All was quiet, as they passed the glass-house, and no one was looking out, for Giovanni’s wife feared him far too much to seem to be spying upon his doings, and the servants were discreet.  Only Nella, hiding behind the flowers in Marietta’s window, and supposing that Marietta was with her sister-in-law, was watching the door of the glass-house to see when Giovanni would come out.  She now heard the steps of the two men, running down the footway.  The rescue had taken place too far away for her to hear anything but a splash in the canal.  She saw that one of the men was carrying what seemed to be the body of a man.  She instinctively crossed herself, as they ran on towards the end of the canal, and when she could see them no longer in the shadow, she drew back into the room, momentarily forgetting Giovanni, and already running over in her head the wonderful conversation she was going to have with her mistress as soon as the young girl came back to her room.

Pasquale, meanwhile, withdrew his feet from the old leathern slippers he wore, and noiselessly stole down the corridor and along the garden path, to find out what Giovanni was doing.  When he came to the laboratory, he saw that the window was now shut, as well as the door, and that Giovanni had set the lamp on the floor behind the further end of the annealing oven.  Its bright light shot upwards to the dark ceiling, leaving the front of the laboratory almost in the dark.  Pasquale listened and he heard the sharp tapping of a hammer on stone.  He understood at once that Giovanni had shut himself in to search for something, and would therefore be busy some time.

Without noise he crossed the garden to the entrance of the main furnace room and went into the passage.

“Come out quickly!” he whispered, as his seaman’s eyes made out Marietta’s figure in a gloom that would have been total darkness to a landsman; and he took hold of the girl’s arm to lead her away.

“Your brother is in the laboratory, and will not come out,” he whispered.  “By this time Zorzi may be safe.”

“Safe!” She spoke the word aloud, in her relief.

“Hush, for heaven’s sake.  The door is open.  You can get home now without being seen.  Make no noise.”

She followed him quickly.  They had to cross the patch of dim light in the garden, and she glanced at the closed window of the laboratory.  It had all happened as Zorzi had foreseen, and Giovanni was already searching for the manuscript.  The only thing she could not understand was that Zorzi should have escaped the archers.  Even as she crossed the garden, the two man were passing the door, bearing Zorzi he knew not where, but away from the nearest danger.  A moment later she was on the footway, hurrying towards the bridge.  Pasquale stood watching her, to be sure that she was safe, and he glanced up at the windows, too, fearing lest some one might still be looking out.

But chance had saved Marietta this time.  She carefully barred the side door after she had gone in, and groped her way up the dark stairs.  On the landing there was light from below, and she paused for breath, her bosom heaving as she leaned a moment on the balustrade.  She passed one hand over her brows, as if to bring herself back to present consciousness, and then went quickly on.