a marriage ceremony, to preside at nuptials thus celebrated. The youthful Violetta trembled at every intonation of the solemn voice of the monk, and towards the close she leaned in helplessness on the arm of the man to whom she had just plighted her vows. The eye of the Carmelite kindled as he proceeded with the office, however; and long ere he had done, he had obtained such a command over the feelings of even Annina as to hold her mercenary spirit in awe. The final union was pronounced, and the benediction given.

"Maria, of pure memory, watch over thy happiness, daughter!" said the monk, for the first time in his life saluting the fair brow of the weeping bride. "Duke of Sant' Agata, may thy patron hear thy prayers, as thou provest kind to this innocent and confiding child!"

"Amen!--Ha!--we are not too soon united, my Violetta; I hear the sound of oars."

A glance from the balcony assured him of the truth of his words, and rendered it apparent that it had now become necessary to take the most decided step of all. A six-oared gondola, of a size suited to endure the waves of the Adriatic at that mild season, and with a pavilion of fit dimensions, stopped at the water-gate of the palace.

"I wonder at this boldness!" exclaimed Don Camillo. "There must be no delay, lest some spy of the Republic apprise the police. Away, dearest Violetta--away, Donna Florinda! Father, away!"

The governess and her charge passed swiftly into the inner rooms. In a minute they returned bearing the caskets of Donna Violetta, and a sufficient supply of necessaries for a short voyage. The instant they reappeared, all was ready; for Don Camillo had long held himself prepared for this decisive moment, and the self-denying Carmelite had little need of superfluities. It was no moment for unnecessary explanation or trivial objections.

"Our hope is in celerity," said Don Camillo. "Secresy is impossible."

He was still speaking, when the monk led the way from the room. Donna Florinda and the half-breathless Violetta followed; Don Camillo drew the arm of Annina under his own, and in a low voice bid her, at her peril, refuse to obey.

The long suite of outer rooms was passed without meeting a single observer of the extraordinary movement. But when the fugitive entered the great hall that communicated with the principal stairs, they found themselves in the centre of a dozen menials of both sexes.

"Place," cried the Duke of Sant' Agata, whose person and voice were alike unknown to them. "Your mistress will breathe the air of the canals."

Wonder and curiosity were alive in every countenance, but suspicion and eager attention were uppermost in the features of many. The foot of Donna Violetta had scarcely touched the pavement of the lower hall, when several menials glided down the flight and quitted the palace by its different outlets. Each sought those who engaged him in the service. One flew along the narrow streets of the islands, to the residence of the Signor Gradenigo; another sought his son; and one, ignorant of the person of him he served, actually searched an agent of Don Camillo, to impart a circumstance in which that noble was himself so conspicuous an actor. To such a pass of corruption had double-dealing and mystery reduced the household of the fairest and richest in Venice! The gondola lay at the marble steps of the water gate, held against the stones by two of its crew. Don Camillo saw at a glance that the masked gondoliers had neglected none of the precautions he had prescribed, and he inwardly commended their punctuality. Each wore a short rapier at his girdle, and he fancied he could trace beneath the folds of their garments evidence of the presence of the clumsy fire-arms in use at that period. These observations were made while the Carmelite and Violetta entered the boat. Donna Florinda followed, and Annina was about to imitate her example, when she was arrested by the arm of Don Camillo.

"Thy service ends here," whispered the bridegroom. "Seek another mistress; in fault of a better, thou mayest devote thyself to Venice."

The little interruption caused Don Camillo to look backwards, and for a single moment he paused to scrutinize the group of eyes that crowded the hall of the palace, at a respectful distance.

"Adieu, my friends!" he added. "Those among ye who love your mistress shall be remembered."

He would have said more, but a rude seizure of his arms caused him to turn hastily away. He was firm in the grasp of the two gondoliers who had landed. While he was yet in too much astonishment to struggle, Annina, obedient to a signal, darted past him and leaped into the boat. The oars fell into the water; Don Camillo was repelled by a violent shove backwards into the hall, the gondoliers stepped lightly into their places, and the gondola swept away from the steps, beyond the power of him they left to follow.

"Gino!--miscreant!--what means this treachery?"

The moving of the parting gondola was accompanied by no other sound than the usual washing of the water. In speechless agony Don Camillo saw the boat glide, swifter and swifter at each stroke of the oars, along the canal, and then whirling round the angle of a palace, disappear.

Venice admitted not of pursuit like another city; for there was no passage along the canal taken by the gondola, but by water. Several of the boats used by the family, lay within the piles on the great canal, at the principal entrance, and Don Camillo was about to rush into one, and to seize its oars with his own hands, when the usual sounds announced the approach of a gondola from the direction of the bridge that had so long served as a place of concealment to his own domestic. It soon issued from the obscurity cast by the shadows of the houses, and proved to be a large gondola pulled, like the one which had just disappeared, by six masked gondoliers. The resemblance between the equipments of the two was so exact, that at first not only the wondering Camillo, but all the others present, fancied the latter, by some extraordinary speed, had already made the tour of the adjoining palaces, and was once more approaching the private entrance of that of Donna Violetta.

"Gino!" cried the bewildered bridegroom.

"Signore mio?" answered the faithful domestic.

"Draw nearer, varlet. What meaneth this idle trifling at a moment like this?"

Don Camillo leaped a fearful distance, and happily he reached the gondola. To pass the men and rush into the canopy needed but a moment; to perceive that it was empty was the work of a glance.

"Villains, have you dared to be false!" cried the confounded noble.

At that instant the clock of the city began to tell the hour of two, and it was only as that appointed signal sounded heavy and melancholy on the night-air, that the undeceived Camillo got a certain glimpse of the truth.

"Gino," he said, repressing his voice, like one summoning a desperate resolution--"are thy fellows true?"

"As faithful as your own vassals, Signore."

"And thou didst not fail to deliver the note to my agent?"

"He had it before the ink was dry, eccellenza."

"The mercenary villain! He told thee where to find the gondola, equipped as I see it?"

"Signore, he did; and I do the man the justice to say that nothing is wanting, either to speed or comfort."

"Aye, he even deals in duplicates, so tender is his care!" muttered Don Camillo between his teeth. "Pull away, men; your own safety and my happiness now depend on your arms. A thousand ducats if you equal my hopes--my just anger if you disappoint them!"

Don Camillo threw himself on the cushions as he spoke, in bitterness of heart, though he seconded his words by a gesture which bid the men proceed. Gino, who occupied the stern and managed the directing oar, opened a small window in the canopy which communicated with the interior, and bent to take his master's directions as the boat sprang ahead. Rising from his stooping posture, the practised gondolier gave a sweep with his blade, which caused the sluggish element of the narrow canal to whirl in eddies, and then the gondola glided into the great canal, as if it obeyed an instinct.


CHAPTER XVII.

"Why liest thou so on the green earth?
'Tis not the hour of slumber:--why so pale?"
CAIN.


Notwithstanding his apparent decision, the Duke of Sant' Agata was completely at a loss in what manner to direct his future movements. That he had been duped by one or more of the agents to whom he had been compelled to confide his necessary preparations for the flight he had meditated several days, was too certain to admit of his deceiving himself with the hopes that some unaccountable mistake was the cause of his loss. He saw at once that the Senate was master of the