The Historical Nights' Entertainment, Rafael Sabatini [freenovel24 .txt] 📗

word to the gaoler,

Soradici should presume to frustrate the divine intentions, he

would immediately strangle him with his own hands.

 

On October 31st Lorenzo paid his usual daily visit early in the

morning. After his departure they waited some hours, Soradici

in expectant terror, Casanova in sheer impatience to be at work.

Promptly at noon fell heavy blows overhead, and then, in a cloud

of plaster and broken laths, the heavenly messenger descended

clumsily into Casanova’s arms.

 

Soradici found this tall, gaunt, bearded figure, clad in a dirty

shirt and a pair of leather breeches, of a singularly unangelic

appearance; indeed, he looked far more like a devil.

 

When he produced a pair of scissors, so that the spy might cut

Casanova’s beard, which, like the angel’s, had grown in captivity,

Soradici ceased to have any illusions on the score of Balbi’s

celestial nature. Although still intrigued - since he could not

guess at the secret correspondence that had passed between Casanova

and Balbi - he perceived quite clearly that he had been fooled.

 

Leaving Soradici in the monk’s care, Casanova hoisted himself

through the broken ceiling and gained Balbi’s cell, where the sight

of Count Asquino dismayed him. He found a middle-aged man of a

corpulence which must render it impossible for him to face the

athletic difficulties that lay before them; of this the Count

himself seemed already persuaded.

 

“If you think,” was his greeting, as he shook Casanova’s hand, “to

break through the roof and find a way down from the leads, I don’t

see how you are to succeed without wings. I have not the courage

to accompany you,” he added, “I shall remain and pray for you.”

 

Attempting no persuasions where they must have been idle, Casanova

passed out of the cell again, and approaching as nearly as possible

to the edge of the attic, he sat down where he could touch the roof

as it sloped immediately above his head. With his spontoon he

tested the timbers, and found them so decayed that they almost

crumbled at the touch. Assured thereby that the cutting of a hole

would be an easy matter, he at once returned to his cell, and there

he spent the ensuing four hours in preparing ropes. He cut up

sheets, blankets, coverlets, and the very cover of his mattress,

knotting the strips together with the utmost care. In the end he

found himself equipped with some two hundred yards of rope, which

should be ample for any purpose.

 

Having made a bundle of the fine taffeta suit in which he had been

arrested, his gay cloak of floss silk, some stockings, shirts, and

handkerchiefs, he and Balbi passed up to the other cell, compelling

Soradici to go with them. Leaving the monk to make a parcel of his

belongings, Casanova went to tackle the roof. By dusk he had made

a hole twice as large as was necessary, and had laid bare the lead

sheeting with which the roof was covered. Unable, single-handed,

to raise one of the sheets, he called Balbi to his aid, and between

them, assisted by the spontoon, which Casanova inserted between the

edge of the sheet and the gutter, they at last succeeded in tearing

away the rivets. Then by putting their shoulders to the lead they

bent it upwards until there was room to emerge, and a view of the

sky flooded by the vivid light of the crescent moon.

 

Not daring in that light to venture upon the roof, where they would

be seen, they must wait with what patience they could until midnight,

when the moon would have set. So they returned to the cell where

they had left Soradici with Count Asquino.

 

>From Balbi, Casanova had learnt that Asquino, though well supplied

with money, was of an avaricious nature. Nevertheless, since money

would be necessary, Casanova asked the Count for the loan of thirty

gold sequins. Asquino answered him gently that, in the first place,

they would not need money to escape; that, in the second, he had a

numerous family; that, in the third, if Casanova perished the money

would be lost; and that, in the fourth, he had no money.

 

“My reply,” writes Casanova, “lasted half an hour.”

 

“Let me remind you,” he said in concluding his exhortation, “of your

promise to pray for us, and let me ask you what sense there can be

in praying for the success of an enterprise to which you refuse to

contribute the most necessary means.”

 

The old man was so far conquered by Casanova’s eloquence that he

offered him two sequins, which Casanova accepted, since he was not

in case to refuse anything.

 

Thereafter, as they sat waiting for the moon to set, Casanova found

his earlier estimate of the monk’s character confirmed. Balbi now

broke into abusive reproaches. He found that Casanova had acted in

bad faith by assuring him that he had formed a complete plan of

escape. Had he suspected that this was a mere gambler’s throw on

Casanova’s part, he would never have laboured to get him out of his

cell. The Count added his advice that they should abandon an

attempt foredoomed to failure, and, being concerned for the two

sequins with which he had so reluctantly parted, he argued the case

at great length. Stifling his disgust, Casanova assured them that,

although it was impossible for him to afford them details of how

he intended to proceed, he was perfectly confident of success.

 

At half-past ten he sent Soradici -who had remained silent throughout

- to report upon the night. The spy brought word that in another

hour or so the moon would have set, but that a thick mist was rising,

which must render the leads very dangerous.

 

“So long as the mist isn’t made of oil, I am content,” said Casanova.

“Come, make a bundle of your cloak. It is time we were moving.”

 

But at this Soradici fell on his knees in the dark, seized Casanova’s

hands, and begged to be left behind to pray for their safety, since

he would be sure to meet his death if he attempted to go with them.

 

Casanova assented readily, delighted to be rid of the fellow. Then

in the dark he wrote as best he could a quite characteristic letter

to the Inquisitors of State, in which he took his leave of them,

telling them that since he had been fetched into the prison without

his wishes being consulted, they could not complain that he should

depart without consulting theirs.

 

The bundle containing Balbi’s clothes, and another made up of half

the rope, he slung from the monk’s neck, thereafter doing the same

in his own case. Then, in their shirt-sleeves, their hats on their

heads, the pair of them started on their perilous journey, leaving

Count Asquino and Soradici to pray for them.

 

Casanova went first, on all fours, and thrusting the point of his

spontoon between the joints of the lead sheeting so as to obtain a

hold, he crawled slowly upwards. To follow, Balbi took a grip of

Casanova’s belt with his right hand, so that, in addition to making

his own way, Casanova was compelled to drag the weight of his

companion after him, and this up the sharp gradient of a roof

rendered slippery by the mist.

 

Midway in that laborious ascent, the monk called to him to stop.

He had dropped the bundle containing the clothes, and he hoped that

it had not rolled beyond the gutter, though he did not mention which

of them should retrieve it. After the unreasonableness already

endured from this man, Casanova’s exasperation was such in that

moment that, he confesses, he was tempted to kick him after this

bundle. Controlling himself, however, he answered patiently that

the matter could not now be helped, and kept steadily amain.

 

At last the apex of the roof was reached, and they got astride of

it to breathe and to take a survey of their surroundings. They

faced the several cupolas of the Church of Saint Mark, which is

connected with the ducal palace, being, in fact, no more than the

private chapel of the Doge.

 

They set down their bundles, and, of course, in the act of doing

so the wretched Balbi must lose his hat, and send it rolling down

the roof after the bundle he had already lost. He cried out that

it was an evil omen.

 

“On the contrary,” Casanova assured him patiently, “it is a sign

of divine protection; for if your bundle or your hat had happened

to roll to the left instead of the right it would have fallen into

the courtyard, where it would be seen by the guards, who must

conclude that some one is moving on the roof, and so, no doubt,

would have discovered us. As it is your hat has followed your

bundle into the canal, where it can do no harm.”

 

Thereupon, bidding the monk await his return, Casanova set off

alone on a voyage of discovery, keeping for the present astride

of the roof in his progress. He spent a full hour wandering along

the vast roof, going to right and to left in his quest, but failing

completely to make any helpful discovery, or to find anything to

which he could attach a rope. In the end it began to look as if,

after all, he must choose between returning to prison and flinging

himself from the roof into the canal. He was almost in despair,

when in his wanderings his attention was caught by a dormer window

on the canal side, about two-thirds of the way down the slope of

the roof. With infinite precaution he lowered himself down the

steep, slippery incline until he was astride of the little dormer

roof. Leaning well forward, he discovered that a slender grating

barred the leaded panes of the window itself, and for a moment

this grating gave him pause.

 

Midnight boomed just then from the Church of Saint Mark, like a

reminder that but seven hours remained in which to conquer this and

further difficulties that might confront him, and in which to win

clear of that place, or else submit to a resumption of his

imprisonment under conditions, no doubt, a hundredfold more

rigorous.

 

Lying flat on his stomach, and hanging far over, so as to see what

he was doing, he worked one point of his spontoon into the sash of

the grating, and, levering outwards, he strained until at last it

came away completely in his hands. After that it was an easy matter

to shatter the little latticed window.

 

Having accomplished so much, he turned, and, using his spontoon as

before, he crawled back to the summit of the roof, and made his way

rapidly along this to the spot where he had left Balbi. The monk,

reduced by now to a state of blending despair, terror, and rage,

greeted Casanova in terms of the grossest abuse for having left

him there so long.

 

“I was waiting only for daylight,” he concluded, “to return to

prison.”

 

“What did you think had become of me?” asked Casanova.

 

“I imagined that you had tumbled off the roof.”

 

“And is this abuse the expression of your joy at finding yourself

mistaken?”

 

“Where have you been all this time?” the monk counter-questioned

sullenly.

 

“Come with me and you shall see.”

 

And taking up his bundle again, Casanova led his companion forward

until they were in line with the dormer. There Casanova showed him

what he had done, and consulted him as to the means to be adopted

to enter the attic. It would be too risky for them to allow

themselves to drop from the sill,