Part 1 (2/2)

You have often asked ht for the first time I will tell you

Suchet's head-quarters at that tie Dandolo, which stands on the lagoon not far from the place of San Marco

It was near the end of the winter, and I had returned one night froondola waiting

She prayed me to come to her at once as she was in trouble To a Frenchman and a soldier there was but one answer to such a note In an instant I was in the boat and the gondolier was pushi+ng out into the dark lagoon

I remember that as I took reat size He was not tall, but he was one of the broadest ondoliers of Venice are a strong breed, and powerfulthean to row

A good soldier in an enemy's country should everywhere and at all times be on the alert It has been one of the rules of rey hairs it is because I have observed it And yet upon that night I was as careless as a foolish young recruit who fears lest he should be thought to be afraid My pistols I had left behind in my hurry My sas at my belt, but it is not always the ondola, lulled by the gentle swish of the water and the steady creaking of the oar Our way lay through a network of narrow canals with high houses towering on either side and a thin slit of star-spangled sky above us Here and there, on the bridges which spanned the canal, there was the dileae of a saint But save for this it was all black, and one could only see the water by the white fringe which curled round the long black nose of our boat It was a place and a tiht of reat deeds in which I had been concerned, of the horses that I had handled, and of the woht also of my dear mother, and I fancied her joy when she heard the folk in the village talking about the faht, and of France, the dear fatherland, the sunny France, loithin ht her colours so reatness I would dedicate my life I placed ondolier fell upon me from behind

When I say that he fell upon me I do not mean merely that he attacked ht The fellow stands behind you and above you as he rows, so that you can neither see hiainst such an assault

One moment I had sat with my mind filled with sublime resolutions, the next I was flattened out upon the bottom of the boat, the breath dashed out ofme down I felt the fierce pants of his hot breath upon the back of my neck In an instant he had torn away my sword, had slipped a sack over my head, and had tied a rope firmly round the outside of it

There I was at the bottoondola as helpless as a trussed fowl

I could not shout, I could not move; I was a mere bundle An instant later I heard onceof the oar

This fellow had done his work and had resumed his journey as quietly and unconcernedly as if he were accustomed to clap a sack over a colonel of Hussars every day of the week

I cannot tell you the humiliation and also the fury which filledcarried to the butcher's I, Etienne Gerard, the chaht cavalry and the first swordsle unarmed man in such a fashi+on! Yet I lay quiet, for there is a tith I had felt the fellow's grip upon my arms, and I knew that I would be a child in his hands I waited quietly, therefore, with a heart which burned with rage, untilI lay there at the botto time, and always there were the hiss of the waters and the steady creaking of the oar Several ti, sad cry which these gondoliers give when they wish to warn their fellows that they are co At last, after a considerable journey, I felt the side of the boat scrape up against a landing-place The fellow knocked three times with his oar upon wood, and in answer to his sureat door creaked back upon its hinges

”Have you got hih and kicked the sack in which I lay

”Here he is,” said he

”They are waiting” He added so which I could not understand

”Take him, then,” said my captor He raised me in his arms, ascended some steps, and I was thron upon a hard floor A moment later the bars creaked and the key whined once more I was a prisoner inside a house

From the voices and the steps there seemed now to be several people round reat deal better than I speak it, and I could

”You have not killed him, Matteo?”

”What matter if I have?”

”My faith, you will have to answer for it to the tribunal”

”They will kill him, will they not?”

”Yes, but it is not for you or me to take it out of their hands”

”Tut! I have not killed him Dead men do not bite, and his cursed teeth met in my thumb as I pulled the sack over his head”