“But,” said M. Dandolo, “you spent the night with the person who is represented as your wife?”

“Quite true, but I have no account to give to anyone respecting what I have done last night.  Are you not of my opinion, M. de la Haye?”

“I wish you would not ask my opinion, for I do not know.  But I must say that public rumour ought not to be despised.  The deep affection I have for you causes me to grieve for what the public voice says about you.”

“How is it that those reports do not grieve M. de Bragadin, who has certainly greater affection for me than you have?”

“I respect you, but I have learned at my own expense that slander is to be feared.  It is said that, in order to get hold of a young girl who was residing with her uncle—­a worthy priest, you suborned a woman who declared herself to be the girl’s mother, and thus deceived the Supreme Council, through the authority of which she obtained possession of the girl for you.  The bailiff sent by the Council swears that you were in the gondola with the false mother when the young girl joined her.  It is said that the deed, in virtue of which you caused the worthy ecclesiastic’s furniture to be carried off, is false, and you are blamed for having made the highest body of the State a stepping-stone to crime.  In fine, it is said that, even if you have married the girl, and no doubt of it is entertained, the members of the Council will not be silent as to the fraudulent means you have had recourse to in order to carry out your intentions successfully.”

“That is a very long speech,” I said to him, coldly, “but learn from me that a wise man who has heard a criminal accusation related with so many absurd particulars ceases to be wise when he makes himself the echo of what he has heard, for if the accusation should turn out to be a calumny, he would himself become the accomplice of the slanderer.”

After that sentence, which brought the blood to the face of the Jesuit, but which my friends thought very wise, I entreated him, in a meaning voice, to spare his anxiety about me, and to be quite certain that I knew the laws of honour, and that I had judgment enough to take care of myself, and to let foul tongues say what they liked about me, just as I did when I heard them speak ill of him.

The adventure was the talk of the city for five or six days, after which it was soon forgotten.

But three months having elapsed without my having paid any visit to Lusia, or having answered the letters written to me by the damigella Marchetti, and without sending her the money she claimed of me, she made up her mind to take certain proceedings which might have had serious consequences, although they had none whatever in the end.

One day, Ignacio, the bailiff of the dreaded tribunal of the State inquisitors, presented himself as I was sitting at table with my friends, De la Haye, and two other guests.  He informed me that the Cavaliere Cantarini dal Zoffo wished to see me, and would wait for me the next morning at such an hour at the Madonna de l’Orto.  I rose from the table and answered, with a bow, that I would not fail to obey the wishes of his excellency.  The bailiff then left us.