The marquis, meanwhile, whose indefatigable search after Julia failed
of success, was successively the slave of alternate passions, and he
poured forth the spleen of disappointment on his unhappy domestics.
The marchioness, who may now more properly be called Maria de
Vellorno, inflamed, by artful insinuations, the passions already
irritated, and heightened with cruel triumph his resentment towards
Julia and Madame de Menon. She represented, what his feelings too
acutely acknowledged,--that by the obstinate disobedience of the
first, and the machinations of the last, a priest had been enabled to
arrest his authority as a father--to insult the sacred honor of his
nobility--and to overturn at once his proudest schemes of power and
ambition. She declared it her opinion, that the _Abate_ was acquainted
with the place of Julia's present retreat, and upbraided the marquis
with want of spirit in thus submitting to be outwitted by a priest,
and forbearing an appeal to the pope, whose authority would compel the
_Abate_ to restore Julia.
This reproach stung the very soul of the marquis; he felt all its
force, and was at the same time conscious of his inability to obviate
it. The effect of his crimes now fell in severe punishment upon his
own head. The threatened secret, which was no other than the
imprisonment of the marchioness, arrested his arm of vengeance, and
compelled him to submit to insult and disappointment. But the reproach
of Maria sunk deep in his mind; it fomented his pride into redoubled
fury, and he now repelled with disdain the idea of submission.
He revolved the means which might effect his purpose--he saw but
one--this was the death of the marchioness.
The commission of one crime often requires the perpetration of
another. When once we enter on the ladyrinth of vice, we can seldom
return, but are led on, through correspondent mazes, to destruction.
To obviate the effect of his first crime, it was now necessary the
marquis should commit a second, and conceal the _imprisonment_ of the
marchioness by her _murder_. Himself the only living witness of her
existence, when she was removed, the allegations of the _Padre Abate_
would by this means be unsupported by any proof, and he might then
boldly appeal to the pope for the restoration of his child.
He mused upon this scheme, and the more he accustomed his mind to
contemplate it, the less scrupulous he became. The crime from which he
would formerly have shrunk, he now surveyed with a steady eye. The
fury of his passions, unaccustomed to resistance, uniting with the
force of what ambition termed necessity--urged him to the deed, and he
determined upon the murder of his wife. The means of effecting his
purpose were easy and various; but as he was not yet so entirely
hardened as to be able to view her dying pangs, and embrue his own
hands in her blood, he chose to dispatch her by means of poison, which
he resolved to mingle in her food.
But a new affliction was preparing for the marquis, which attacked him
where he was most vulnerable; and the veil, which had so long
overshadowed his reason, was now to be removed. He was informed by
Baptista of the infidelity of Maria de Vellorno. In the first emotion
of passion, he spurned the informer from his presence, and disdained
to believe the circumstance. A little reflection changed the object of
his resentment; he recalled the servant, whose faithfulness he had no
reason to distrust, and condescended to interrogate him on the subject
of his misfortune.
He learned that an intimacy had for some time subsisted between Maria
and the Cavalier de Vincini; and that the assignation was usually held
at the pavilion on the sea-shore, in an evening. Baptista farther
declared, that if the marquis desired a confirmation of his words, he
might obtain it by visiting this spot at the hour mentioned.
This information lighted up the wildest passions of his nature; his
former sufferings faded away before the stronger influence of the
present misfortune, and it seemed as if he had never tasted misery
till now. To suspect the wife upon whom he doated with romantic
fondness, on whom he had centered all his firmest hopes of happiness,
and for whose sake he had committed the crime which embittered even
his present moment, and which would involve him in still deeper
guilt--to find _her_ ungrateful to his love, and a traitoress to his
honor--produced a misery more poignant than any his imagination had
conceived. He was torn by contending passions, and opposite
resolutions:--now he resolved to expiate her guilt with her blood--and
now he melted in all the softness of love. Vengeance and honor bade
him strike to the heart which had betrayed him, and urged him
instantly to the deed--when the idea of her beauty--her winning
smiles--her fond endearments stole upon his fancy, and subdued his
heart; he almost wept to the idea of injuring her, and in spight of
appearances, pronounced her faithful. The succeeding moment plunged
him again into uncertainty; his tortures acquired new vigour from
cessation, and again he experienced all the phrenzy of despair. He was
now resolved to end his doubts by repairing to the pavilion; but again
his heart wavered in irresolution how to proceed should his fears be
confirmed. In the mean time he determined to watch the behaviour of
Maria with severe vigilance.
They met at dinner, and he observed her closely, but discovered not
the smallest impropriety in her conduct. Her smiles and her beauty
again wound their fascinations round his heart, and in the excess of
their influence he was almost tempted to repair the injury which his
late suspicions had done her, by confessing them at her feet. The
appearance of the Cavalier de Vincini, however, renewed his
suspicions; his heart throbbed wildly, and with restless impatience he
watched the return of evening, which would remove his suspence.
Night at length came. He repaired to the pavilion, and secreted
himself among the trees that embowered it. Many minutes had not
passed, when he heard a sound of low whispering voices steal from
among the trees, and footsteps approaching down the alley. He stood
almost petrified with terrible sensations, and presently heard some
persons enter the pavilion. The marquis now emerged from his
hiding-place; a faint light issued from the building. He stole to the
window, and beheld within, Maria and the Cavalier de Vincini. Fired
at the sight, he drew his sword, and sprang forward. The sound of his
step alarmed the cavalier, who, on perceiving the marquis, rushed by
him from the pavilion, and disappeared among the woods. The marquis
pursued, but could not overtake him; and he returned to the pavilion
with an intention of plunging his sword in the heart of Maria, when he
discovered her senseless on the ground. Pity now suspended his
vengeance; he paused in agonizing gaze upon her, and returned his
sword into the scabbard.
She revived, but on observing the marquis, screamed and relapsed. He
hastened to the castle for assistance, inventing, to conceal his
disgrace, some pretence for her sudden illness, and she was conveyed
to her chamber.
The marquis was now not suffered to doubt her infidelity, but the
passion which her conduct abused, her faithlessness could not subdue;
he still doated with absurd fondness, and even regretted that
uncertainty could no longer flatter him with hope. It seemed as if his
desire of her affection increased with his knowledge of the loss of
it; and the very circumstance which should have roused his aversion,
by a strange perversity of disposition, appeared to heighten his
passion, and to make him think it impossible he could exist without
her.
When the first energy of his indignation was subsided, he determined,
therefore, to reprove and to punish, but hereafter to restore her to
favor.
In this resolution he went to her apartment, and reprehended her
falsehood in terms of just indignation.
Maria de Vellorno, in whom the late discovery had roused resentment,
instead of awakening penitence; and exasperated pride without exciting
shame--heard the upbraidings of the marquis with impatience, and
replied to them with acrimonious violence.
She boldly asserted her innocence, and instantly invented a story, the
plausibility of which might have deceived a man who had evidence less
certain than his senses to contradict it. She behaved with a
haughtiness the most insolent; and when she perceived that the marquis
was no longer to be misled, and that her violence failed to accomplish
its purpose, she had recourse to tears and supplications. But the
artifice was too glaring to succeed; and the marquis quitted her
apartment in an agony of resentment.
His former fascinations, however, quickly returned, and again held him
in suspension between love and vengeance. That the vehemence of his
passion, however, might not want an object, he ordered Baptista to
discover the retreat of the Cavalier de Vincini on whom he meant to
revenge his lost honor. Shame forbade him to employ others in the
search.
This discovery suspended for a while the operations of the fatal
scheme, which had before employed the thoughts of the marquis; but it
had only suspended--not destroyed them. The late occurrence had
annihilated his domestic happiness; but his pride now rose to rescue
him from despair, and he centered all his future hopes upon ambition.
In a moment of cool reflection, he considered that he had derived
neither happiness or content from the pursuit of dissipated pleasures,
to which he had hitherto sacrificed every opposing consideration. He
resolved, therefore, to abandon the gay schemes of dissipation which
had formerly allured him, and dedicate himself entirely to ambition,
in the pursuits and delights of which he hoped to bury all his cares.
He therefore became more earnest than ever for the marriage of Julia
with the Duke de Luovo, through whose means he designed to involve
himself in the interests of the state, and determined to recover her
at whatever consequence. He resolved, without further delay, to appeal
to the pope; but to do this with safety it was necessary that the
marchioness should die; and he returned therefore to the consideration
and execution of his diabolical purpose.
He mingled a poisonous drug with the food he designed for her; and
when night arrived, carried it to the cell. As he unlocked the door,
his hand trembled; and when he presented the food, and looked
consciously for the last time upon the marchioness, who received it
with humble thankfulness, his heart almost relented. His countenance,
over which was diffused the paleness of death, expressed the secret
movements of his soul, and he gazed upon her with eyes of stiffened
horror. Alarmed by his looks, she fell upon her knees to supplicate
his pity.
Her attitude recalled his bewildered senses; and endeavouring to
assume a tranquil aspect, he bade her rise, and instantly quitted the
cell, fearful of the instability of his purpose. His mind was not yet
sufficiently hardened by guilt to repel the arrows of conscience, and
his imagination responded to her power. As he passed through the long
dreary passages from the prison, solemn and mysterious sounds seemed
to speak in every murmur of the blast which crept along their
windings, and he often started and looked back.
He reached his chamber, and having shut the door, surveyed the room in
fearful examination. Ideal forms flitted before his fancy, and for the
first time in his life he feared to be alone. Shame only withheld him
from calling Baptista. The gloom of the hour, and the death-like
silence that prevailed, assisted the horrors of his imagination. He
half repented of the deed, yet deemed it now too late to obviate it;
and he threw himself on his bed in terrible emotion. His head grew
dizzy, and a sudden faintness overcame him; he hesitated, and at
length arose to ring for assistance, but found himself unable to
stand.
In a few moments he was somewhat revived, and rang his bell; but
before any person appeared, he was seized with terrible pains, and
staggering to his bed, sunk senseless upon it. Here Baptista, who was
the first person that entered his room, found him struggling seemingly
in the agonies of death. The whole castle was immediately roused, and
the confusion may be more easily imagined than described. Emilia,
amid the general alarm, came to her father's room, but the sight of
him overcame her, and she was carried from his presence. By the help
of proper applications the marquis recovered his senses and his pains
had a short cessation.
'I am dying,' said he, in a faultering accent; 'send instantly for the
marchioness and my son.'
Ferdinand, in escaping from the hands of the banditti, it was now
seen, had fallen into the power of his father. He had been since
confined in an apartment of the castle, and was now liberated to obey
the summons. The countenance of the marquis exhibited a ghastly image;
Ferdinand, when he drew near the bed, suddenly shrunk back, overcome
with horror. The marquis now beckoned his attendants to quit the room,
and they were preparing to obey, when a violent noise was heard from
without; almost in the same instant the door of the apartment was
thrown open, and the servant, who had been sent for the marchioness,
rushed in. His look alone declared the horror of his mind, for words
he had none to utter. He stared wildly, and pointed to the gallery he
had quitted. Ferdinand, seized with new terror, rushed the way he
pointed to the apartment of the marchioness. A spectacle of horror
presented itself. Maria lay on a couch lifeless, and bathed in blood.
A poignard, the instrument of her destruction, was on the floor; and
it appeared from a letter which was found on the couch beside her,
that she had died by her own hand. The paper contained these words:
TO THE MARQUIS DE MAZZINI
Your words have stabbed my heart. No power on earth could
restore the peace you have destroyed. I will escape from my
torture. When you read this, I shall be no more. But the
triumph shall no longer be yours--the draught you have drank
was given by the hand of the injured
MARIA DE MAZZINI.
It now appeared that the marquis was poisoned by the vengeance of the
woman to whom he had resigned his conscience. The consternation and
distress of Ferdinand cannot easily be conceived: he hastened back to
his father's chamber, but determined to conceal the dreadful
catastrophe of Maria de Vellorno. This precaution, however, was
useless; for the servants, in the consternation of terror, had
revealed it, and the marquis had fainted.
Returning pains recalled his senses, and the agonies he suffered were
too shocking for the beholders. Medical endeavours were applied, but
the poison was too powerful for antidote. The marquis's pains at
length subsided; the poison had exhausted most of its rage, and he
became tolerably easy. He waved his hand for the attendants to leave
the room; and beckoning to Ferdinand, whose senses were almost stunned
by this accumulation of horror, bade him sit down beside him. 'The
hand of death is now upon me,' said he; 'I would employ these last
moments in revealing a deed, which is more dreadful to me than all the
bodily agonies I suffer. It will be some relief to me to discover it.'
Ferdinand grasped the hand of the marquis in speechless terror. 'The
retribution of heaven is upon me,' resumed the marquis. 'My punishment
is the immediate consequence of my guilt. Heaven has made that woman
the instrument of its justice, whom I made the instrument of my
crimes;----that woman, for whose sake I forgot conscience, and braved
vice--for whom I imprisoned an innocent wife, and afterwards murdered
her.'
At these words every nerve of Ferdinand thrilled; he let go the
marquis's hand and started back. 'Look not so fiercely on me,' said
the marquis, in a hollow voice; 'your eyes strike death to my soul; my
conscience needs not this additional pang.'--'My mother!' exclaimed
Ferdinand--'my mother! Speak, tell me.'--'I have no breath,' said the
marquis. 'Oh!--Take these keys--the south tower--the trapdoor.--'Tis
possible--Oh!--'
The marquis made a sudden spring upwards, and fell lifeless on the
bed; the attendants were called in, but he was gone for ever. His last
words struck with the force of lightning upon the mind of Ferdinand;
they seemed to say that his mother might yet exist. He took the keys,
and ordering some of the servants to follow, hastened to the southern
building; he proceeded to the tower, and the trapdoor beneath the
stair-case was lifted. They all descended into a dark passage, which
conducted them through several intricacies to the door of the cell.
Ferdinand, in trembling horrible expectation, applied the key; the
door opened, and he entered; but what was his surprize when he found
no person in the cell! He concluded that he had mistaken the place,
and quitted it for further search; but having followed the windings of
the passage, by which he entered, without discovering any other door,
he returned to a more exact examination of the cell. He now observed
the door, which led to the cavern, and he entered upon the avenue, but
no person was found there and no voice answered to his call. Having
reached the door of the cavern, which was fastened, he returned lost
in grief, and meditating upon the last words of the marquis. He now
thought that he had mistaken their import, and that the words ''tis
possible,' were not meant to apply to the life of the marchioness, he
concluded, that the murder had been committed at a distant period; and
he resolved, therefore, to have the ground of the cell dug up, and the
remains of his mother sought for.
When the first violence of the emotions excited by the late scenes was
subsided, he enquired concerning Maria de Vellorno.
It appeared that on the day preceding this horrid transaction, the
marquis had passed some hours in her apartment; that they were heard
in loud dispute;--that the passion of the marquis grew high;--that he
upbraided her with her past conduct, and threatened her with a formal
separation. When the marquis quitted her, she was heard walking quick
through the room, in a passion of tears; she often suddenly stopped in
vehement but incoherent exclamation; and at last threw herself on the
floor, and was for some time entirely still. Here her woman found her,
upon whose entrance she arose hastily, and reproved her for appearing
uncalled. After this she remained silent and sullen.
She descended to supper, where the marquis met her alone at table.
Little was said during the repast, at the conclusion of which the
servants were dismissed; and it was believed that during the interval
between supper, and the hour of repose, Maria de Vellorno contrived to
mingle poison with the wine of the marquis. How she had procured this
poison was never discovered.
She retired early to her chamber; and her woman observing that she
appeared much agitated, inquired if she was ill? To this she returned
a short answer in the negative, and her woman was soon afterwards
dismissed. But she had hardly shut the door of the room when she heard
her lady's voice recalling her. She returned, and received some
trifling order, and observed that Maria looked uncommonly pale; there
was besides a wildness in her eyes which frightened her, but she did
not dare to ask any questions. She again quitted the room, and had
only reached the extremity of the gallery when her mistress's bell
rang. She hastened back, Maria enquired if the marquis was gone to
bed, and if all was quiet? Being answered in the affirmative, she
replied, 'This is a still hour and a dark one!--Good night!'
Her woman having once more left the room, stopped at the door to
listen, but all within remaining silent, she retired to rest.
It is probable that Maria perpetrated the fatal act soon after the
dismission of her woman; for when she was found, two hours afterwards,
she appeared to have been dead for some time. On examination a wound
was discovered on her left side, which had doubtless penetrated to the
heart, from the suddenness of her death, and from the effusion of
blood which had followed.
These terrible events so deeply affected Emilia that she was confined
to her bed by a dangerous illness. Ferdinand struggled against the
shock with manly fortitude. But amid all the tumult of the present
scenes, his uncertainty concerning Julia, whom he had left in the
hands of banditti, and whom he had been withheld from seeking or
rescuing, formed, perhaps, the most affecting part of his distress.
The late Marquis de Mazzini, and Maria de Vellorno, were interred with
the honor due to their rank in the church of the convent of St Nicolo.
Their lives exhibited a boundless indulgence of violent and luxurious
passions, and their deaths marked the consequences of such indulgence,
and held forth to mankind a singular instance of divine vengeance.