But not upon that stately form riveted the gaze of Adrian—­pale, breathless, trembling, he clung to the walls against which he leaned.  Was it a dream?  Had the dead revived?  Or was it his own—­his living Irene—­whose soft and melancholy loveliness shone sadly by the side of Nina—­a star beside the moon?  The pageant faded from his eyes—­all grew dim and dark.  For a moment he was insensible.  When he recovered, the crowd was hurrying along, confused and blent with the mighty stream that followed the procession.  Through the moving multitude he caught the graceful form of Irene, again snatched by the closing standards of the procession from his view.  His blood rushed back from his heart through every vein.  He was as a man who for years had been in a fearful trance, and who is suddenly awakened to the light of heaven.

One of that mighty throng remained motionless with Adrian.  It was Cecco del Vecchio.

“He did not see me,” muttered the smith to himself; “old friends are forgotten now!  Well, well, Cecco del Vecchio hates tyrants still—­no matter what their name, nor how smoothly they are disguised.  He did not see me!  Umph!”

Chapter 9.II.  The Masquerade.

The acuter reader has already learned, without the absolute intervention of the author as narrator, the incidents occurring to Rienzi in the interval between his acquittal at Avignon and his return to Rome.  As the impression made by Nina upon the softer and better nature of Albornoz died away, he naturally began to consider his guest—­as the profound politicians of that day ever considered men—­a piece upon the great Chess-Board, to be moved, advanced, or sacrificed, as best suited the scheme in view.  His purpose accomplished, in the recovery of the patrimonial territory, the submission of John di Vico, and the fall and death of the Demagogue Baroncelli, the Cardinal deemed it far from advisable to restore to Rome, and with so high a dignity, the able and ambitious Rienzi.  Before the daring Roman, even his own great spirit quailed; and he was wholly unable to conceive or to calculate the policy that might be adopted by the new Senator, when once more Lord of Rome.  Without affecting to detain, he therefore declined to assist in restoring him.  And Rienzi thus saw himself within an easy march of Rome, without one soldier to protect him against the Barons by the way.  But Heaven had decreed that no single man, however gifted, or however powerful, should long counteract or master the destinies of Rienzi:  and perhaps in no more glittering scene of his life did he ever evince so dexterous and subtle an intellect as he now did in extricating himself from the wiles of the Cardinal.  Repairing to Perugia, he had, as we have seen, procured, through the brothers of Montreal, men and money for his return.  But the Knight of St. John was greatly mistaken, if he imagined that Rienzi was not thoroughly aware of the perilous and