“Matteo is right,” said a voice. “His heart beats like a hammer. Let him
lie and he will soon find his senses.”
I waited for a minute or so and then I ventured to take a stealthy peep
from between my lashes. At first I could see nothing, for I had been
so long in darkness and it was but a dim light in which I found myself.
Soon, however, I made out that a high and vaulted ceiling covered with
painted gods and goddesses was arching over my head. This was no mean
den of cut-throats into which I had been carried, but it must be the
hall of some Venetian palace. Then, without movement, very slowly and
stealthily I had a peep at the men who surrounded me. There was the
gondolier, a swart, hard-faced, murderous ruffian, and beside him were
three other men, one of them a little, twisted fellow with an air
of authority and several keys in his hand, the other two tall young
servants in a smart livery. As I listened to their talk I saw that the
small man was the steward of the house, and that the others were under
his orders.
There were four of them, then, but the little steward might be left out
of the reckoning. Had I a weapon I should have smiled at such odds as
those. But, hand to hand, I was no match for the one even without three
others to aid him. Cunning, then, not force, must be my aid. I wished
to look round for some mode of escape, and in doing so I gave an almost
imperceptible movement of my head. Slight as it was it did not escape my
guardians.
“Come, wake up, wake up!” cried the steward.
“Get on your feet, little Frenchman,” growled the gondolier. “Get up, I
say,” and for the second time he spurned me with his foot.
Never in the world was a command obeyed so promptly as that one. In an
instant I had bounded to my feet and rushed as hard as I could to the
back of the hall. They were after me as I have seen the English hounds
follow a fox, but there was a long passage down which I tore.
It turned to the left and again to the left, and then I found myself
back in the hall once more. They were almost within touch of me and
there was no time for thought. I turned toward the staircase, but two
men were coming down it. I dodged back and tried the door through which
I had been brought, but it was fastened with great bars and I could not
loosen them. The gondolier was on me with his knife, but I met him with
a kick on the body which stretched him on his back. His dagger flew with
a clatter across the marble floor. I had no time to seize it, for there
were half a dozen of them now clutching at me. As I rushed through them
the little steward thrust his leg before me and I fell with a crash, but
I was up in an instant, and breaking from their grasp I burst through
the very middle of them and made for a door at the other end of the
hall. I reached it well in front of them, and I gave a shout of triumph
as the handle turned freely in my hand, for I could see that it led to
the outside and that all was clear for my escape. But I had forgotten
this strange city in which I was. Every house is an island. As I flung
open the door, ready to bound out into the street, the light of the hall
shone upon the deep, still, black water which lay flush with the topmost
step.