I COMMIT A DOUBLE MURDER
Francis Antony Strelley, Tennis-ball of Fate, should be inscribed upon
my tomb, unless like the wandering Jew I were not destined to have any
other than that restless globe upon whose shelving surfaces I was for
ever to slip and slide. Here was I once more buffeted on to the road;
and yet I could not fairly pretend that there was no fault of mine
concerned in the stroke. O, fatal dower of beauty that was thine,
Aurelia! Could I say that, had I maintained my firm resolve of a few
days' date, and fixed my heart and inclination where they were due--
towards the loving bosom and welcoming arms of my Virginia--this new
shame had come upon me? Alas, what malign influence drew thee, lady, to
Siena, to rekindle my flame, to melt my conjugal desires, to betray me
into the old passion, to draw me into the old despair? Thus I bitterly
questioned myself as, guarded on either hand by mounted men, I descended
the silent street on the way to what I must needs consider perpetual
imprisonment.
Going out of the Porta Romana, where we were obliged to wait in the cold
drizzle of a cheerless dawn for the porter to open the gate, a deeply
veiled, respectably dressed young woman asked the favour of our escort
from the corporal, and received it, probably on account of her good
looks, which should be extraordinary. She was going, she said, to join
her husband at Volterra, and feared the brigands who were notoriously
rife in that country. The corporal offered to take her pillion behind
him. "Willingly, sir," she said, and was lifted up by the troopers. As
we went out of the gate she raised her veil to use her handkerchief and
to look at me. In a moment I saw that it was my brave and affectionate
Belviso, and was no little comforted by the thought that here, at any
rate, was one heart in Siena generously inclined to mine.
We baited at Colle, and rested there two or three hours; from thence we
mounted a very steep hill and reached a country of abounding desolation
and misery, where bare grey hills alternated with dense thickets, and
were told that there was not a human habitation for the rest of the
journey to Volterra. Our guards saw to the priming of their muskets
before they started from Colle, and kept a sharp lookout on all sides of
the way. We met nothing, however, threatening or otherwise, for nearly
half our journey, but somewhere about four o'clock of the afternoon,
when we were traversing a barren moor, the corporal gave a sharp cry and
reined up his horse. Before I knew what he was about a pistol had been
placed in my hands, and he said, "Every man for himself now. You are
free, sir."
"How--free?" I asked him.
His reply was to point ahead of us. "Brigands," he said, "and the
Kingdom of Heaven in view."
The troopers got off their horses, lashed them by the bridles, head to
head, and stood behind them with their muskets pointed the way the enemy
was coming. They were upon us almost before I had seen anything but a
cloud of whirling dust. They came on at a furious pace, yelling and
discharging their arms, and made short work of our defenses. The three
soldiers were killed and rifled. I and Belviso had our hands tied, were
strapped on to horses, put in the midst of the band, who were all
masked, and carried off at a terrible rate across the open country. We
went down a mountain side, crossed a torrent and crashed into a thick
belt of woodland which lay beyond it. In the midst of this a ruined
chapel or hermitage seemed to serve our captors for a camp; for here
they drew rein and disposed of us, their booty. My feet were bound, as
my hands already had been, and I was thrown thus helpless on my face on
one side; the miserable Belviso, whose disguise and beauty made him
appear what he had so unhappily pretended to be, had his hands tied
behind him, but his ankles left free. Him they placed on the other side
of the ruin at some distance from me. They had made no effort to search
me, my wretched rags of a clown of the theatre being my protection, and
by that means only I was able to keep the pistol given me by the
corporal. Mercifully I had not used it yet, for when the attack was made
I saw that I had better make no defence if I wished to save my life; and
I could not see that I had any good reason for risking it on behalf of
the soldiers. I suppose it must have been evident that I was a prisoner,
and that it would be better worth their while to keep and sell me as a
slave than to blow my brains out. It was only too clear what they
intended to do with my poor friend.
The brigands, so soon as they were rid of us, set to work preparing a
meal for themselves. They lit a fire in the chapel, filled a cauldron,
fed and watered their horses. Very soon they were all about the pot,
eating and drinking like wild beasts; and when the meat was done they
went on with the wine and brandy which they had in abundance, played
cards and dice, quarrelled or caroused far into the night. It was
densely dark, save for the chance flames of the fire, when I heard them
all wrangling together and had some hopes of a fight which might turn to
our advantage. But whatever was the subject of their disputations, their
fury died down into grumbling. They had decided on drawing lots for
possession of us, as I now understand--but some were too drunk to take a
part, and some too indifferent. It came down to three who went on with
the contest, while three fell asleep and snored through all the noise.
I saw the whole affair: how three billets were put into an empty crock
and one was drawn out. The man who drew it had won me, I could tell,
because when he had shown his paper to the others, he came over to where
I was and touched me with his foot to learn whether I was safe. I
shammed sleep, and never moved; so presently he lay down by the side of
me and himself slept. Meantime another, of the remaining two, had drawn
Belviso and had gone towards his victim. I saw the loser creep after
him, and lost sight of both in the dark; but then, after a horrible
pause, I heard my wretched friend begin to cry for mercy, to confess the
truth, to pray to God, to shriek in a way I shuddered to hear. The
ruffian at my side, like his companions by the fire, slept through all,
and this dared me to what sounds like an act of madness. With a temerity
born of my anguish on Belviso's account, I rolled over and over until I
was close to the fire. There, I thrust my ankles into the flames,
regardless of the excruciating pain, and burnt away the cord that tied
me. I served my hands in the same way, and springing up, crept swiftly
to where I heard the crying lad and the scuffling. By what light the
fire afforded I saw that the two men were fighting for possession. One
was full length on the ground, the other crouched over him and upon him
with a knife in his teeth, but so intent upon his murderous design that
he had no eyes for me. I came quite close, made a sudden snap at the
knife, and plunged it with all my force into the neck of the topmost. It
drove right through him and pierced his victim; I think they must have
died at once, for except for one horrible gasping snort I heard nothing.
At the moment I felt myself caught by the ankle and heard, "Francis,
Francis, it is I." I pulled Belviso to his feet, cut the cord at the
wrist and plunged forward into the black of the wood, running downhill,
as near as I could judge, towards where I knew the brook was. We were
pursued, but in a darkness so impenetrable the chances were in our
favour, and we were never within a quarter-mile of being caught. We
gained the river side. "Jump!" I cried, and dragged Belviso in after me.
We could just bottom it. There we stayed, under a shelving bank, up to
our necks in cold water until the day began to break--not daring to move
lest we should happen upon our enemies, our teeth chattering together,
in a state of semi-death. How we endured it I don't know; but life is
sweet to young men.
Looking about with great caution, I could see nothing nor hear anything
of the brigands. We crossed the river and ran as fast as we could--
Belviso in dripping weeds and myself in my wet rags of the comedy. By
very good luck he had had some four lire in the pocket of his gown.
When we had recovered something of blood and heart by our running, I
told Belviso to keep himself snug in some bushes while I went marketing
with his four lire. I had seen some herdboys on the hill and was
determined to supply him with clothes proper to his sex. I went up to
the boys and offered a lire for a pair of breeches. Half a dozen pairs
were off and under my nose before I had done speaking. I chose two pair,
begged a hunch of bread into the bargain, and made them happy as kings
with three lire. I asked them my whereabouts and learned that I was four
leagues from Volterra and seven from Pomarance. I was south of Volterra,
south-west of Siena, but Pomarance was on my road to Arezzo. To
Pomarance, therefore, so soon as we were clothed in the one
indispensable garment of manhood, we determined to go.
To reach our haven it was necessary to cross one of the main lines of
communication with Siena, that from Florence, namely, by the Val d'Elsa,
or that from Rome by San Quirico and the Val d'Orcia. We agreed that the
latter was the safer for us as being further from the seat of
Government, though much the more difficult. The country was mountainous
and thinly populated. If we ran in no danger of robbery--as how should
we, who had nothing but rags and empty stomachs about us?--we might
easily starve, or keep the beasts from starvation. There were wolves in
these hills, and dogs, turned rogue, which were as bad or worse. All
this, however, we were ready to face so soon as we had eaten bread,
washed ourselves at a well by the roadside, and commended ourselves to
God. "Come, brother," I said, "our fortunes must needs mend since they
can never be more broken. In this world there is no stay, but a thing
gets better or worse. I believe we may be happy yet."
"Brother," replied Belviso, "I am sure of it, and I promise you I have
never looked forward to happiness before. This well in which I have
washed myself is lustral water. I have fouled it with the vile thing I
was once. In return it has made a new creature of me, thanks to God and
you."
"Bravo," said I, "and now, Avanti!"
"Pronti," says Belviso, and we struck east along a fine grassy valley
where the trees were in the full glory of early summer. I was full of
hope, which I could neither explain nor justify, and though I did not
know it then I had some grounds to be so. I shall not inflict upon the
reader the vicissitudes of our wearisome journey of three weeks over the
sharp-ridged valleys of lower Tuscany. We sometimes begged, sometimes
worked for the bread we ate and the sheds in which we slept. We were
tanned to the colour of walnuts, healthy as young cattle, merry as larks
in the sky. We gave each other our full confidence, or so I believed. At
any rate I kept nothing from my friend. He was more reticent. "The past
is past," he used to say. "My safety is only in the future; let me talk
to you of that." And so he did. A friendship was sealed between us which
no difference of race, degree or age could ever break in upon; we loved
each other tenderly, we were as brothers. Belviso was at one and the
same time the most affectionate, the shrewdest, and the most candid boy
that ever was conceived in sin and nurtured in vice. No shameful dealing
had left a mark upon him, he was fine gold throughout. But so I have
found it always in this dear country of my adoption, that it takes
prosperity, never misery, to corrupt its native simplicity. The lower
you descend in the scale of human attainment the greater the hopes you
may conceive of what humanity may be permitted to attain. The poor drab,
the world's hire for the price of a rush-light, the lurking thief, the
beggar at the church door, the naked urchin of the gutter--these, though
they live with swine and are of them, have the souls of children new and
clean from God. Neither malice nor forethought of evil, nor craft, nor
hatred, nor clamour, nor the great and crowning sin is in their hearts.
A kind word, a touch, a kiss redeems them. Thus they, whom the tyrants
of Italy have enslaved, are in truth the very marrow of Italy, without
whom she would never have done anything in this world. And the sorrowful
verity is that slaves they must remain if Italy is to live on. For
prosperity, which fattens their bodies, chokes and poisons their souls.