as having been the young prince's confidant, declared with cool
impudence that, his master having shown a wish to escape for a few days
from the importunities of a young married lady whose passion was
beginning to tire him, had followed him to the island with three or four
of his most faithful servants, and that he himself had adopted the
disguise of a pilgrim, not wishing to betray his excellency's incognito
to the fisher-people, who would certainly have tormented so powerful a
person by all sorts of petitions. Two local watch men, who had happened
to be on the hillside at the moment of the crime, gave evidence that
confirmed the valet's lengthy statement; hidden by some under wood, they
had seen Gabriel rush upon the prince, and had distinctly heard the last
words of the dying man; calling "Murder!" All the witnesses, even those
summoned at the request of the prisoner, made his case worse by their
statements, which they tried to make favourable. Thus the court, with
its usual perspicacity and its infallible certainty, succeeded in
establishing the fact that Prince Eligi of Brancaleone, having taken a
temporary dislike to town life, had retired to the little island of
Nisida, there to give himself up peaceably to the pleasure of fishing,
for which he had at all times had a particular predilection (a proof
appeared among the documents of the case that the prince had regularly
been present every other year at the tunny-fishing on his property at
Palermo); that when once he was thus hidden in the island, Gabriel might
have recognised him, having gone with his sister to the procession, a
few days before, and had, no doubt, planned to murder him. On the day
before the night of the crime, the absence of Gabriel and the
discomposure of his father and sister had been remarked. Towards evening
the prince had dismissed his servant, and gone out alone, as his custom
was, to walk by the seashore. Surprised by the storm and not knowing the
byways of the island, he had wandered round the fisherman's house,
seeking a shelter; then Gabriel, encouraged by the darkness and by the
noise of the tempest, which seemed likely to cover the cries of his
victim, had, after prolonged hesitation, resolved to commit his crime,
and having fired two shots at the unfortunate young man without
succeeding in wounding him, had put an end to him by blows of the axe;
lastly, at the moment when, with Solomon's assistance, he was about to
throw the body into the sea, the prince's servants having appeared, they
had gone up to the girl's room, and, inventing their absurd tale, had
cast themselves on their knees before the Virgin, in order to mislead
the authorities. All the circumstances that poor Solomon cited in his
son's favour turned against him: the ladder at Nisida's window belonged
to the fisherman; the dagger which young Brancaleone always carried upon
him to defend himself had evidently been taken from him after his death,
and Gabriel had hastened to break it, so as to destroy, to the best of
his power, the traces of his crime. Bastiano's evidence did not receive
a minute's consideration: he, to destroy the idea of premeditation,
declared that the young fisherman had left him only at the moment when
the storm broke over the island; but, in the first place, the young
diver was known to be Gabriel's most devoted friend and his sister's
warmest admirer, and, in the second, he had been seen to land at Torre
during the same hour in which he had affirmed that he was near to
Nisida. As for the prince's passion for the poor peasant girl, the
magistrates simply shrugged their shoulders at the ridiculous assertion
of that, and especially at the young girl's alleged resistance and the
extreme measures to which the prince was supposed to have resorted to
conquer the virtue of Nisida. Eligi of Brancaleone was so young, so
handsome, so seductive, and at the same time so cool amid his successes,
that he had never been suspected of violence, except in getting rid of
his mistresses. Finally, an overwhelming and unanswerable proof
overthrew all the arguments for the defence: under the fisherman's bed
had been found a purse with the Brancaleone arms, full of gold, the
purse which, if our readers remember, the prince had flung as a last
insult at Gabriel's feet.
The old man did not lose heart at this fabric of lies; after the
pleadings of the advocates whose ruinous eloquence he had bought with
heavy gold, he defended his son himself, and put so much truth, so much
passion, and so many tears into his speech, that the whole audience was
moved, and three of the judges voted for an acquittal; but the majority
was against it, and the fatal verdict was pronounced.
The news at once spread throughout the little island, and caused the
deepest dejection there. The fishers who, at the first irruption of
force, had risen as one man to defend their comrade's cause, bowed their
heads without a murmur before the unquestioned authority of a legal
judgment. Solomon received unflinchingly the stab that pierced his
heart. No sigh escaped his breast; no tear came to his eyes; his wound
did not bleed. Since his son's arrest he had sold all he possessed in
the world, even the little silver cross left by his wife at her death,
even the pearl necklace that flattered his fatherly pride by losing its
whiteness against his dear Nisida's throat; the pieces of gold gained by
the sale of these things he had sewn into his coarse woollen cap, and
had established himself in the city. He ate nothing but the bread thrown
to him by the pity of passers-by, and slept on the steps of churches or
at the magistrates' door.
To estimate at its full value the heroic courage of this unhappy father,
one must take a general view of the whole extent of his misfortune.
Overwhelmed by age and grief, he looked forward with solemn calmness to
the terrible moment which would bear his son, a few days before him, to
the grave. His sharpest agony was the thought of the shame that would
envelop his family. The first scaffold erected in that gently mannered
island would arise for Gabriel, and that ignominious punishment tarnish
the whole population and imprint upon it the first brand of disgrace. By
a sad transition, which yet comes so easily in the destiny of man, the
poor father grew to long for those moments of danger at which he had
formerly trembled, those moments in which his son might have died nobly.
And now all was lost: a long life of work, of abnegation, and of good
deeds, a pure and stainless reputation that had extended beyond the gulf
into distant countries, and the traditional admiration, rising almost to
worship, of several generations; all these things only served to deepen
the pit into which the fisherman had fallen, at one blow, from his
kingly height. Good fame, that divine halo without which nothing here on
earth is sacred, had disappeared. Men no longer dared to defend the poor
wretch, they pitied him. His name would soon carry horror with it, and
Nisida, poor orphan, would be nothing to anyone but the sister of a man
who had been condemned to death. Even Bastiano turned away his face and
wept. Thus, when every respite was over, when poor Solomon's every
attempt had failed, people in the town who saw him smile strangely, as
though under the obsession of some fixed idea, said to one another that
the old man had lost his reason.
Gabriel saw his last day dawn, serenely and calmly. His sleep had been
deep; he awoke full of unknown joy; a cheerful ray of sunlight, falling
through the loophole, wavered over the fine golden straw in his cell; an
autumn breeze playing around him, brought an agreeable coolness to his
brow, and stirred in his long hair. The gaoler, who while he had had him
in his charge had always behaved humanely, struck by his happy looks,
hesitated to announce the priest's visit, in fear of calling the poor
prisoner from his dream. Gabriel received the news with pleasure; he
conversed for two hours with the good priest, and shed sweet tears on
receiving the last absolution. The priest left the prison with tears in
his eyes, declaring aloud that he had never in his life met with a more
beautiful, pure, resigned, and courageous spirit.
The fisherman was still under the influence of this consoling emotion
when his sister entered. Since the day when she had been carried,
fainting, from the room where her brother had just been arrested, the
poor girl, sheltered under the roof of an aunt, and accusing herself of
all the evil that had befallen, had done nothing but weep at the feet of
her holy protectress. Bowed by grief like a young lily before the storm,
she would spend whole hours, pale, motionless, detached from earthly
things, her tears flowing silently upon her beautiful clasped hands.
When the moment came to go and embrace her brother for the last time,
Nisida arose with the courage of a saint. She wiped away the traces of
her tears, smoothed her beautiful black hair, and put on her best white
dress. Poor child, she tried to hide her grief by an angelic deception.
She had the strength to smile! At the sight of her alarming pallor
Gabriel felt his heart wrung, a cloud passed over his eyes; he would
have run to meet her, but, held back by the chain which fettered him to
a pillar of his prison, stepped back sharply and stumbled. Nisida flew
to her brother and upheld him in her arms. The young girl had understood
him; she assured him that she was well. Fearing to remind him of his
terrible position, she spoke volubly of all manner of things--her aunt,
the weather, the Madonna. Then she stopped suddenly, frightened at her
own words, frightened at her own silence; she fixed her burning gaze
upon her brother's brow as though to fascinate him. Little by little
animation returned to her; a faint colour tinted her hollowed cheeks,
and Gabriel, deceived by the maiden's super human efforts, thought her
still beautiful, and thanked God in his heart for having spared this
tender creature. Nisida, as though she had followed her brother's secret
thoughts, came close to him, pressed his hand with an air of
understanding, and murmured low in his ear, "Fortunately our father has
been away for two days; he sent me word that he would be detained in
town. For us, it is different; we are young, we have courage!"
The poor young girl was trembling like a leaf.
"What will become of you, my poor Nisida?"
"Bah! I will pray to the Madonna. Does she not watch over us?" The girl
stopped, struck by the sound of her own words, which the circumstances
so cruelly contradicted. But looking at her brother, she went on in a
low tone: "Assuredly she does watch over us. She appeared to me last
night in a dream. She held her child Jesus on her arm, and looked at me
with a mother's tenderness. She wishes to make saints of us, for she
loves us; and to be a saint, you see, Gabriel, one must suffer."
"Well, go and pray for me, my kind sister; go away from the view of this
sad place, which will eventually shake your firmness, and perhaps mine.
Go; we shall see each other again in heaven above, where our mother is
waiting for us--our mother whom you have not known, and to whom I shall
often speak of you. Farewell, my sister, until we meet again!"
And he kissed her on the forehead.
The young girl called up all her strength into her heart for this
supreme moment; she walked with a firm step; having reached the
threshold, she turned round and waved him a farewell, preventing herself
by a nervous contraction from bursting into tears, but as soon as she
was in the corridor, a sob broke from her bosom, and Gabriel, who heard
it echo from the vaulted roof, thought that his heart would break.
Then he threw himself on his knees, and, lifting his hands to heaven,
cried, "I have finished suffering; I have nothing more that holds me to
life. I thank Thee, my God! Thou hast kept my father away, and hast been
willing to spare the poor old man a grief that would have been beyond
his strength."
It was at the hour of noon, after having exhausted every possible means,
poured out his gold to the last piece, and embraced the knees of the
lowest serving man, that Solomon the fisherman took his way to his son's
prison. His brow was so woebegone that the guards drew back, seized with
pity, and the gaoler wept as he closed the door of the cell upon him.
The old man remained some moments without advancing a step, absorbed in
contemplation of his son. By the tawny gleam of his eye might be divined
that the soul of the man was moved at that instant by some dark project.
He seemed nevertheless struck by the-beauty of Gabriel's face. Three
months in prison had restored to his skin the whiteness that the sun had
turned brown; his fine dark hair fell in curls around his neck, his eyes
rested on his father with a liquid and brilliant gaze. Never had this
head been so beautiful as now, when it was to fall.
"Alas, my poor son!" said the old man, "there is no hope left; you must
die."
"I know it," answered Gabriel in a tone of tender reproach, "and it is
not that which most afflicts me at this moment. But you, too, why do you
wish to give me pain, at your age? Why did you not stay in the town?"
"In the town," the old man returned, "they have no pity; I cast myself
at the king's feet, at everybody's feet; there is no pardon, no mercy
for us."
"Well, in God's name, what is death to me? I meet it daily on the sea.
My greatest, my only torment is the pain that they are causing you."
"And I, do you think, my Gabriel, that I only suffer in seeing you die?
Oh, it is but a parting for a few days; I shall soon go to join you. But
a darker sorrow weighs upon me. I am strong, I am a man". He stopped,
fearing that he had said too much; then drawing near to his son, he said
in a tearful voice, "Forgive me, my Gabriel; I am the cause of your
death. I ought to have killed the prince with my own hand. In our
country, children and old men are not condemned to death. I am over
eighty years old; I should have been pardoned; they told me that when,
with tears, I asked pardon for you; once more, forgive me, Gabriel; I
thought my daughter was dead; I thought of nothing else; and besides, I
did not know the law."
"Father, father!" cried Gabriel, touched, "what are you saying? I would
have given my life a thousand times over to purchase one day of yours.
Since you are strong enough to be present at my last hour, fear not; you
will not see me turn pale; your son will be worthy of you."
"And he is to die, to die!" cried Solomon, striking his forehead in
despair, and casting on the walls of the dungeon a look of fire that
would fain have pierced them.
"I am resigned, father," said Gabriel gently; did not Christ ascend the
cross?"
"Yes," murmured the old man in a muffled voice, "but He did not leave
behind a sister dishonoured by His death."
These words, which escaped the old fisherman in spite of himself, threw
a sudden and terrible light into the soul of Gabriel. For the first time
he perceived all the infamous manner of his death: the shameless
populace crowding round the scaffold, the hateful hand of the
executioner taking him by the Hair, and the drops of his blood
besprinkling the white raiment of his sister and covering her with
shame.
"Oh, if I could get a weapon!" cried Gabriel, his haggard eyes roaming
around.
"It is not the weapon that is lacking," answered Solomon, carrying his
hand to the hilt of a dagger that he had hidden in his breast.
"Then kill me, father," said Gabriel in a low tone, but with an
irresistible accent of persuasion and entreaty; "oh yes, I confess it
now, the executioner's hand frightens me. My Nisida, my poor Nisida, I
have seen her; she was here just now, as beautiful and as pale as the
Madonna Dolorosa; she smiled to hide from me her sufferings. She was
happy, poor girl, because she believed you away. Oh, how sweet it will
be to me to die by your hand! You gave me life; take it back, father,
since God will have it so. And Nisida will be saved. Oh, do not
hesitate! It would be a cowardice on the part of both of us; she is my
sister, she is your daughter."
And seeing that his powerful will had subjugated the old man, he said,
"Help! help, father!" and offered his breast to the blow. The poor
father lifted his hand to strike; but a mortal convulsion ran through
all his limbs; he fell into his son's arms, and both burst into tears.
"Poor father!" said Gabriel. "I ought to have foreseen that. Give me
that dagger and turn away; I am young and my arm will not tremble."
"Oh no!" returned Solomon solemnly, "no, my son, for then you would be a
suicide! Let your soul ascend to heaven pure! God will give me His
strength. Moreover, we have time yet."
And a last ray of hope shone in the eyes of the fisherman.
Then there passed in that dungeon one of those scenes that words can
never reproduce. The poor father sat down on the straw at his son's side
and laid his head gently upon his knees. He smiled to him through his
tears, as one smiles to a sick child; he passed his hand slowly through
the silky curls of his hair, and asked him countless questions,
intermingled with caresses. In order to give him a distaste for this
world he kept on talking to him of the other. Then, with a sudden
change, he questioned him minutely about all sorts of past matters.
Sometimes he stopped in alarm, and counted the beatings of his heart,
which were hurriedly marking the passage of time.
"Tell me everything, my child; have you any desire, any wish that could
be satisfied before you die? Are you leaving any woman whom you loved
secretly? Everything we have left shall be hers."
"I regret nothing on earth but you and my sister. You are the only
persons whom I have loved since my mother's death."
"Well, be comforted. Your sister will be saved."
"Oh, yes! I shall die happy."
"Do you forgive our enemies?"
"With all the strength of my heart. I pray God to have mercy on the
witnesses who accused me. May He forgive me my sins!"
"How old is it that you will soon be?" the old man asked suddenly, for
his reason was beginning to totter, and his memory had failed him.
"I was twenty-five on All Hallows' Day."
"True; it was a sad day, this year; you were in prison."
"Do you remember how, five years ago, on that same day I got the prize
in the regatta at Venice?"
"Tell me about that, my child."
And he listened, his neck stretched forward, his mouth half open, his
hands in his son's. A sound of steps came in from the corridor, and a
dull knock was struck upon the door. It was the fatal hour. The poor
father had forgotten it.
The priests had already begun to sing the death hymn; the executioner
was ready, the procession had set out, when Solomon the fisherman
appeared suddenly on the threshold of the prison, his eyes aflame and
his brow radiant with the halo of the patriarchs. The old man drew
himself up to his full height, and raising in one hand the reddened
knife, said in a sublime voice, "The sacrifice is fulfilled. God did not
send His angel to stay the hand of Abraham."
The crowd carried him in triumph!
[The details of this case are recorded in the archives of the Criminal
Court at Naples. We have changed nothing in the age or position of the
persons who appear in this narrative. One of the most celebrated
advocates at the Neapolitan bar secured the acquittal of the old man.]
----