Whilst the maid was about that errand, she scrawled a hurried note with fingers scarcely able to hold a pen.
This note hastily sealed, she delivered to the young man ushered presently by Tessa. Her instructions, if breathlessly delivered, were yet precise.
'Listen, Renzo. You will take a gondola; two oars, so as to make the better speed; and you will go straight to the Inn of the Swords on the Rio delle Beccherie. You will ask to see Messer Melville, and you will deliver this note to him in person. In person, you understand?'
'Perfectly, madonna.'
'Listen still. If by any chance he should not be there, endeavour to discover where he is. He has a valet, a Frenchman. See him. Question him. Tell him that the matter is of great urgency, and have him help you, if he can, to find his master, so that you may deliver the note at the very earliest moment. It is very, very important, Renzo, do you understand? And I depend upon you to do all in your power to reach Mr. Melville with it without losing a moment.'
'I understand, madonna. If I am wanted here . . .'
'Never mind that,' she interrupted him. 'Tell no one where you are going, or even that you are going. I will answer for you if you are missed. Now go, boy; I pray God you may make good speed. And bring me word the moment you are back.' She gave him a handful of silver and so dismissed him.
Deriving some relief from the sense of having at least done something, Isotta sank down on the stool before her dressing-table and viewed her ghostly face in its long Murano mirror.
It would be an hour after the Angelus had sounded, and night had already closed in when Renzo reached the Inn of the Swords to be met by the landlord with the information that Messer Melville was absent. Since the landlord could add nothing to this information, Renzo asked to see Messer Melville's valet. He was conducted by the landlord above-stairs.
The keen-faced Philibert desired to know what the young man wanted with his master. Renzo told him frankly, whence he came and what his errand.
'Morbleu,' said Philibert, 'it seems, then, that all Venice is hunting Monsieur Melville this evening. Half-an-hour ago it was Monsieur Vendramin, just as eager to find him. It's fortunate I overheard him ordering his gondolier, or you would both be disappointed. He left here to go to the Casa Gazzola, if you know where that is.'
'By the Rialto. I know.' The breathless Renzo would have departed, but that Philibert caught him by the arm.
'Not so much haste, my lad. You have a proverb in Italy that he goes safely who goes slowly. Remember it. When you come to the Casa Gazzola, ask for Madame la Vicomtesse de Saulx. Madame la Vicomtesse de Saulx,' he repeated. 'That's where you'll find him.'
Renzo flung down the stairs and back to the waiting gondola. Within ten minutes he was at the Casa Gazzola.
The Vicomtesse was from home, the porter informed him. She had gone out nearly an hour ago.
'It is not the Vicomtesse I was seeking, but a gentleman I was told I should find here with her. A Messer Melville. Do you know him? Is he here?'
'He left with madama. If your business is urgent, you may find him at the French Legation. At least, that's where they were going when they left here. Do you know where it is? In the Corte del Cavallo, Fondamenta of the Madonna del' Orto. Palazzo della Vecchia. Anyone there will point it out to you.'
Renzo re-embarked, and the black boat glided away and swung presently from the broad waters of the Grand Canal, aglitter with the lights of the Rialto Bridge, into the darkness of a narrow rio to the north. It was a long way to the Madonna del' Orto, and Renzo prayed that he was not making the journey merely again to be sent on somewhere else.
CHAPTER XXVI
THE PURSUERS
Marc-Antoine had been visited at his lodging that morning by the secretary Jacob, who brought him a letter addressed to Camille Lebel which had arrived at the French Legation two days ago. It was accompanied by a note from Lallemant inviting him to supper at the Palazzo della Vecchia that evening, and asking him to act as an escort to the Vicomtesse de Saulx, who was also expected.
Now that he had actually parted with the drafts to Vendramin, Lallemant was not entirely without uneasiness on Marc-Antoine's behalf. Anyway, the job being done and Villetard in possession of his charts, there was nothing to prevent the ambassador from discharging what he regarded as a duty to Lebel by informing him of what had taken place. If he did this in the presence of the Vicomtesse, that should avoid him the recriminations which he had cause to fear. So he asked them both to supper.
Marc-Antoine sent word back by Jacob that he would be glad to come, and then opened the letter. It was from Barras, and it proved perhaps the most startling communication that the Directors had yet addressed to their plenipotentiary Lebel.
Writing in the name of the Directory, Barras began by contrasting the strength of the Army of Italy with that of the imperialists under the Archduke. In view of the greatly superior French forces, the Austrian defeat was considered inevitable. When it occurred, if the situation were properly handled, it should be possible to end, not merely the campaign, but the war itself. Austria, if properly approached, should be more than ready to make peace. To ensure this, the plan of the Directors was that Austria should be offered the Venetian provinces both in Italy, Istria, and Dalmatia as compensation for the loss of Lombardy. In the view of the Directors there was little doubt that the Austrians would count themselves fortunate in being able to make peace on such terms.
Barras went on to state that instructions to this end were being sent to General Bonaparte; and Lebel was desired to co-operate as might be necessary, and empowered to take all measures that he accounted desirable for the promotion of the end now in view. He was particularly desired to see that an adequate pretext for hostilities was supplied by Venice. Hitherto the Serenissima had yielded supinely to every demand, however rigorous. If she persisted in this, she might rob France of all justification for employing the strong hand. Lebel on the spot would see where provocation might be given of a kind to draw Venice into an act of hostility that should open the door for a declaration of war.
Marc-Antoine sat with his elbows on his writing-table, his head in his hands and that letter before him. In these months in Venice he had tasted more than once the bitterness of failure; but never so completely as now. This was definitely the end. The doom of the ancient, great and glorious Republic of Venice was written. The Serenissima was to pay with her independence for the spinelessness of her Doge and the meanness of spirit of the preponderance of her governing patricians.
It seemed to him, too, that it must prove the end of those personal hopes in which he had come to Venice, and which so far he had been able to sustain in spite of what he found there.
That sense of failure paralyzed his wits, and in this despairing acceptance of defeat he remained all day. In the mechanical pursuit of the processes of existence, he was suffering Philibert to dress him that evening, when suddenly he perceived that this was not yet necessarily the end. Sometimes those whom an excessive caution has brought to the point of ruin will, when face to face with it, adventure all upon a gambler's throw.
The indolent, irresolute Doge had hitherto leaned ever upon the conviction that Venice would be saved by other hands than her own. This plan of the Directory should bring him at last to face the fact that, if Venice was now to be saved at all, she could be saved only by her own effort. In an eleventh-hour alliance with Austria there was no longer the assurance of victory that there would have been before Rivoli; but in anything short of that alliance there was only the assurance of extinction. Perhaps, when this was perceived, that supreme and tardy effort would be made.