“I shall be very anxious to hear the result of his investigation—­ very.  I will look in, if you will allow me, to-morrow morning.  And now I think I will go to that unfortunate man, the Marchese Lamberto.  I should not be at all surprised if I were to find that he had heard nothing about all this.  Only think what it is I shall have to tell him—­the woman about whom he has been so mad as to have determined on sacrificing to her everything, fame, position, friends, respect,—­everything—­is dead!  It is his monstrous proposal that has caused her death; and the same folly has made the representative of his house a murderer and a felon.  Think, Signor Pietro, what that man’s feelings must be when these tidings are told him.”

“Depend upon it, the whole city knows all about it by this time,” said the Commissary.

“But I think it exceedingly likely that he has not been out of his library, all day,” returned the lawyer.

“But the servants will have heard the news.  Ill news travels fast,” said the Commissary, with a shrug.

“Yes; but the servants will hardly have ventured to repeat such tidings to him.  Two to one it will fall to my lot to tell him.  A pleasant office, isn’t it, Signor Pietro?”

“Not one I should like to undertake.  Good-evening, Signor Giovacchino.  If I don’t see you to-morrow morning I will send you a couple of lines with the result of the medical examination.”

“Thanks, Signor Pietro; but I will look in about the beginning of your office hours to-morrow morning.  I feel as if I should be able to think of nothing else but this terrible business for some time to come.  Felice sera.”

And so the old lawyer went off to call upon his client, the Marchese Lamberto, truly dreading the interview, and yet not without a certain degree of satisfaction, and a kind of I-told-you-so feeling in the prospect of announcing to the unhappy Marchese those terrible first-fruits of the disastrous purpose, in condemnation of which the lawyer had spoken so strongly a few hours ago.

CHAPTER IV

The Marchese hears the Ill News

Signor Fortini judged rightly, when he said that he thought it probable that the Marchese Lamberto had not quitted his library, from the time when he had left him there, after the conversation, in which the Marchese had avowed his purpose with regard to La Bianca.

The shrewd lawyer had well understood, that the final decision with regard to such a purpose, and the definite announcement of it, which the Marchese had made to him, his lawyer, were not likely to dispose such a man to meet the eyes of his fellow-citizens.  Had Fortini known that the Marchese had been made aware of the purposed excursion of his nephew with the singer—­as the reader knows that he had been by the officious meddling of the Conte Leandro,—­it might have seemed strange that he should have chosen just that day and hour for the declaration of his intention.  Was it that he hastened to acquire such an authority over Bianca, as might enable him to put an end to any such escapades for the future?  Was it that he was infatuated to that degree, that he feared, that if he did not make haste to secure the prize, it might be taken from him by his nephew?