The Muse of the Department Part 13

"For pity's sake, come back to the Duke of Bracciano," cried Monsieur de Clagny.

To the despair of all the company, Lousteau went on with the made-up sheet.

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I then wished to make sure of my misfortune that I might be avenged under the protection of Providence and the Law. The d.u.c.h.ess guessed my intentions. We were at war in our purposes before we fought with poison in our hands. We tried to tempt each other to such confidence as we could not feel, I to induce her to drink a potion, she to get posses- sion of me. She was a woman, and she won the day; for women have a snare more than we men. I fell into it--I was happy; but I awoke next day in this iron cage. All through the day I bellowed with rage in the

OR ROMAN REVENGE 225

darkness of this cellar, over which is the d.u.c.h.ess' bedroom. At night an ingenious counterpoise acting as a lift raised me through the floor, and I saw the d.u.c.h.ess in her lover's arms. She threw me a piece of bread, my daily pittance.

"Thus have I lived for thirty months! From this marble prison my cries can reach no ear. There is no chance for me. I will hope no more. Indeed, the d.u.c.h.ess' room is at the furthest end of the palace, and when I am carried up there none can hear my voice. Each time I see my wife she shows me the

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poison I had prepared for her and her lover. I crave it for myself, but she will not let me die; she gives me bread, and I eat it.

"I have done well to eat and live; I had not reckoned on robbers!"

"Yes, Eccellenza, when those fools the honest men are asleep, we are wide awake."

"Oh, Rinaldo, all I possess shall be yours; we will share my treasure like brothers; I would give you everything--even to my Duchy----"

"Eccellenza, procure from the Pope an absolution _in articulo mor- tis_. It would be of more use to me in my walk of life."

OR ROMAN REVENGE 227

"What you will. Only file through the bars of my cage and lend me your dagger. We have but little time, quick, quick! Oh, if my teeth were but files!--I have tried to eat through this iron."

"Eccellenza," said Rinaldo, "I have already filed through one bar."

"You are a G.o.d!"

"Your wife was at the fete given by the Princess Villaviciosa. She brought home her little Frenchman; she is drunk with love.--You have plenty of time."

"Have you done?"

"Yes."

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"Your dagger?" said the Duke eagerly to the brigand.

"Here it is."

"Good. I hear the clatter of the spring."

"Do not forget me!" cried the robber, who knew what grat.i.tude was.

"No more than my father," cried the Duke.

"Good-bye!" said Rinaldo. "Lord!

How he flies up!" he added to him- self as the Duke disappeared.--"No more than his father! If that is all he means to do for me.--And I

OR ROMAN REVENGE 229

had sworn a vow never to injure a woman!"

But let us leave the robber for a moment to his meditations and go up, like the Duke, to the rooms in the palace.

"Another tailpiece, a Cupid on a snail! And page 230 is blank," said the journalist. "Then there are two more blank pages before we come to the word it is such a joy to write when one is unhappily so happy as to be a novelist--_Conclusion_!

CONCLUSION

Never had the d.u.c.h.ess been more lovely; she came from her bath clothed like a G.o.ddess, and on seeing

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Adolphe voluptuously reclining on piles of cushions--

"You are beautiful," said she.

"And so are you, Olympia!"

"And you still love me?"

"More and more," said he.

"Ah, none but a Frenchman knows how to love!" cried the d.u.c.h.ess. "Do you love me well to- night?"

"Yes."

"Then come!"

And with an impulse of love and hate--whether it was that Cardinal Borborigano had reminded her of her husband, or that she felt un- wonted pa.s.sion to display, she pressed the springs and held out her arms.

"That is all," said Lousteau, "for the foreman has torn off the rest in wrapping up my proofs. But it is enough to show that the author was full of promise."

"I cannot make head or tail of it," said Gatien Boirouge, who was the first to break the silence of the party from Sancerre.

"Nor I," replied Monsieur Gravier.

"And yet it is a novel of the time of the Empire," said Lousteau.

"By the way in which the brigand is made to speak," said Monsieur Gravier, "it is evident that the author knew nothing of Italy. Banditti do not allow themselves such graceful conceits."

Madame Gorju came up to Bianchon, seeing him pensive, and with a glance towards her daughter Mademoiselle Euphemie Gorju, the owner of a fairly good fortune--"What a rhodomontade!" said she. "The prescriptions you write are worth more than all that rubbish."

The Mayoress had elaborately worked up this speech, which, in her opinion, showed strong judgment.