On regaining the first chamber, Ellena rested for a moment to recover breath; and, while she leaned upon what had once been a window, opening to the court, she heard a distant report of firearms. The sound swelled, and seemed to revolve along the avenue through which Schedoni had disappeared. — Supposing that the combatants were engaged at the farthest entrance, Ellena was preparing to go thither, when a sudden step moved near her, and, on turning, she discovered, with a degree of horror that almost deprived her of recollection, Spalatro himself stealing along the very chamber in which she was.
That part of the room which she stood in, fell into a kind of recess; and whether it was this circumstance that prevented him from immediately perceiving her, or that, his chief purpose being directed against another object, he did not chuse to pause here, he passed on with skulking steps; and, before Ellena had determined whither to go, she observed him cross the court before her, and enter the avenue. As he had passed, he looked up at the window: and it was certain he then saw her, for he instantly faultered, but in the next moment proceeded swiftly, and disappeared in the gloom.
It seemed that he had not yet encountered Schedoni, but it also occurred to Ellena, that he was gone into the avenue for the purpose of waiting to assassinate him in the darkness. While she was meditating some means of giving the Confessor a timely alarm of his danger, she once more distinguished his voice. It approached from the avenue, and Ellena immediately calling aloud that Spalatro was there, entreated him to be on his guard. In the next instant a pistol was fired there.
Among the voices that succeeded the report, Ellena thought she distinguished groans. Schedoni’s voice was in the next moment heard again, but it seemed faint and low. The courage which she had before exerted was now exhausted; she remained fixed to the spot, unable to encounter the dreadful spectacle that probably awaited her in the avenue, and almost sinking beneath the expectation of it.
All was now hushed; she listened for Schedoni’s voice, and even for a footstep — in vain. To endure this state of uncertainty much longer was scarcely possible, and Ellena was endeavouring to collect fortitude to meet a knowledge of the worst, when suddenly a feeble groaning was again heard. It seemed near, and to be approaching still nearer. At that moment, Ellena, on looking towards the avenue, perceived a figure covered with blood, pass into the court. A film, which drew over her eyes, prevented her noticing farther. She tottered a few paces back, and caught at the fragment of a pillar, by which she supported herself. The weakness was transient; immediate assistance appeared necessary to the wounded person, and pity soon predominating over horror, she recalled her spirits, and hastened to the court.
When, on reaching it, she looked round in search of Schedoni, he was no where to be seen; the court was again solitary and silent, till she awakened all its echoes with the name of father. While she repeated her calls, she hastily examined the colonnade, the separated chamber which opened immediately from it, and the shadowy ground beneath the palmetos, but without discovering any person.
As she turned towards the avenue, however, a track of blood on the ground told her too certainly where the wounded person had passed. It guided her to the entrance of a narrow passage, that seemingly led to the foot of the tower; but here she hesitated, fearing to trust the obscurity beyond. For the first time, Ellena conjectured, that not Schedoni, but Spalatro might be the person she had seen, and that, though he was wounded, vengeance might give him strength to strike his stiletto at the heart of whomsoever approached him, while the duskiness of the place would fathe deed.
She was yet at the entrance of the passage, fearful to enter, and reluctant to leave it, listening for a sound, and still hearing at intervals, swelling though feeble groans; when quick steps were suddenly heard advancing up the grand avenue, and presently her own name was repeated loudly in the voice of Schedoni. His manner was hurried as he advanced to meet her, and he threw an eager glance round the court. “We must be gone,” said he, in a low tone, and taking her arm within his. “Have you seen any one pass?”
“I have seen a wounded man enter the court,” replied Ellena, “and feared he was yourself.”
“Where? — Which way did he go!” inquired Schedoni, eagerly, while his eyes glowed, and his countenance became fell.
Ellena, instantly comprehending his motive for the question, would not acknowledge that she knew whither Spalatro had withdrawn; and, reminding him of the danger of their situation, she entreated that they might quit the villa immediately.
“The sun is already set,” she added.
“I tremble at what may be the perils of this place at such an obscure hour, and even at what may be those of our road at a later!”
“You are sure he was wounded?” said the Confessor.
“Too sure,” replied Ellena, faintly.
“Too sure!” sternly exclaimed Schedoni.
“Let us depart, my father; O let us go this instant!” repeated Ellena.
“What is the meaning of all this!” asked Schedoni, with anger. “You cannot, surely, have the weakness to pity this fellow!”
“It is terrible to see any one suffer,” said Ellena. “Do not, by remaining here, leave me a possibility of grieving for you. What anguish it would occasion you, to see me bleed; judge, then, what must be mine, if you are wounded by the dagger of an assassin!”
Schedoni stifled the groan which swelled from his heart, and abruptly turned away.
“You trifle with me,” he said, in the next moment: “you do not know that the villain is wounded. I fired at him, it is true, at the instant I saw him enter the avenue, but he has escaped me. What reason have you for your supposition?”
Ellena was going to point to the track of blood on the ground, at a little distance, but checked herself; considering that this might guide him on to Spalatro, and again she entreated they might depart, adding, “O! spare yourself, and him!”
“What! spare an assassin!” said Schedoni, impatiently.
“An assassin! He has, then, attempted your life?” exclaimed Ellena.
“Why no, not absolutely that,” said Schedoni, recollecting himself, “but — what does the fellow do here? Let me pass, I will find him.”
Ellena still hung upon his garment, while, with persuasive tenderness, she endeavoured to awaken his humanity. “O! if you had ever known what it was to expect instant death,” she continued, “you would pity this man now, as he, perhaps, has sometimes pitied others! I have known such suffering, my father, and can, therefore, feel even for him!”
“Do you know for whom you are pleading?” said the distracted Schedoni, while every word she had uttered seemed to have penetrated his heart. The surprize which this question awakened in Ellena’s countenance, recalled him to a consciousness of his imprudence; he recollected that Ellena did not certainly know the office, with which Spalatro had been commissioned against her: and when he considered that this very Spalatro, whom Ellena had with such simplicity supposed to have, at some time, spared a life through pity, had in truth spared her own, and, yet more, had been eventually a means of preventing him from destroying his own child, the Confessor turned in horror from his design; all his passions changed, and he abruptly quitted the court, nor paused till he reached the farthest extremity of the avenue, where the guide was in waiting with the horses.
A recollection of the conduct of Spalatro respecting Ellena had thus induced Schedoni to spare him; but this was all; it did not prevail with him to inquire into the condition of this man, or to mitigate his punishment; and, without remorse, he now left him to his fate.
With Ellena it was otherwise; though she was ignorant of the obligation she owed him, she could not know that any human being was left under such circumstances of suffering and solitude, without experiencing very painful emotion; but, considering how expeditiously Spalatro had been able to remove himself, she endeavoured to hope that his wound was not mortal.
The travellers, mounting their horses in silence, left the ruin, and were for some ti
me too much engaged by the impression of the late occurrences, to converse together. When, at length, Ellena inquired the particulars of what had passed in the avenue, she understood that Schedoni, on pursuing Spalatro, had seen him there only for a moment. Spalatro had escaped by some way unknown to the Confessor, and had regained the interior of the ruin, while his pursuers were yet following the avenue. The cry, which Ellena had imagined to proceed from the interior, was uttered, as it now appeared, by the guide, who, in his haste, had fallen over some fragments of the wall that lay scattered in the avenue: the first report of arms had been from the trombone, which Schedoni had discharged on reaching the portal; and the last, when he fired a pistol, on perceiving Spalatro passing from the court.
“We have had trouble enough in running after this fellow,” said the guide, “and could not catch him at last. It is strange that, if he came to look for us, he should run away so when he had found us! I do not think he meant us any harm, after all, else he might have done it easily enough in that dark passage; instead whereof he only took to his heels!”
“Silence!” said Schedoni, “fewer words, friend.”
“Well, Signor, he’s peppered now, however; so we need not be afraid; his wings are clipped for one while, so he cannot overtake us. We need not be in such a hurry, Signor, we shall get to the inn in good time yet. It is upon a mountain yonder, whose top you may see upon that red streak in the west. He cannot come after us; I myself saw his arm was wounded.”
“Did you so?” said Schedoni, sharply: “and pray where was you when you saw so much? It was more than I saw.”
“I was close at your heels, Signor, when you fired the pistol.”
“I do not remember to have heard you there,” observed the Confessor: “and why did you not come forward, instead of retreating? And where, also, did you hide yourself while I was searching for the fellow, instead of assisting me in the pursuit?”
The guide gave no answer, and Ellena, who had been attentively observing him during the whole of this conversation, perceived that he was now considerably embarrassed; so that her former suspicions as to his integrity began to revive, notwithstanding the several circumstances, which had occurred to render them improbable. There was, however, at present no opportunity for farther observation, Schedoni having, contrary to the advice of the guide, immediately quickened his pace, and the horses continuing on the full gallop, till a steep ascent compelled them to relax their speed.
Contrary to his usual habit, Schedoni now, while they slowly ascended, appeared desirous of conversing with this man, and asked him several questions relative to the villa they had left; and, whether it was that he really felt an interest on the subject, or that he wished to discover if the man had deceived him in the circumstances he had already narrated, from which he might form a judgment as to his general character, he pressed his inquiries with a patient minuteness, that somewhat surprized Ellena. During this conversation, the deep twilight would no longer permit her to notice the countenances of either Schedoni, or the guide, but she gave much attention to the changing tones of their voices, as different circumstances and emotions seemed to affect them. It is to be observed, that during the whole of this discourse, the guide rode at the side of Schedoni.
While the Confessor appeared to be musing upon something, which the peasant had related respecting the Baróne di Cambrusca, Ellena inquired as to the fate of the other inhabitants of the villa.
“The falling of the old tower was enough for them,” replied the guide; “the crash waked them all directly, and they had time to get out of the new buildings, before the second and third shocks laid them also in ruins. They ran out into the woods for safety, and found it too, for they happened to take a different road from the earthquake. Not a soul suffered, except the Baróne, and he deserved it well enough. O! I could tell such things that I have heard of him!— “
“What became of the rest of the family?” interrupted Schedoni.
“Why, Signor, they were scattered here and there, and every where; and they none of them ever returned to the old spot. No! no! they had suffered enough there already, and might have suffered to this day, if the earthquake had not happened.”
“If it had not happened?” repeated Ellena.
“Aye, Signora, for that put an end to the Baróne. If those walls could but speak, they could tell strange things, for they have looked upon sad doings: and that chamber, which I shewed you, Signora, nobody ever went into it but himself, except the servant, to keep it in order, and that he would scarcely suffer, and always staid in the room the while.”
“He had probably treasure secreted there,” said Ellena.
“No, Signora, no treasure! He had always a lamp burning there; and sometimes in the night he has been heard — Once, indeed, his valet happened to— “
“Come on,” said Schedoni, interrupting him; “keep pace with me. What idle dream are you relating now?”
“It is about the Baróne di Cambrusca, Signor, him that you was asking me so much about just now. I was saying what strange ways he had, and how that, on one stormy night in December, as my cousin Francisco told my father, who told me, and he lived in the family at the time it happened— “
“What happened?” said Schedoni, hastily.
“What I am going to tell, Signor. My cousin lived there at the time; so, however unbelievable it may seem, you may depend upon it, it is all true. My father knows I would not believe it myself till— “
“Enough of this,” said Schedoni; no more. What family had this Baróne
— had he a wife at the time of this destructive shock?”
“Yes, truly, Signor, he had, as I was going to tell, if you would but condescend to have patience.”
“The Baróne had more need of that, friend; I have no wife.”— “The Baróne’s wife had most need of it, Signor, as you shall hear. A good soul, they say, was the Baronessa! but luckily she died many years before. He had a daughter, also, and, young as she was, she had lived too long, but for the earthquake which set her free.”
“How far is it to the inn?” said the Confessor, roughly.
“When we get to the top of this hill, Signor, you will see it on the next, if any light is stirring, for there will only be the hollow between us. But do not be alarmed, Signor, the fellow we left cannot overtake us. Do you know much about him, Signor?”
Schedoni inquired whether the trombone was charged; and, discovering that it was not, ordered the man to load immediately.
“Why, Signor, if you knew as much of him as I do, you could not be more afraid!” said the peasant, while he stopped to obey the order.
“I understood that he was a stranger to you!” observed the Confessor, with surprize.
“Why, Signor, he is, and he is not; I know more about him than he thinks for.”
“You seem to know a vast deal too much of other persons affairs,” said Schedoni, in a tone that was meant to silence him.
“Why, that is just what he would say, Signor; but bad deeds will out, whether people like them to be known or not. This man comes to our town sometimes to market, and nobody knew where he came from for a long while; so they set themselves to work and found it out at last.”
“We shall never reach the summit of this hill,” said Schedoni, testily.
“And they found out, too, a great many strange things about him,” continued the guide.
Ellena, who had attended to this discourse with a degree of curiosity that was painful, now listened impatiently for what might be farther mentioned concerning Spalatro, but without daring to invite, by a single question, any discovery on a subject which appeared to be so intimately connected with Schedoni.
“It was many years ago,” rejoined the guide, “that this man came to live in that strange house on the seashore. It had been shut up ever since— “
“What are you talking of now?” interrupted the Confessor.
“Why, Signor, you never will let me tell you. You always snap me up so short at the b
eginning, and then ask — what am I talking about! I was going to begin the story, and it is a pretty long one. But first of all, Signor, who do you suppose this man belonged to! And what do you think the people determined to do, when the report was first set a-going? only they could not be sure it was true, and any body would be unwilling enough to believe such a shocking— “
“I have no curiosity on the subject,” replied the Confessor, sternly interrupting him; “and desire to hear no more concerning it.”
“I meant no harm, Signor,” said the man; “I did not know it concerned you.”
“And who says that it does concern me!”
“Nobody, Signor, only you seemed to be in a bit of a passion, and so I thought — But I meant no harm, Signor, only as he happened to be your guide part of the way, I guessed you might like to know something of him.”
“All that I desire to know of my guide is, that he does his duty,” replied Schedoni, “that he conducts me safely, and understands when to be silent.”
To this the man replied nothing, but slackened his pace, and slunk behind his reprover.
The travellers reaching, soon after, the summit of this long hill, looked out for the inn of which they had been told; but darkness now confounded every object, and no domestic light twinkling, however distantly, through the gloom, gave signal of security and comfort. They descended dejectedly into the hollow of the mountains, and found themselves once more immerged in woods. Schedoni again called the peasant to his side, and bade him keep abreast of him, but he did not discourse; and Ellena was too thoughtful to attempt conversation. The hints, which the guide had thrown out respecting Spalatro, had increased her curiosity on that subject; but the conduct of Schedoni, his impatience, his embarrassment, and the decisive manner in which he had put an end to the talk of the guide, excited a degree of surprize, that bordered on astonishment. As she had, however, no clue to lead her conjectures to any point, she was utterly bewildered in surmise, understanding only that Schedoni had been much more deeply connected with Spalatro than she had hitherto believed.
Delphi Complete Works of Ann Radcliffe (Illustrated) Page 198