“You told the contessina my name, then?” I said to the man.  He had announced me to the baron, and consequently knew who I was.  He nodded, closed the door behind him, and came with me.  When we were in the street he explained that Hedwig desired to speak with me.  He expounded the fact that there was a staircase in the rock, leading to the level of the town.  Furthermore, he said that the old count and the baron occasionally drank deeply, as soldiers and adventurers will do, to pass the evening.  The next time it occurred he, the faithful servant, would come to my lodging and conduct me into the castle by the aforesaid passage, of which he had the key.

I confess I was unpleasantly alarmed at the prospect of making a burglarious entrance in such romantic fashion.  It savoured more of the last century than of the quiet and eminently respectable age in which we live.  But then, the castle of Fillettino was built hundreds of years ago, and it is not my fault if it has not gone to ruin, like so many others of its kind.  The man recommended me to be always at home after eight o’clock in the evening in case I were wanted, and to avoid seeing the baron when he was abroad.  He came and saw where I lived, and with many bows he left me.

You may imagine in what anxiety I passed my time.  A whole week elapsed, and yet I was never summoned.  Every evening at seven, an hour before the time named, I was in my room waiting for someone who never came.  I was so much disturbed in mind that I lost my appetite and thought of being bled again.  But I thought it too soon, and contented myself with getting a little tamarind from the apothecary.

One morning the apothecary, who is also the postmaster, gave me a letter from Nino, dated in Rome.  His engagement was over, he had reached Rome, and he would join me immediately.

CHAPTER XV

As it often happens that, in affairs of importance, the minor events which lead to the ultimate result seem to occur rapidly, and almost to stumble over each other in their haste, it came to pass that on the very evening after I had got Nino’s letter I was sent for by the contessina.

When the man came to call me I was sitting in my room, from force of habit, though the long delay had made the possibility of the meeting seem shadowy.  I was hoping that Nino might arrive in time to go in my place, for I knew that he would not be many hours behind his letter.  He would assuredly travel as fast as he could, and if he had understood my directions he was not likely to go astray.  But in spite of my hopes the summons came too soon, and I was obliged to go myself.

Picture to yourselves how I looked and how I felt:  a sober old professor, as I am, stealing out in the night, all wrapped in a cloak as dark and shabby as any conspirator’s; armed with a good knife in case of accidents; with beating heart, and doubting whether I could use my weapon if needful; and guided to the place of tryst by the confidential servant of a beautiful and unhappy maiden.  I have often laughed since then at the figure I must have cut, but I did not laugh at the time.  It was a very serious affair.