Lorenzi lowered his point in salute, in accordance with the rules of fence. Casanova returned the salute. Next moment they crossed blades, and the steel glittered like silver in the sun.
“How long is it,” thought Casanova, “since last I stood thus measuring sword with sword?” But none of his serious duels now recurred to his mind. He could think only of practice with the foils, such as ten years earlier he used to have every morning with his valet Costa, the rascal who afterwards bolted with a hundred and fifty thousand lire. “All the same, he was a fine fencer; nor has my hand forgotten its cunning! My arm is as true, my vision as keen, as ever..... Youth and age are fables. Am I not a god? Are we not both gods? If anyone could see us now. There are women who would pay a high price for the spectacle!”
The blades bent, the points sparkled; at each contact the rapiers sang softly in the morning air. “A fight? No, a fencing match! Why this look of horror, Marcolina? Are we not both worthy of your love? He is but a youngster; I am Casanova!”
Lorenzi sank to the ground, thrust through the heart. The sword fell from his grip. He opened his eyes wide, as if in utter astonishment. Once he raised his head for a moment, while his lips were fixed in a wry smile. Then the head fell back again, his nostrils dilated, there was a slight rattling in his throat, and he was dead.
Casanova bent over him, kneeled beside the body, saw a few drops of blood ooze from the wound, held his hand in front of Lorenzi’s mouth—but the breath was stilled. A cold shiver passed through Casanova’s frame. He rose and put on his cloak. Then, returning to the body, he glanced at the fallen youth, lying stark on the turf in incomparable beauty. The silence was broken by a soft rustling, as the morning breeze stirred the tree-tops.
“What shall I do?” Casanova asked himself. “Shall I summon aid? Olivo? Amalia? Marcolina? To what purpose? No one can bring him back to life.”
He pondered with the calmness invariable to him in the most dangerous moments of his career. “It may be hours before anyone finds him; perhaps no one will come by before evening; perchance later still. That will give me time, and time is of the first importance.”
He was still holding his sword. Noticing that it was bloody, he wiped it on the grass. He thought for a moment of dressing the corpse, but to do this would have involved the loss of precious and irrecoverable minutes. Paying the last duties, he bent once more and closed Lorenzi’s eyes. “Lucky fellow,” he murmured; and then, dreamily, he kissed the dead man’s forehead.
He strode along beside the wall, turned the angle, and regained the road. The carriage was where he had left it, the coachman fast asleep on the box. Casanova was careful to avoid waking the man at first. Not until he had cautiously taken his seat did he call out: “Hullo, drive on, can’t you?” and prodded him in the back. The startled coachman looked round, greatly astonished to find that it was broad daylight. Then he whipped up his horse and drove off.
Casanova sat far back in the carriage, wrapped in the cloak which had once belonged to Lorenzi. In the village a few children were to be seen in the streets, but it was plain that the elders were already at work in the fields. When the houses had been left behind Casanova drew a long breath. Opening the valise, he withdrew his clothes, and dressed beneath the cover of the cloak, somewhat concerned lest the coachman should turn and discover his fare’s strange behavior. But nothing of the sort happened. Unmolested, Casanova was able to finish dressing, to pack away Lorenzi’s cloak, and resume his own.