Marietta | Page 8

everything in heaven and earth was crying to
him to go back.
That was folly, and he knew it. The master who had trusted him would

drive him out of his house, and out of Venetian land and water, too, if
he chose, and he should never see Marietta again; and she would be
married to Contarini just as if Zorzi had taken the message. Besides, it
was the custom of the world everywhere, so far as he knew, that
marriage and money should be spoken of in the same breath, and there
was no reason why his master should make an exception and be
different from other men.
He could put some hindrance in the way, of course, if he chose to
interfere, for he could deliver the message wrong, and Contarini would
go to the church in the afternoon instead of in the morning. He smiled
grimly in the dark as he thought of the young nobleman waiting for an
hour or two beside the pillar, to be looked at by some one who never
came, then catching sight at last of some ugly old maid of forty,
protected by her servant, ogling him, while she said her prayers and
filling him with horror at the thought that she must be Marietta
Beroviero. All that might happen, but it must inevitably be found out,
the misunderstanding would be cleared away and the marriage would
be arranged after all.
He had rested on his oar to think, and now he struck it deep into the
black water and the skiff shot ahead. He would have a far better chance
of serving Marietta in the future if he obeyed his master and delivered
his message exactly; for he should see Contarini himself and judge of
him, in the first place, and that alone was worth much, and afterwards
there would be time enough for desperate resolutions. He hastened his
stroke, and when he ran under the shadow of the overhanging houses
his mood changed and he grew hopeful, as many young men do, out of
sheer curiosity as to what was before him, and out of the wish to meet
something or somebody that should put his own strength to the test.
It was not far now. With infinite caution he threaded the dark canals,
thanking fortune for the faint starlight that showed him the turnings.
Here and there a small oil lamp burned before the image of a saint;
from a narrow lane on one side, the light streamed across the water, and
with it came sounds of ringing glasses, and the tinkling of a lute, and
laughing voices; then it was dark again as his skiff shot by, and he

made haste, for he wished not to be seen.
Presently, and somewhat to his surprise, he saw a gondola before him
in a narrow place, rowed slowly by a man who seemed to be in black
like himself. He did not try to pass it, but kept a little astern, trying not
to attract attention and hoping that it would turn aside into another
canal. But it went steadily on before him, turning wherever he must
turn, till it stopped where he was to stop, at the water-gate of the house
of the Agnus Dei. Instantly he brought to in the shadow, with the
instinctive caution of every one who is used to the water. Gondolas
were few in those days and belonged only to the rich, who had just
begun to use them as a means of getting about quickly, much more
convenient than horses or mules; for when riding a man often had to go
far out of his way to reach a bridge, and there were many canals that
had no bridle path at all and where the wooden houses were built
straight down into the water as the stone ones are to-day. Zorzi peered
through the darkness and listened. The occupant of the gondola might
be Contarini himself, coming home. Whoever it was tapped softly upon
the door, which was instantly opened, but to Zorzi's surprise no light
shone from the entrance. All the house above was still and dark, and he
could barely make out by the starlight the piece of white marble
bearing the sculptured Agnus Dei whence the house takes its name. He
knew that above the high balcony there were graceful columns bearing
pointed stone arches, between which are the symbols of the four
Evangelists; but he could see nothing of them. Only on the balcony, he
fancied he saw something less dark than the wall or the sky, and which
might be a woman's dress.
Some one got out of the gondola and went in after speaking a few
words in a low tone, and the door was then shut without