When the music is over you stroll along the arcades and under the Bocca del Leone, and through the narrow streets leading to the Campo of San Moisè, and so over the bridge near the Bauer-Grünwald to the crack in the wall that leads you to the rear of your own quarter. Then you cross your garden and mount the steps to your rooms, and so out upon your balcony.
The canal is deserted. The music-boats have long since put out their lanterns and tied up for the night. The lighters at the Dogana opposite lie still and motionless, their crews asleep under the mats stretched on the decks. Away up in the blue swims the silver moon, attended by an escort of clouds hovering close about her. Towering above you rises the great dome of the Salute, silent, majestic, every statue, cross, and scroll bathed in the glory of her light.
Suddenly, as you hang over your balcony, the soft night embracing you, the odor of oleanders filling the air, you hear the quick movement of a flute borne on the night wind from away up the Iron Bridge. Nearer it comes, nearer, the clear, bird-like notes floating over the still canal and the deserted city. You lean forward and catch the spring and rhythm of the two gondoliers as they glide past, keeping time to the thrill of the melody. You catch, too, the abandon and charm of it all. He is standing over her, his head uncovered, the moonlight glinting on the uplifted reed at his lips. She lies on the cushions beneath him, throat and shoulders bare, a light scarf about her head. It is only a glimpse, but it lingers in your memory for years,—you on the balcony and alone.
Out they go,—out into the wide lagoon,—out into the soft night, under the glory of the radiant stars. Fainter and fainter falls the music, dimmer and dimmer pales the speck with its wake of silver.
Then all is still!
The Riverside Press
CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS, U. S. A.
ELECTROTYPED AND PRINTED BY
H. O. HOUGHTON AND CO.
FOOTNOTE:
[1] Misteri di Venezia, di Edmondo Lundy.
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES:
Obvious typographical errors have been corrected.