Covering my eyes to shut out the sight before me I turned away. I hurried in a frenzy toward the stairway. On reaching the lowest step I extinguished the light I carried. Some impulse made me glance back. And what I saw, I shall see till the day I die.
Moonlight poured down a long ghostly ray from the opening in the roof caused by the fall of the great stone. The green glimmer, like a spectral lamp, deepened the surrounding darkness and fell distinctly on one object—that protruding wrist and hand, whiter than snow!
I gazed at it wildly. The gleam of the coffin’s spilled jewels hurt my eyes. The shine of the silver crucifix clasped in those waxen fingers dazzled my brain. With a frantic cry of terror, I rushed up the steps with maniacal speed, opened the iron gate through which Dario would pass no more, and stood in the free air, face to face with a wind as tempestuous as my own passions.
With furious haste I shut the entrance to the vault locking and double-locking it. I did not yet fully believe that Dario was actually dead. I am safe at last. He cannot escape. I walked around the vault to make sure the secret passage was forever sealed shut. It was. He cannot scream. He cannot struggle. He will never laugh any more, never kiss, never love, never tell lies to women anymore. He was buried as I was—buried alive!”
Muttering thus to myself with a sort of sobbing incoherence, I turned to meet the snarl of the savage blast of the night, with my brain reeling, my limbs weak and trembling, with the heavens and earth rocking before me like a wild sea, with the flying moon staring aghast through the driving clouds, with all the universe, as it were, in a broken and shapeless chaos about me.
I went forth to meet my fate, and left him behind.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Unrecognized, untracked, I departed from Vicenza. Wrapped in my cloak, and standing in a heavy stupor on the deck of the Rondinella, my appearance apparently caused no suspicion in the mind of the captain, with whom my friend Enrico had arranged the terms for my voyage. He was oblivious to the real identity of the passenger that had been recommended to him.
The morning was radiantly beautiful. The sparkling waves rose high against the still boisterous wind. The sunlight broke in a wide smile of springtide glory over the world. With the burden of my agony upon me, with the utter exhaustion of my overwrought nerves, I beheld all things as if I were in a feverish dream; the laughing light, the azure ripple of waters, the receding line of my native shores. Everything was blurred, indistinct, and unreal to me, though my soul would always peer down into those dark depths where Dario lay, silent forever. For now I knew he was dead. Fate had killed him, not I. Unrepentant as he was, triumphing in his treachery to the very last, even in his madness. Still, if I could have, I would have saved him, even though he tried to murder me.
Yet it was just as well the stone had fallen. Who knows what would have happened if he had lived. I strove not to think of him, and drawing the key of the vault from my pocket, I tossed it with a sudden splash into the waves. It was over. No one pursued me. No one inquired where I went.
I arrived at Civita Vecchia unquestioned. From there, I travelled to Leghorn, where I boarded a merchant trading vessel bound for South America. Thus I lost myself to the world. Thus I became, as it were, buried alive for the second time. Only after several years passed, did I return to Vicenza to seek sanctuary at Monte Berico. There I am safely established and I seek no escape.
No one can trace in my care-worn face and white hair, any resemblance to the once popular and wealthy Contessa Corona, whose disappearance, so strange and sudden, was for a time the talk throughout all of the Veneto. On one occasion, I saw an article in a newspaper entitled MYSTERIOUS OCCURRENCE IN VICENZA and I read every word of it with a sensation of dull amusement.
From it I learned that Contessa Corona was being sought. Her sudden and unexpected departure, together with that of her new husband, formerly Dario Gismondi, on the very night of their wedding, had created the utmost excitement in the city. The landlord of the hotel where she stayed was making inquiries, as was the contessa’s former servant, one Paolo Flamma. Police authorities were also seeking any information. If within twelve months no news were obtained, the immense properties of the Mancini family, in default of existing kindred, would be handed over to the Venetian government.
There was much more to the same effect, and I read it with numb indifference. Why do they not search the Mancini vault, I thought gloomily. Plenty of answers to be found there! But I know people well. They are timorous and superstitious. They would as soon hug a pestilence than explore a charnel house. One thing gladdened me, however; it was the disposal of my fortune. The coffers of Venice was surely as noble an heir as anyone could have.
As I told you at first, I am a dead woman. The world, with its busy life and aims, has naught to do with me. The tall trees, the birds, the whispering grasses are my friends and my companions. They, and they only, are sometimes the silent witnesses of the torturing fits of agony that every now and then overwhelm me with bitterness. For I suffer always. That is natural. Revenge is sweet, but who can remove the horrors of memory? My vengeance now recoils upon my own head. I do not complain of this; it is the law of compensation. It is just. I blame no one, except him, the man who caused my wrong-doing. Dead as he is I do not forgive him. I have tried to, but I cannot. Do women ever truly forgive the men who ruin their lives? I doubt it. As for me, I feel that the end is not yet. When my soul is finally released from its earthly prison, I shall still be doomed to pursue his treacherous spirit over the black chasms of a hell darker than Dante’s in my relentless wrath, forever and ever!
But I ask no pity. I need none. I punished the guilty, and in doing so suffered more than they did. That is as it must always be. I have no regret and no remorse. Only one thing troubles me. One little thing; a mere foolish notion. It comes upon me in the night, when the moon peers down at me from heaven. For the moon sweeps in lustrous magnificence through the dense violet skies. I shut out her radiance as much as I can; I close the blind at the narrow window of my solitary cell, and yet no matter what I do, one wide ray creeps always manages to creep in. One solitary ray that evades all my efforts to expel it. Under the door it comes, or through some unguessed cranny in the wood-work. I have tried and tried in vain to find the place of its entrance and stop it.
I cannot understand why that pale ray visits me so often. I see a white hand on which its ring shines. The hand moves. It lifts itself. The fingers point at me threateningly. They quiver, and then beckon me slowly, solemnly, commandingly onward to some infinite land of awful mysteries where light and love shall dawn for me no more.
About the Author
Mirella Sichirollo Patzer lives in Cochrane, Alberta, Canada with her husband, two daughters, and rambunctious little grandson. She is also the author of The Blighted Troth and The Pendant.
For more information about Mirella, please visit:
http://mirellapatzer.com
http://historyandwomen.com
Coming October 2012-10-02
A family saga of dark secrets set in 13th century Tuscany
A Novel of forgiveness in 18th century New France
A 100 year old family feud
A buried ancient treasure
Treachery and love in medieval Genoa
The Contessa's Vendetta Page 33