Sunrise Part 47

"You are sanguine, Signor Calabressa," said the other.

"Besides, the thirty thousand lire!"' said Calabressa, eagerly. "Do you know what that is? Ah, you English have always too much money!"

"No doubt," said Edwards, with a smile. "We are all up to the neck in gold."

"Thirty thousand lire a year, and the favor of the Vatican; what fools Granaglia and I were to laugh! But perhaps we will find that the Council were wiser."

They had now got out to Posilipo, and the stormy sunset had waned, leaving the sky overclouded and dusk. Calabressa, having first looked up and down the road, stopped by the side of a high wall, over which projected a number of the broken, gray-green, spiny leaves of the cactus--a hedge at the foot of the terrace above.

"_Peste!_" said he. "How the devil is one to find it out in the dark?"

"Find what out?"

"My good friend," said he, in a whisper, "you are not able by chance to see a bit of thread--a bit of red thread--tied round one of those big leaves?"

Edwards glanced up.

"Not I."

"Ah, well, we must run the risk. Perhaps by accident there may be a meeting."

They walked on for some time, Calabressa becoming more and more watchful. They paused to let a man driving a wagon and a pair of oxen go by; and then Calabressa, enjoining his companion to remain where he was, went on alone.

The changing sky had opened somewhat overhead, and there was a wan twilight s.h.i.+ning through the parted clouds. Edwards, looking after Calabressa, could have fancied that the dark figure had disappeared like a ghost; but the old albino had merely crossed the road, opened the one half of a huge gate, and entered a garden.

It was precisely like the gardens of the other villas along the highway--cut in terraces along the steep side of the hill, with winding pathways, and marble lions here and there, and little groves of orange and olive and fig trees; while on one side the sheer descent was guarded by an enormous cactus hedge. The ground was very unequal: on one small plateau a fountain was playing--the trickling of the water the only sound audible in the silence.

Calabressa took out his pocket-book, and tore a leaf from it.

"The devil!" he muttered to himself. "How is one to write in the dark?"

But he managed to scrawl the word "Barsanti;" then he wrapped the paper round a small pebble and approached the fountain. By putting one foot on the edge of the stone basin beneath he could reach over to the curved top, and there he managed to drop the missive into some aperture concealed under the lip. He stepped back, dried his hand with his handkerchief, and then went down one of the pathways to a lower level of the garden.

Here he easily found the entrance to an ordinary sort of grotto--a narrow cave winding inward and ending in a piece of fancy rockwork down which the water was heard to trickle. But he did not go to the end--he stopped about half-way and listened. There was no sound whatever in the dark, except the plash of the tiny water-fall.

Then there was a heavy grating noise, and in the black wall before him appeared a vertical line of orange light. This sudden gleam was so bewildering to the eyes that Calabressa could not see who it was that come out to him; he only knew that the stranger waited for him to pa.s.s on into the outer air.

"It is cooler here. To your business, friend Calabressa."

The moment Calabressa recognized this tall, military-looking man, with the closely cropped bullet-head and long silver-white mustache, he whipped off his cap, and said, anxiously,

"A thousand pardons, Excellency! a thousand pardons! Do I interrupt? May not I see Fossati?"

"It is unnecessary. There is much business to-night. One must breathe the air sometimes."

Calabressa for once had completely lost his _sang-froid_. He could not speak for stammering.

"I a.s.sure you, your Excellency, it is death to me to think that I interrupt you."

"But why did you come, then, my friend? To the point."

"Zaccatelli," the other managed to get out.

"Well?"

"There was a proposal. Some days ago I saw Granaglia."

"Well?"

"Pardon me, Excellency. If I had known, not for worlds would I have called you--"

"Come, come my Calabressa," said the other, good-naturedly. "No more apologies. What is it you have to say?--the proposal made by the Cardinal? Yes; we know about that."

"And it has not been accepted?--the decree remains?"

"You waste your breath, my friend. The decree remains, certainly. We are not children; we do not play. What more, my Calabressa?"

But Calabressa had to collect his thoughts. Then he said, slowly,

"It occurred to me when I was in England--there was a poor devil there who would have thrown away his life in a useless act of revenge--well--"

"Well, you brought him over here," said the other, interrupting him.

"Your object? Ah, Lind and you being old comrades; and Lind appearing to you to be in a difficulty. But did Lind approve?"

"Not quite," said Calabressa, still hesitating. "He allowed us to try.

He was doubtful himself."

"I should have thought so," said the other, ironically. "No, good Calabressa; we cannot accept the services of a maniac. The night has got dark; I cannot see whether you are surprised. How do we know? The man Kirski has been twice examined--once in Venice, once this morning, when you went down to the _Luisa_; the reports the same. What! To have a maniac blundering about the gates, attracting every one's notice by his gibberish; then he is arrested with a pistol or a knife in his hand; he talks nonsense about some Madonna; he is frightened into a confession, and we become the laughing-stock of Europe! Impossible, impossible, my Calabressa: where were your wits? No wonder Lind was doubtful--"

"The man is capable of being taught," said Calabressa, humbly.

"We need not waste more breath, my friend. To-night Lind will be reminded why it was necessary that the execution of this decree was intrusted to the English section: he must not send any Russian madman to compromise us."

"Then I must take him back, your Excellency!"

"No; send him back--with the English scholar. You will remain in Naples, Calabressa. There is something stirring that will interest you."

"I am at your service, Excellency."

"Good-night, dear friend."

The figure beside him had disappeared almost before he had time to return the salutation, and he was left to find his way down to the gate, taking care not to run unawares on one of the long cactus spines. He discovered Edwards precisely where he had left him.

"Ah, Monsieur Edouarts, now you may clap your hands--now you may shout an English 'hurrah!' For you, at all events, there is good news."

"That project has been abandoned, then?" said Edwards, eagerly.

"No, no, no!" said Calabressa, loftily; as if he had never entertained such a possibility. "Do you think the Council is to be played with--is to be bribed by so many and so many lire? No, no. Its decree is inviolable."