"My bones ache at the recollection thereof; I narrowly escaped hanging, shooting, and drowning: all of which were proposed in turns by a little hunchbacked fellow, a follower of Francatripa, who chose to make himself very active on the occasion. And do you know, Bianca, that I was immured in the thieves' cage at the end of the town prison: a good joke, is it not?"
"I heard it all from Annina, whose last love-letter from Giacomo (written, of course, by an itinerant scrivano) was filled with a history of the affair. O, the madness of my dear and foolish sister! How bitterly I wept for and deplored it! Believe me, Claude, had an Italian cavalier been put into that horrid cage, his soldiers would have set the town on fire: but you, British! oh, you take some things very quietly. Yesterday a mounted sbirro brought me a letter from my sweet little friend Luisa Gismondo, who is with her father in the camp at Cassano. O, what dreadful things she tells me of! And Massena, that very bad Italian, he is gathering together an army, who boast that they will soon clear Calabria of the British."
"But where is Luigi now?"
"Just behind you, signor, and most happy to congratulate you on your promotion, I saw it in the Messina Gazette," said the visconte, coming from the recess of a window, where, unseen he had been a smiling spectator. Grasping my hand, he continued, "How I rejoice that you escaped from the villanous Crotonians. On my honour! Dundas, nothing but fear for my poor Francesca restrained me from putting back to save or avenge you: and we all imagined those base paesani would have respected your uniform and character——"
"No more apologies: but say, how does the Signora Francesca?'
"Indifferently, indeed. She bemoans her degraded situation incessantly (here Bianca reclined her head on my epaulette, and sobbed audibly). Torn from her convent, to which she dare return no more, she is still a nun; and, until her vows are dispensed with at Rome, I cannot make her my wife. I now see that her position is deplorable, and hourly wish that I had been less rash: but what will not a wild spirit dare, when love leads, and the fiend prompts? I have, perhaps, blighted her prospects for ever, and placed myself in most deadly jeopardy: every hour increases our peril! The Bishop of Cosenza (so famous for his pretended piety) has taken up the matter hotly, and placed us under the ban of the church; while, armed with warrants, procured from the Grand Criminal Court at Palermo, his sbirri, aided by those of that old blockhead the Barone di Bivona (who owes me a thousand sequins, lost at Faro), are searching all Lower Calabria for us: I expect them here every hour. King Ferdinand, anxious to flatter our priesthood and please his bigoted subjects, has declared himself my enemy, and we dare not venture to Sicily, even could we reach its shores: the commissaries of the townships are everywhere on the alert, and we could never, unless escorted by some armed followers, embark on the Calabrian seas.
"To pass into the Upper Province would only redouble the danger: Francesca would become the prey of the bishop, or the brutal Massena; who would, undoubtedly, order me to be shot. Ha! the French have not forgotten certain exploits of mine, when I first unsheathed my sword beneath the walls of Altamurra, on that great day when, on the eve of battle, Ruffo performed high mass before the whole Calabrian line.
"I never dreamt that the toils of my adversaries would close so tightly round me! But the villa is well provided with lurking-holes, and I have little doubt of being able to baffle completely any band that may come in pursuit of us here. Were my old sbirri under its roof-tree—were Benedetto del Castagno, Marco of Castelermo, and my trusty Giacomo by my side, I would yet shew them that the Visconte of Santugo was not to be hunted like a wild boar. No, by the gods! I would make good the house against the bishop's rascals, though backed by the papal guard. San Gennaro! rather than surrender, I would blow it into the air, and flying to the Grecian isles, there hoist the red banner of piracy, as many a reckless Italian noble has done before." His eyes glared, as black eyes only do: he laughed bitterly, showing his white teeth beneath the sable moustache, and he panted rather than breathed, as he continued, "Our king, Monsignore Macheroni, should remember the feeble tenure on which he holds his tottering throne, and be wary of raising enemies in this last stronghold of Italian independence. Palermo will not always have a British fleet to protect its walls from the cannon of France: withdraw your frigates from the straits of the Faro, your red coats from the ramparts of Messina, Milazzo, and Syracuse, and the power and throne of the lazzaroni king will fall prone to the earth, like a house of cards!"
"Hush! dearest Luigi," exclaimed his timid and terrified cousin, when a pause in this long tirade permitted her to speak. "This is all treason, every word; and you know not who may be within hearing."
"If there are any within hearing who would prove false to the race of Santugo, I would crop their ears like base Jacobins, and then bore their tongues with a hot bodkin, that they may the more glibly tell their story at Palermo. Corpo di Baccho! I defy and scorn them all!" and snatching a large cup of wine from a marble cooler, he drained it to the bottom; then casting himself upon an ottoman, he tossed the cup to the other end of the apartment with such force, that it dashed to pieces a rich Etruscan vase.