The effect of these words was unexpected. Again did Father Dangelis’s thin face brighten into a smile, but with a twist of the lips, sharp with ironical contempt. He had become yet paler, and his keen intelligent eyes were flaming. “Ah! it was Monsignor Nani who sent you!” he said. “Well, if you think you need a protector, it is useless for you to apply to any other than himself. He is all-powerful. Go to see him; go to see him!”
And that was the only encouragement Pierre derived from his visit: the advice to go back to the man who had sent him. At this he felt that he was losing ground, and he resolved to return home in order to reflect on things and try to understand them before taking any further steps. The idea of questioning Don Vigilio at once occurred to him, and that same evening after supper he luckily met the secretary in the corridor, just as, candle in hand, he was on his way to bed.
“I have so many things that I should like to say to you,” Pierre said to him. “Can you kindly come to my rooms for a moment?”
But the other promptly silenced him with a gesture, and then whispered: “Didn’t you see Abbé Paparelli on the first floor? He was following us, I’m sure.”
Pierre often saw the train-bearer roaming about the house, and greatly disliked his stealthy, prying ways. However, he had hitherto attached no importance to him, and was therefore much surprised by Don Vigilio’s question. The other, without awaiting his reply, had returned to the end of the corridor, where for a long while he remained listening. Then he came back on tip-toe, blew out his candle, and darted into Pierre’s sitting-room. “There—that’s done,” he murmured directly the door was shut. “But if it is all the same to you, we won’t stop in this sitting-room. Let us go into your bed-room. Two walls are better than one.”
When the lamp had been placed on the table and they found themselves seated face to face in that bare, faded bed-chamber, Pierre noticed that the secretary was suffering from a more violent attack of fever than usual. His thin puny figure was shivering from head to foot, and his ardent eyes had never before blazed so blackly in his ravaged, yellow face. “Are you poorly?” asked Pierre. “I don’t want to tire you.”
“Poorly, yes, I am on fire—but I want to talk. I can’t bear it any longer. One always has to relieve oneself some day or other.”
Was it his complaint that he desired to relieve; or was he anxious to break his long silence in order that it might not stifle him? This at first remained uncertain. He immediately asked for an account of the steps that Pierre had lately taken, and became yet more restless when he heard how the other had been received by Cardinal Sarno, Monsignor Fornaro, and Father Dangelis. “Yes, that’s quite it,” he repeated, “nothing astonishes me nowadays, and yet I feel indignant on your account. Yes, it doesn’t concern me, but all the same it makes me ill, for it reminds me of all my own troubles. You must not rely on Cardinal Sarno, remember, for he is always elsewhere, with his mind far away, and has never helped anybody. But that Fornaro, that Fornaro!”
“He seemed to me very amiable, even kindly disposed,” replied Pierre; “and I really think that after our interview, he will considerably soften his report.”
“He! Why, the gentler he was with you the more grievously he will saddle you! He will devour you, fatten himself with such easy prey. Ah! you don’t know him, dilizioso that he is, ever on the watch to rear his own fortune on the troubles of poor devils whose defeat is bound to please the powerful. I prefer the other one, Father Dangelis, a terrible man, no doubt, but frank and brave and of superior mind. I must admit, however, that he would burn you like a handful of straw if he were the master. And ah! if I could tell you everything, if I could show you the frightful under-side of this world of ours, the monstrous, ravenous ambition, the abominable network of intrigues, venality, cowardice, treachery, and even crime!”