"Then let me inform you that in a week, at farthest, they will go, as they came, in the space of a few hours. Count Canossa will have lost them at the gaming-table, and the palazzo will be in the same condition as it was yesterday."
"Count Canossa is powerless to touch the least portion of your property, signora."
"Powerless? How! Are you a sorcerer, and have you changed him into stone? Or have you spirited him away?"
"I have spirited him away, signora. I have persuaded him by the eloquence of gold to forsake Venice, forever. As long as he remains in Paris, he is to receive it yearly pension from the King of France."
"Gone to Paris! Pensioned by the King of France!" exclaimed
Lucretia.
"Gone, signora; and, in leaving, he desired me to say to you that he hoped you would forgive all the unhappiness he had caused you since your marriage."
"Gone! Gone! Am I then free?" cried Lucretia, starting from her ottoman, and grasping the hand of the marquis.
"Yes, signora. You are free to bestow your heart on whomsoever you will. Count Canossa will never molest you more."
"Oh how I thank you! How I thank you!" replied she, her beautiful eyes filling with tears of joy. "But tell me," added she, after a short pause—"tell me, if you please, the meaning of all this providential interference with my domestic affairs?"
"I am ready, signora," said the marquis, waiting for the countess to resume her seat, and then placing himself at her side. "Perhaps in your leisure hours you may have interested yourself in European politics."