YEARS passed, and in a foreign land Alfieri sought to win wealth and a
new name to offer the idol of his heart. He succeeded beyond his wildest
hopes, and with an impatience that would have been unsatisfied with the
swiftness of the lightning, sped over the waters, in a richly freighted
argosy of his own, back to his native city of the "Siren Sea."
Trusty adherents of his house had, in the mean time, procured the
reversion of the attainder as far as it touched him, and, as his father
was no longer alive, there was a strong prospect of his estate being
restored to him.
Arrived at Venice, he learned that the Duke D'Alvarez had been recalled,
and in the course of conversation the new ambassador mentioned that there
was talk in Madrid of a projected nuptial between the Donna Leonora and
the Prince Carlos of the blood royal of Spain.
Zanotti's lip quivered, and his eye flashed fiercely as he heard the
rumor, but not a word escaped to betray the hot feelings that were
pressing at his heart. Ere the sun sank into his bed of rosy clouds that
night, his gallant ship, with straining masts and every stitch of canvas
set, was speeding, like a gull, over the waters, and Zanotti paced the
deck through that night and the next with a stride that betokened troubled
thoughts. He reached Madrid in safety, and lost no time in finding the
residence of the ambassador. There were bright lights flitting from
window to window, and the sound of music was borne upon the night-wind,
betokening revelry within. He stopped to question a lackey who was
lounging at the entrance.
"The Donna Leonora was married this night three weeks ago, and Monseignor
gives a feast to-night to his son-in-law, the prince!"
Zanotti clutched one of the pillars that supported the massive doorway,
and kept his hold for a moment convulsively, for he felt his limbs
failing him. This movement brought his face beneath the jet of a lighted
chandelier, and the servant shrank with affright--it was like the
countenance of the dead! Terrible as was the struggle in his breast;
fearful as was the sudden contest of passion and despair; lost as he was
to aught but a blighting sense of the wreck and desolation of his hopes,
he still could not be oblivious to the significantly curious glance of the
affrighted servant. By an almost superhuman effort he repressed further
show of feeling, and his voice was without a particle of tremulousness,
although very hollow, as he told the menial to announce "General di
Romano." Such was his new rank and name! Many a fair dame started as that
tall, majestic figure, with its proud head and features, pale and rigid
as if hewn from the quarries of Pentelicus, passed her, as straight he
proceeded to the extremity of the apartment, where, in a group conversing
with smiling looks, stood the Duke de la Darca, his daughter, and the
Prince Carlos of Spain. The count (or, as we should now call him, the
general), unobserved by the group, placed himself near one of the large
Gothic windows, opposite to which was a group of statuary that effectually
concealed him from view. Here he paused to gaze upon the woman who had
wrecked his happiness! Four years had passed without robbing her of a
single grace, and she stood there sparkling with diamonds, radiant with
beauty, and with a regality of bearing that well became her new and
princely station.
An hour had elapsed, and he had watched her through many a stately measure
in the pompous dances of her country, and heard her light jest and her
gay laugh, and saw the same haughty fire in her magnificent black eyes,
through all! Jealousy has often been described, and the burning words
of the poet have wrought out an appalling picture; but if, during that
hour, each wild throb of his bursting heart, if each shooting fire of
his seething brain, if the madness and the agony and the fierce black
promptings that fashioned each thought into shape, and called it _murder_!
could have been conveyed in words or upon canvas to the minds of less
volcanic natures, they would have laughed to scorn the artist or the
author, and accused him of conjuring up the Titan agonies of hell to
confine them in the contracted space afforded by the heart of a mere
mortal man!
He turned from the revellers, sick and dizzy, and gazed out upon the
night. The scene was as fair a one as God's smile ever lighted into
beauty. The moon--floating in a sea of blue, cloudless, with the exception
of one fleecy-looking mass of vapor that covered a small space like a veil
of silver tissue--poured a flood of radiance upon a garden (surrounding
the house on three sides) filled with rare exotics, and in the distance
the steeples of the city rose up towards the sky, as if formed of
luminous mist. The stars, too, were scattered round night's queen in rich
profusion, and the air was fragrant with the breath of orange-blossoms.
The Venetian, even in that land of sunshine and of flowers--his native
Italy--had never looked upon as beautiful a scene. But it suggested no
soothing fancies! It only revived the memory of hours of which it was now
madness to think! Hours that were freighted with dreams and aspirations
as lovely as itself! Hours that were passed--and forever; and aspirations
that were coffined and dead! His brain seemed bursting with the heat
of the room, and, as the window was a casement but a few feet from the
ground, he sprang out, and walked with a hasty step in a direction in
which, from a plashing sound that smote his ear, he hoped to find a
spring or fountain. He found his conjecture a correct one, and, stooping
down, laved his fevered temples in the liquid, which was as cold as ice,
but seemed ineffectual when applied to the terrible fever that consumed
him! He threw himself upon a richly sculptured seat that was supported
by two marble Dryads on the edge of the fountain, and, in spite of every
restraining effort, groaned aloud. He had remained thus for some time,
regardless of time, place, everything but a dull leaden weight of misery,
when a light footfall on the hard gravel roused him, and, springing from
his recumbent position, he was about to conceal himself amid the foliage
of the adjoining shrubbery, for he was in no mood for society just then.
He also had been heard, however, and a rich, musical voice exclaimed--
"Dear father, are you there?"
Good heaven! it was _her_ voice! He stood spell-bound--volition was
suspended. The next moment they were face to face! With a low thrilling
cry, she cast herself upon his breast. There was a gleam half of
terror--partly of surprise and partly of joy--within her eyes. There were
the two again! ay, even as of yore! Leonora and Carlo! The ruined noble
and his betrothed bride--the princess and the soldier!
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