The Serapion Brethren Volume I Part 40

"'Antonio had got into the boat beside him, and now saw that he was close to the machinery, and the rope which rose out of the sea. Other ropes, for moving the machinery, went disappearing off in the darkness.

"'"Listen, comrade Pietro," said Antonio, after a brief silence; "would it not suit you better to earn ten _zecchini_, and not risk your life?"

"'"Of course," said Pietro, with a hearty laugh.

"'"Well," said Antonio, "here are ten _zecchini_; change clothes with me, and let me take your place. I'll go aloft instead of you. Do, now, good comrade Pietro!"

"'Pietro shook his head dubiously, and, weighing the money in his hand, said: "You are very kind, Signer Antonio, to call a poor devil like me your comrade still; and you are generous too. I want the money, of course; but what one risks his neck for is the putting the flowers into the beautiful Dogaressa's hand, and hearing her sweet voice. But however, as it is _you_, Signer Antonio, be it as you wish."

"'They changed clothes rapidly, and scarcely was this done when Pietro cried, "Get into the machine; there goes the signal!"

"At that moment the sea glowed with the flaming reflection of thousands of flashes, and the sh.o.r.es re-echoed to thousands of crackling detonations. Antonio flew up, with the rapidity of the storm-wind, amongst the crackling, hissing fireworks, reached the gallery without so much as a singe, and hovered before the Dogaressa, She had risen and come forward; he felt her breath on his cheek--he handed her the flowers; but, blissful as that instant was with the most unutterable rapture of heaven, the burning torture of love seized him as with red-hot arms. Out of his senses--mad with longing, rapture, torture--he seized the Dogaressa's hand, pressed burning kisses on it, and cried, in a tone of inconsolable sorrow, "Annunziata!" Then the machinery, like a blind minister of destiny, tore him away from her, down to the sea, where he fell into Pietro's arms--who was waiting for him in the boat--stupefied and exhausted.

"'Meanwhile in the Doge's gallery all was uproar and confusion. A little written paper had been found, fastened to the Doge's chair, on which were the following words, in the popular dialect of Venice:

"'"Il Dose Falier della bella muier, I altri la G.o.de, e lui la mantien."

"'"The Doge, old Falier, sits in state with the fair Who of love takes her fill, while my lord pays the bill."

"Old Falieri started up in glowing anger, and swore that the direst punishment should be the lot of the person who committed this insulting outrage. As he looked round him, his eyes lighted on Michaele Steno standing below the gallery, on the Piazza, in the full blaze of the illuminations. He immediately ordered the guards to seize him, as the culprit. Every one protested against this order; for the Doge, by thus yielding to his anger, was outraging both the Signoria and the populace--interfering with the privileges of the former, spoiling the Festa for the latter. The Signoria quitted their places, Bodoeri alone remaining, and mingling with the populace, speaking eagerly of the bitter insult to the Chief of the State, and trying to turn all the anger upon Steno. Falieri had not been mistaken; for it was the truth that Steno, when ordered away from the Doge's gallery, had hurried home and written the paper in question, which he had afterwards fastened to the Doge's seat when all eyes were fixed on the fireworks, and then gone away again unnoticed. He had devised this resentful trick very artfully and maliciously; it struck at the hearts of both Doge and Dogaressa, wounding them to the core. He at once admitted his deed, laying all the blame on the Doge, who had insulted him so bitterly in the first instance. The Signoria had long been dissatisfied with a chief who, instead of fulfilling the just expectations of the State, daily gave proof that the fiery, warlike spirit in his chilled and enfeebled heart was too much like the train of sparks which rush crackling out of the rocket, but immediately die away into dead, useless spots of black charcoal. In addition to this, his marriage to his lovely wife (it had long been discovered that it had only taken place after his appointment as Doge), and his jealousy, made him much more the old "_Pantalone_" than the warlike general; so that the Signoria, nourishing all this poison in their hearts, were more disposed to side with Steno than with the Doge. The Council of Ten referred the matter to the Council of Forty, of which Steno was one of the chiefs. This Council decided that Steno had suffered enough already, and that a month's banishment was ample punishment for his offence. And this embittered Falieri afresh, and more strongly against a Signoria which not only did not take his side, but punished repeated outrages upon him as offences of the most trivial kind.

"'Now, as it is wont to happen that a lover upon whom has beamed one single ray of love-fortune goes on dreaming heavenly dreams for days, weeks, and months, enwrapped in a golden shimmer, so could Antonio scarce recover from his stupefaction of amazement at his instant of bliss. The old woman had rated him soundly for his rashness, and muttered and muttered unceasingly about the utter needlessness of what he had done. But one day she came in skipping and dancing on her stick, as she did when under the influence of her strange spell. She paid no attention to Antonio's questions, went on chuckling and laughing, lighted a little fire in the fire-place, set a little pan on it, cooked a salve, throwing in ingredients from all sorts of phials, of various shapes and colours, put it in a small box, and limped away with it, snickering and laughing as she went. She did not return till late in the evening, when she threw herself into an arm-chair, coughing and wheezing. At last, as if coming to herself from great exhaustion, she began:

"'"Tonino! Tonino, my dear son, where have I been, do you think? Whom have I been seeing? Try if you can guess!"

"'Antonio stared at her, full of a strange presentiment.

"'"Well," she continued, "I come from herself, from the beautiful dove, the lovely Annunziata!"

"'"Do not drive me frantic!" Antonio cried.

"'"What? what?" she went on. "I am always thinking of you, my Tonino!

So, this morning, as I was bargaining in the pillared pa.s.sage of the Palace, the people were murmuring about the misfortune which had befallen the beautiful Dogaressa. I asked and asked, and then a great uncouth, red-looking fellow, who was leaning against one of the pillars, chewing a lemon, said: 'Why, a little young scorpion tried his teeth on the little finger of her left hand, and, you see, that got into her blood a bit. But Signer Dottore Giovanni Baseggio went up to her a few minutes ago; he will have the little hand off by this time finger and all.' And just as the big fellow was saying this a great scream sounded from the broad staircase, and a little, very little gentleman came rolling down it like a ball, impelled by the kicks of the guards, right in amongst our feet, crying and lamenting. The people gathered round him, laughing loud. He struggled and stamped with his legs, unable to rise; but the big red fellow ran and lifted the little doctor, took him in his arms, and made off with him as hard as he could (he still shrieking and howling) to the ca.n.a.l, where he put him in his gondola, and rowed away with him. What I thought had happened was, that when Signor Baseggio was going to put his knife into the pretty little hand, the Doge had had him kicked downstairs. But I thought something else besides. 'Quick! quick!' I thought; as quick as I could off home, make my salve, and be off with it in my hand to the Palace. When I got there with it, old Falieri was just coming down. He flashed out at me with 'What is this old hag doing here?' I made a curtsey deep, deep down to the ground as well as I could, and said I had a medicine which would cure the beautiful Dogaressa very speedily. When the old fellow heard that, he gazed steadfastly at me with most terrible eyes, and stroked his grey beard smooth. Then he seized me by the shoulders, and dragged me up to her chamber in such a way that I nearly fell down all my length on the floor of it. Ah, Tonino! there lay the pretty young creature stretched on her couch, pale as a corpse, sighing and groaning with pain, and gently complaining, "Ah! I am certain I am poisoned through and through!" But I set to work in a moment and took off the stupid doctor's useless plaster. Oh, heaven! the beautiful delicate hand! swollen, red as blood! Well, well! my ointment cooled it--eased the pain. 'That is very comforting!' the little dove whispered. 'A thousand _zecchini_ are yours if you save the Dogaressa,' old Falieri cried, as he left the room. When I had been sitting there for three hours, with the little hand in mine, stroking and nursing it, the little soul awoke from a slumber into which she had fallen, and felt no further pain. When I had put on a fresh bandage, she looked at me with eyes sparkling with gladness. Then I said:

"'"Ah, gracious Lady Dogaressa! you once saved a boy's life, when you killed a serpent which was going to strike him while he was sleeping."

"'"Tonino! you should have seen how her pale cheeks glowed red, as if a beam of the evening sun had shone in upon them--how her eyes flashed with sparkling fire."

"'"'Ah! yes! old woman,' she cried. 'I was only a child, at my father's place in the country. Ah! he was a dear, beautiful boy! Oh, how I think of him still! It seems to me as if nothing happy had ever come into my lot since that day.'

"'"Then I spoke of you; told her that you were in Venice that your heart is still full of all the love and blissfulness of that moment, and that you risked your life on Giovedi Gra.s.so merely to look into the eyes of your guardian angel, and put the flowers into her hand."

"'"'Tonino! Tonino!' she cried, enthusiastically; 'I knew it! I knew it! I felt it! When he pressed his lips on my hand, when he called me by my name--I did not know what it was that pierced my heart so strangely. Perhaps it was happiness--but it was pain too. Bring him here to me, the beautiful boy.'

"'When the old woman said this, Antonio threw himself on his knees, and cried out like one bereft of his senses:

"'"Oh, Lord of Heaven! only let me not perish _now_, _now_, in my terrible destiny, until I have seen her and pressed her to my heart."

He implored her to take him to the Dogaressa the very next day. But she strongly advised him against this, inasmuch as old Falieri went to see her almost hourly.

"'Many days had elapsed. The Dogaressa was almost completely cured by the old woman, but it was still impossible to take Antonio to see her.

The old woman comforted him as well as she could, always repeating how she spoke with the Dogaressa of him whose life she had saved, and who loved her so fervently. Antonio, tortured by a thousand torments of longing, pa.s.sed his time as best he might, in gondolas, and in wandering about the Piazzas. His steps always led him, involuntarily, towards the Ducal Palace. One day, by the bridge at the back of it, he came upon Pietro, leaning on a gaily painted oar near a gondola, which was dancing on the waves, made fast to a pillar. It was a small gondola, but beautifully carved and ornamented, and flying the Venetian standard almost as if it had been the Bucentoro.

"'When Pietro saw his old comrade, he cried out, "A thousand fair greetings to you, Signor Antonio! Those _zecchini_ of yours brought me good luck." Antonio, thinking of other matters, asked what the luck was, and learned nothing less than that Pietro took the Doge and Dogaressa nearly every evening across to the Giudecca, in this gondola; for the Doge had a country house there, over against San Giorgio Maggiore. Antonio gazed hard at Pietro, and burst out quickly:

"'"You can earn other ten _zecchini_, comrade, and more, if you like.

Let me take your place, and row the Doge over!"

"'Pietro thought this could not be managed, as the Doge knew him, and would trust himself to n.o.body else. But at length, when Antonio, in all the wild pa.s.sion which sparkled from his heart, tortured with a thousand pains of love, swore that he would spring after the gondola, and drag it over into the sea, Pietro cried, laughing:

"'"Eh! Signer Antonio, how the Dogaressa's beautiful eyes have turned that head of yours!" and agreed to take Antonio on board as his a.s.sistant, under the pretext that he was unwell, and unable to do the heavy work alone. For the Doge never thought the gondola went quick enough. Antonio hurried away; and scarcely had he got back in a mean suit of boatman's clothes, with his face stained brown, and a long drooping moustache, when the Doge and the Dogaressa came down, both splendidly dressed. "Who is this stranger?" the Doge asked; and it was only when Pietro swore by all the saints that he was unfit to row that day without somebody to help him that the Doge could be persuaded to let Antonio remain.

"'It is sometimes the case that the very excess of happiness so invigorates the mind that it can control itself, and keep a command over the fires of its pa.s.sion, such that they shall not burst forth visibly. Antonio managed to control himself (though he was so close to Annunziata that the very hem of her garment touched him) by giving his whole attention to his rowing, and avoiding any more adventurous proceeding than an occasional rapid glance at her. Old Falieri chuckled and laughed, kissed and stroked Annunziata's little white hand, and put his arm about her slender waist. When they were half-way across, and magnificent Venice was spread out before them with all her towers and palaces, he raised his head and said:

"'"Is it not a fine thing, my darling, to be on the sea with her ruler and consort? Do not be jealous, sweet one, of this Lady of mine who bears us on her bosom so meekly and submissively. Listen how sweetly the waves plash and murmur! She is whispering words of love to the consort who rules her. You, my darling, wear my ring on your finger; but _she_ cherishes the betrothal ring which I cast to her in the profoundest depths of her heart.'

"'"How can the cold, treacherous sea be your consort, my n.o.ble lord?"

said Annunziata. "I cannot help a shudder at the thought of your being betrothed to that arrogant, domineering element."

"'Old Falieri laughed; his beard and chin went up and down.

"'"Have no anxiety, little one," he said; "rest in your soft, tender arms is sweeter than on the icy breast of that consort beneath us; yet it is fine to float on the sea, with the sea's lord and master."

"'As he spoke, distant music floated across the water, and the tones of a soft male voice came near, singing the words--

"'"Ah, senza amare andar sulla mare, Col sposo del mare non pu consolare."

"'Other voices joined in, and the words were repeated again and again till they died away over the sea at last, like the breath of the breeze. Old Falieri seemed to pay no attention. He was telling Annunziata, at much length, about the ceremony of the Doge's betrothal to the sea, when he throws a ring into it from the Bucentoro on Ascension Day. He spoke of the victories of the Republic, of the time when the ceremony was first inst.i.tuted, after the taking of Istria and Dalmatia, under Peter Urseolus the Second. If the words of the song made no impression on Falieri, the tale he told was utterly lost on the Dogaressa. She sate with all her attention fixed upon the sweet tones floating over the sea. When the song ceased, she gazed before her with the expression of one who awakes from a dream, and is still striving to see and understand its images.

"'"_Senza Amare_," she whispered gently. "_Senza Amare_--_non pu consolare_." Tears, like pearls, rose in her heavenly eyes; sighs heaved her breast, which rose and fell, oppressed. Still chuckling and laughing, the old Doge landed with her at the verandah of his house opposite San Giorgio Maggiore, not observing Annunziata, how she stood beside him in silence, moved by the dim sensations awaking within her, her gaze, heavy with tears, fixed upon a distant realm. A young man, dressed as a boatman, blew a sh.e.l.l-shaped horn, whose tones echoed far over the waters. At this signal another gondola came up, a man, carrying a sunshade, and a woman appeared, and, attended by them, the Doge and Dogaressa went into the palace. The second gondola came to the sh.o.r.e, and from it there landed Bodoeri and other persons, amongst whom were merchants, artists, and people of the lower cla.s.ses even. These followed the Doge.

"'Antonio could scarcely wait for the next evening, for he expected some private message from his beloved Annunziata. At last, however, the old woman came hobbling in, set herself down, coughing, in the arm-chair, clapped her bony, withered hands two or three times, and cried--

"'"Ah, Tonino! what has happened to our poor little dove? When I went to her to-day, she was lying on her cushions, with half-shut eyes, leaning her head on her arm, neither sleeping nor waking, neither ill nor well. 'What has befallen you, gracious Lady Dogaressa?' I cried.

'Is it your wound, not quite whole yet, which is paining you?' But she looked at me with eyes such as I had never seen in her, and scarce had I peeped into these moist moonbeams than they hid themselves behind silken lashes, as if amongst dark clouds. And then she heaved a deep sigh, turned her beautiful face to the wall, and whispered softly, very softly, but so mournfully that it went sharply to my very heart--

"'"'_Amare! Amare! Ah! Senza Amare!_'

"'"I got a little stool and sate down beside her. I began to talk of _you_. She hid her face in the cushions. Her breathing came quicker and quicker, till it became sighing. I told her that you had been in the gondola, disguised; that you were dying of love and longing, and that I should bring you to her at once.

"'"'No, no! for the love of Christ and the saints, I implore you tell him I must never see him again--never! Tell him he must leave Venice immediately.'

"'"'Then my darling Tonino must die,' I interrupted. She fell back in the most unspeakable pain, and sobbed, in a voice hidden in tears:

"'"'"And I must die too, the bitterest of deaths!' Just then the old Doge came in, and I was obliged to leave."

"'"She spurns me," cried Antonio, in wild despair. "Away! away! to the sea!"

"'The old woman cackled and laughed as usual. "You silly child!" she cried. "Do you not see that she loves you with the most fervent love and torment that ever fired a woman's heart? Tomorrow night, when it is dark, I will slip you into the Ducal Palace. You will find me in the second gallery on the left of the great staircase, and then we shall see what happens further."