He drew her to the door and began to unbar it himself. She had understood that he was right, so far as her own safety was concerned, and she helped him. A horn lantern stood on the stone floor in the entry at the head of the stair, where she had left it when she had last come up. Before going down she barred the door outside as usual, and then led the way.
At the first landing she opened a door as softly as she could and went in, leaving Zeno on the threshold. It was the sleeping room, and Zeno heard the captain's stertorous breathing with relief. He went in and looked at the sleeping man's face, which was congested to a dark red by the powerful drug, and Zeno thought it doubtful whether he would ever wake again. The woman, ignorant of the effects of much opium, was afraid her husband might open his eyes, and she plucked at Zeno's sleeve, anxious to get him away; but the Venetian smiled.
'He is good for twelve hours' sleep,' he said. 'Give me his cloak and helmet. If I find no one awake I will leave them at the outer gate. Otherwise I will send them to the tower in a clothes-basket to-morrow morning.'
The captain's wife obeyed, less frightened than she had been at first; Zeno muffled half his face in the big cloak, and threw the end over his shoulder whence it hung down, displaying the three broad stripes of gold lace that formed the border distinctive of a captain's rank in the guards. The bright helmet had a gilt eagle for a crest, scarcely differing from that of the modern German Gardes du Corps regiment.
'Now show me the way,' Zeno said.
Under the folds of the cloak he had the short broad sheath-knife ready in his grasp, and it was no bad weapon in the hand of such a fighter as Carlo Zeno. The captain's wife led the way with the lantern.
The captain's wife obeyed, less frightened than she had been at first.
At the foot of the next flight of stairs she almost stumbled over the sentinel, half-seated on the lowest step in a drunken sleep; his shaggy head had fallen forwards on his breast, and his legs stuck straight out before him, wide apart, like the legs of a wooden doll. His hands lay open with the palms upwards, one on his knee, the other on the step beside him; and his helmet, which had rolled off his head, had happened to stop just between his feet, the right side up, and facing him, as if it were watching him in his slumber like a living thing.