I embraced him affectionately, and went away, but his prediction was verified, for I never saw him again; he died eleven years afterwards. I found myself in the street without feeling the slightest fear, but I was in a good deal of trouble about my debts. I had not the heart to go to Muran to take away from M. M. her last five hundred sequins, which sum I owed to the man who won it from me in the night; I preferred asking him to wait eight days, and I did so. After performing this unpleasant piece of business I returned home, and, having consoled my landlady to the utmost of my power, I kissed the daughter, and lay down to sleep. The date was July 25th, 1755.
Next morning at day-break who should enter my room but the awful Messer-Grande. To awake, to see him, and to hear him asking if I were Jacques Casanova, was the work of a moment. At my “yes, I am Casanova,” he told me to rise, to put on my clothes, to give him all the papers and manuscripts in my possession, and to follow him.
“On whose authority do you order me to do this?”
“By the authority of the Tribunal.”
EPISODE 10 — UNDER THE LEADS
CHAPTER XXVI
Under The Leads—The Earthquake