Part 17 (1/2)
Before he was removed, Antonio went up to him and whispered in his ear: ”If you are a man of honour, not a word about the cause of our fray will pa.s.s over your lips. In four days time we will meet again: and if you are not of my way of thinking then, I am ready to give you any satisfaction.”
Alfonso pledged his solemn promise; all the bystanders too a.s.sured Antonio that the wound as well as the whole affair should be kept a secret, not to expose him to any danger.
When they were all gone Antonio walkt with the priest Theodore deeper into the wood.
”Why,” began the latter, ”will you, for a fiend's sake, make over your own soul to h.e.l.l? I see, you are now of a different opinion; but is the sword the spokesman that should preach truth to a brother?”
Antonio felt in doubt how much he should disclose to the monk; however he said nothing about the wonderful event that had befallen him, and only entreated that, at the approaching festival of Easter, he might be allowed to enter the great church during high ma.s.s through the sacristy, near the altar.
After some objections Theodore complied, though he could not conceive what was the youth's purpose in asking for this permission. All Antonio said further was: ”I wish to bring a friend into the church that way, whose entrance at the great door might perhaps be stopt.”
All the bells in the city were ringing, that the holy feast of Easter might be kept with gladness and devotion. The people flockt toward the dome, to celebrate the most joyous of Christian festivals, and also to behold the renowned Apone in his new dignity. The students escorted their ill.u.s.trious teacher, who walkt along amid the reverent salutations of the n.o.bles, the council, and the citizens, in seeming piety and humility, an example to all, the pride of the city, the inspiring model of the youth. At the door of the cathedral the crowd shrank back in timid respect, to make way for their honoured bishop, who, in the garb of a prelate, with the golden chain round his neck, with his white beard and the white locks on his head, might be compared to an emperor or an ancient doctor of the church in his majestic demeanour.
A seat had been raised up on high for the great man near the altar, that the students and the people might see him; and when the mult.i.tude of the devout had poured into the church, the service began.
Theodore, the little priest, read ma.s.s on this day; and young and old, gentle and simple, all rejoiced to keep the festival of their Lord's resurrection in a worthy manner, and to behold the pomp of wors.h.i.+p returning, glad that after the days of severe fasting, after the saddening representations of suffering and sorrow, they might now comfort themselves with the feeling of a new life springing forth from the grave.
The first part of the divine service was already over, when people were astonisht to see Antonio Cavalcanti stepping into the church by the side of the altar, leading a thickly veiled figure in his hand. He placed the figure on the raised pavement just in face of Pietro, and then threw himself down before the altar praying. The m.u.f.fled form remained standing stiff and high, and beneath the covering one saw the firy black eyes. Pietro lifted himself from his seat, and sank back into it pale and trembling. The music of the ma.s.s now gusht and rolled in fuller symphonies; the m.u.f.fled form disentangled itself slowly from its veils; the face became free; and those who were nearest with horrour recognized the dead Crescentia. A shudder pa.s.sed through the whole church; even over those who were furthest off a secret s.h.i.+vering crept, to see the image pale as death standing so tall there, and praying so fervently, and never turning her large burning eyes from the priest at the altar. Even the great mighty Pietro himself seemed changed into a corpse; from his distorted features one might have held him to be dead, but that his life betrayed itself in his violent trembling.
Now the priest turned round and lifted up the consecrated host; trumpets announced the renewed presence of the Lord; and with a voice of triumph, with a face of high transport, her arms widely outspread, as she cried aloud ”Hosannah!” so that the church resounded with it, the pale apparition dropt down, and lay dead, stiff, and motionless, before Pietro's feet.
The people rusht forward; the music stopt; curiosity, astonishment, horrour, and affright spake from every asking countenance; the n.o.bles and students went up to comfort and support the venerable old man, who appeared so deeply shockt; when Antonio with a yelling sound shouted: ”Murder! Murder!” and began the most fearful charge, the most appalling tale, unfolded the h.e.l.lish arts, the accursed magic of the dismayed sinner, spake of himself and of Crescentia and of their awful meeting again, until anger and rage and imprecations and loathing and curses raved like a stormy sea around the criminal, and threatened to annihilate him, to tear him to pieces in the madness of their fury.
They talkt of gaolers and chains; the inquisitors drew near; when Pietro started up as in a frenzy, thrust and struck about him with clencht fists, and seemed to spread himself out to a gigantic size. He walkt up to Crescentia's body that lay smiling like the picture of a saint, gazed at her once more, and then pa.s.sed roaring and with flas.h.i.+ng eyes through the crowd.
A new horrour seized the people; they made room for the huge form; all moved out of his way. Thus Pietro came to the open street: but the mob now bethought themselves, and with cries and curses and revilings pursued the fugitive, who ran hastily onward, while his long robes flew far behind him, and the gold chain beat and rattled upon his breast and shoulders. The rabble, as they could not catch him, tore up the stones from the pavement, and threw them after him; and wounded, bleeding, dripping with sweat, his teeth chattering from fear, Pietro at last reacht the threshold of his house.
He hid himself in the innermost apartments; and Beresynth came forward inquisitively, asking all sorts of questions, to meet the mob and the rush of the people.
”Fall upon the maskt devil! the familiar!” they all shouted: ”tear in pieces the profane creature who never yet set foot in a church!”
He was dragged and pusht into the street; no answer was made to his inquiries and intreaties, to his howls and shrieks, nor indeed was anything heard through the stormy tumult except curses and threats of death. ”Bring me before the magistrate!” at length screamed the dwarf; ”there my innocence will be made clear as day.”
The constables were summoned, and seizing him led him toward the prison. All the people prest after him. ”In here with him!” cried the chief of the officers: ”chains and f.a.ggots are waiting for thee.”
He tried to tear himself away from them; the constables laid hold on him and shoved him to and fro: one seized him by the collar, another by the arm, the next clung round his leg to hold him fast, a fourth caught his head to make quite sure of him.
While they were pulling him backward and forward in this way amid shouts and curses and laughter, on the sudden they all started off from one another; for each had got nothing but a piece of clothing, a sleeve, cap, or shoe of the monster; he himself was nowhere to be seen. He could not have run away; he seemed to have vanisht; but n.o.body could tell how.
When they had broken into Apone's chamber, those who rusht in found him lying on his bed, lifeless, having bled to death. They plundered the house; the magical implements, the books, the strange furniture, were all made over to the flames; and throughout the whole city nothing resounded except curses on the man whom but this morning all had honoured as a messenger from Heaven. This only embittered the loathing with which they now revolted from the phantom.
When the turmoil by which the people were agitated was somewhat allayed, the body of Pietro was silently buried at night, without the consecrated churchyard. Antonio and Alfonso renewed their friends.h.i.+p, and attacht themselves to the pious Theodore, who, after going through the solemn rites and p.r.o.nouncing a devout oration, had the body of the beautiful Crescentia laid a second time in the vault designed for her.
Antonio however could not bear to stay any longer at Padua; he resolved to revisit his native city, that he might settle his affairs, and then perhaps get admitted into a convent. Alfonso on the other hand determined to make a pilgrimage to Rome, where the holy Father had just been proclaiming a year of jubilee with a plenary indulgence for sins. Not only throughout Italy was every one in motion; but from France too, and Germany, and Spain, came numerous trains of pilgrims, to celebrate this till then unheard of solemnity, this great festival of the church, in the holy city.
After the friends had parted, Antonio pursued his lonely path, shunning the great road, partly for the sake of brooding uninterruptedly over his sorrows, and partly to avoid the swarms that were flocking along the highway, and were often troublesome at the nightly resting-places.
Thus following his own mood, he roamed through the plains and through the vallies of the Apennines. One evening the sun set and no inn was to be seen. As the shades were deepening, he heard a hermit's little bell tinkling in a wood on one side. He bent his steps toward the sound, and when the darkness of night was already closing, he arrived at a small hut, to which a narrow plank led across a brook, surrounded by bushes.