Part 51 (2/2)

'Were I to say to your Eminence that, after a certain interview with you, I had come away, a.s.suring myself that other sentiments were in your heart than those you had avowed to me; that you had but half revealed this, totally ignored that, affected credulity here, disbelief there, my subtlety, whether right or wrong, would resolve itself into a mere common gift--the practised habit of one skilled to decipher motives; but if, while in your presence, standing as I now do here, I could, with an effort of argument or abstraction, open your whole heart before me, and read there as in a book, and, while doing this, place you in circ.u.mstances where your most secret emotions must find vent, so that not a corner nor a nook of your nature should be strange to me, by what name would you call such an influence?'

'What you describe now has never existed, Ma.s.soni. Tricksters and mountebanks have pretended to such power in every age, but they have had no other dupes than the unlettered mult.i.tude.'

'How say you, then, if I be a believer here? What say you, if I have tested this woman's power, and proved it? What say you, if all she has predicted has uniformly come to pa.s.s; not a day, nor a date, nor an hour mistaken! I will give an instance. Of Delia Rocca's mission and its objects here, I had not the very faintest antic.i.p.ation. That the exiled family of France cherished hope enough to speculate on some remote future, I did not dream of suspecting; and yet, through her foretelling, I learned the day he would arrive at Rome, the very hotel he would put up at, the steps he would adopt to obtain an audience of the Chevalier, the attempts he would make to keep his mission a secret from me; nay, to the very dress in which he would present himself, I knew and was prepared for all.'

'All this might be concerted; what more easy than to plan any circ.u.mstance you have detailed, and by imposing on your credulity secure your co-operation?'

'Let me finish, sir. I asked what success would attend his plan, and learned that destiny had yet left this doubtful--that all was yet dependent on the will of one whose mind was still unresolved. I pressed eagerly to learn his name, she refused to tell me, openly avowing that she would thwart his influence, if in her power. I grew angry and even scoffed at her pretended powers, declaring, as you have just suggested, that all she had told me might be nothing beyond a well-arranged scheme.

”For once, then, you shall have a proof,” said she, ”and never shall it be repeated; fold that sheet of paper there, as a letter, and seal it carefully and well. The name I have alluded to is written within,” said she. I started, for the paper contained no writing--not a word, not a syllable--I had scanned it carefully ere I folded it. Of this I can pledge my solemn and sacred word.'

'Well, when you broke the seal,' burst in the Cardinal.

'I have not yet done so,' said the Pere calmly, 'there is the letter, just as I folded and sealed it; from that moment to this it has never quitted my possession. It may be, that, as you would suspect, even this might be sleight-of-hand. It may be, sir, that the paper contains no writing.'

'Let us see,' cried the Cardinal, taking the letter and breaking it open. 'Madonna!' exclaimed he suddenly. 'Look here'; and his finger then tremblingly pointed to the word, 'Caraffa,' traced in small letters and with a very faint ink in the middle of the page.

'And to this you swear, on your soul's safety,' cried Caraffa eagerly.

He bent forward till his lips touched the large golden cross which, as a pectoral, the Cardinal wore, and muttered, 'By this emblem, I swear it.'

'Such influence is demoniacal, none can doubt it; who is this woman, and whence came she?'

'So much of her story as I know is briefly told,' said Ma.s.soni, who related all that he had heard of the Egyptian, concluding with the steps by which he had her arrested and confined in the convent of St. Maria Maggiore, on the Tiber.

'There was an age when such a woman had been sent to the stake,' said Caraffa fiercely. 'Is it a wiser policy that pardons her?'

'Yes; if by her means a good end can be served,' interrupted the Pere; 'if through what she can reveal, errors may be avoided, perils averted, and successes gained; if, in short, Satan can be used as slave, not master.'

'And wherefore should she be opposed to _me_? broke in Caraffa, whose thoughts reverted to what concerned himself personally.

'As a true and faithful priest, as an honoured prince of the Church, you must be her enemy,' said the Pere; and, though the words were spoken in all seeming sincerity, the Cardinal's dark eyes scanned the speaker's face keenly and severely. As if failing, however, to detect any equivocation in his manner, Caraffa addressed himself to another course of thought and said--

'Have you questioned her, then, as to this young man's chances?'

'She will not speak of them,' was the abrupt reply.

'Have they met?'

'Once, and only once; and of the meeting his memory preserves no trace whatever, since it was during his fever, and when his mind was wandering and incoherent.'

'Could I see her, without being known? could I speak with her myself?'

Ma.s.soni shook his head doubtingly, 'No disguise would avail against her craft.'

Caraffa pondered long over his thoughts, and at last said--'I have a strong desire to see her, even though I should not speak to her. What say you, Ma.s.soni?'

'It shall be as pleases your Eminence,' was the meek answer.

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