Calm and terrible stood the bravo before them, in all the pomp of his strange and awful ugliness, with his bravo’s habit, his girdle filled with pistols and poniards, his distorted yellow countenance, his black and bushy eyebrows, his lips convulsed, his right eye covered by a large patch, and his left half buried among the wrinkles of flesh which swelled around it. He gazed around him for a few moments in silence, and then approached the stupefied Andreas.
“Ho! ho!” he roared in a voice like thunder, “you wish to see the bravo Abellino? Doge of Venice, here he stands, and is come to claim his bride.”
Andreas gazed with looks of horror on this model for demons, and at length stammered out with difficulty, “It cannot be real; I must surely be the sport of some terrible dream.”
“Without there, guards!” exclaimed the Cardinal Gonzaga, and would have hastened to the folding doors, when Abellino put his back against them, snatched a pistol from his girdle, and pointed it at the Cardinal’s bosom.
“The first,” cried he, “who calls for the guard, or advances one step from the place on which he stands, expires that moment. Fools! Do ye think I would have delivered myself up, and desired that guards might beset these doors, had I feared their swords, or intended to escape from your power? No; I am content to be your prisoner, but not through compulsion! I am content to be your prisoner; and it was with that intent that I came hither. No mortal should have the glory of seizing Abellino. If justice required him to be delivered up, it was necessary that he should be delivered up by himself! Or do ye take Abellino for an ordinary ruffian, who passes his time in skulking from the sbirri, and who murders for the sake of despicable plunder? No, by heaven, no! Abellino was no such common villain. It’s true I was a bravo; but the motives which induced me to become one were great and striking.”
Andreas (clasping his hands together).—Almighty God! can all this be possible?
An awful silence again reigned through the saloon. All trembled while they listened to the voice of the terrible assassin, who strode through the chamber proud and majestic as the monarch of the infernal world.
Rosabella opened her eyes; their first look fell upon the bravo.
“Oh, God of mercy!” she exclaimed, “he is still there. Methought, too, that Flodoardo—. No, no; it could not be! I was deceived by witchcraft.”
Abellino advanced towards her, and attempted to raise her. She shrunk from his touch with horror.