The Wing-and-Wing; Or, Le Feu-Follet

by James Fenimore Cooper

[6] Singular as was this occurrence, and painful as it must have proved to the parties to the execution, it is one of the simplest consequences of natural causes. All animal matter swells in water previously to turning corrupt. A body that has became of twice its natural size, in this manner, as a matter of course, displaces twice the usual quantity of water; the weight of the mass remaining the same. Most human frames floating, in their natural state, so long as the lungs are inflated with air, it follows that one in this condition would bring up with it as much weight in iron, as made the difference between its own gravity and that of the water it displaced. The upright attitude of Caraccioli was owing to the shot attached to the feet; of which, it is also probable, one or two had become loosened.

Neither Carlo Giuntotardi nor Ghita Caraccioli--for so we must continue to call the girl, albeit the name is much too illustrious to be borne by one of her humble condition in life--but neither of these two had any other design, in thus seeking out the unfortunate admiral, than to perform what each believed to be a duty. As soon as the fate of Caraccioli was decided, both were willing to return to their old position in life; not that they felt ashamed to avow their connection with the dead, but because they were quite devoid of any of that worldly ambition which renders rank and fortune necessary to happiness.

When he left the crowd of boats, Raoul pulled toward the rocks which bound the shores of the bay, near the gardens of Portici. This was a point sufficiently removed from the common anchorage to be safe from observation; and yet so near as to be reached in considerably less than an hour. As the light boat proceeded Ghita gradually regained her composure. She dried her eyes and looked around her inquiringly, as if wondering whither their companion was taking them.

"I will not ask you, Raoul, why you are here at a moment like this, and whence you have come," she said; "but I may ask whither you are now carrying us? Our home is at St. Agata, on the heights above Sorrento, and on the other side of the bay. We come there annually to pass a month with my mother's sister, who asks this much of our love."

"If I did not know all this, Ghita, I would not and could not be here. I have visited the cottage of your aunt this day; followed you to Naples, heard of the admiral's trial and sentence, understood how it would affect your feelings, traced you on board the English admiral's ship, and was in waiting as you found me; having first contrived to send away the man who took you off. All this has come about as naturally as the feeling which has induced me to venture again into the lion's mouth."

"The pitcher that goes often to the well, Raoul, gets broken at last," said Ghita, a little reproachfully, though it surpassed her power to prevent the tones of tenderness from mingling with her words.

"You know all, Ghita. After months of perseverance and a love such as man seldom felt before, you deliberately and coldly refused to be my wife;--nay, you have deserted Monte Argentaro purposely to get rid of my importunities; for there I could go with the lugger at any moment; and have come here, upon this bay, crowded with the English and other enemies of France, fancying that I would not dare to venture hither. Well, you see with what success; for neither Nelson nor his two-deckers can keep Raoul Yvard from the woman he loves, let him be as victorious and skilful as he may!"

The sailor had ceased rowing, to give vent to his feelings in this speech, neither of the two colloquists regarding the presence of Giuntotardi any more than if he had been a part of themselves. This indifference to the fact that a third person was a listener proceeded from habit, the worthy scholar and religionist being usually too abstracted to attend to concerns as light as love and the youthful affections. Ghita was not surprised either at the reproaches of her suitor or at his perseverance; and her conscience told her he uttered but the truth, in attributing to her the motives he had, in urging her uncle to make their recent change of residence; for, while a sense of duty had induced her to quit the towers, her art was not sufficient to suggest the expediency of going to any other abode than that which she was accustomed to inhabit periodically, and about which Raoul knew, from her own innocent narrations, nearly as much as she knew herself.

"I can say no more than I have said already," the thoughtful girl answered, after Raoul had begun again to row. "It is better on every account that we should part. I cannot change my country; nor can you desert that glorious republic of which you feel so proud. I am an Italian, and you are French; while, more than all, I worship my God, while you believe in the new opinions of your own nation. Here are causes enough for separation surely, however favorably and kindly we may happen to think of each other in general."

"Tell me not any more of the heart of an Italian girl, and of her readiness to fly to the world's end with the man of her choice!" exclaimed Raoul, bitterly. "I can find a thousand girls in Languedoc who would make the circuit of the earth yearly rather than be separated a day from the seamen they have chosen for their husbands."