"Thus saying he seized both her hands as though clinging to her to save him from falling into an abyss, but seeing that her face remained unmoved he let her go again, and returned to the open window. There he stood awhile quite still and silent, and only the nightingale in the bush below went on with her ceaseless trilling and warbling. Then as if seized by some sudden resolve the youth turned round and cried, 'But even though it should undo all that is done I will not consent, I will not endure these bonds and chains! Tomorrow with the dawn I send letters to Vicenza to take back my promise, and then I shall retire from both towns and challenge with sword and lance all who dare to deny that Gianna the Fair is the queen of womanhood.' 'This shalt thou not do, Attilio,' returned the beautiful being looking beyond him to the midnight sky with a calm and earnest gaze. 'That you should have been so suddenly attracted towards me, and should endow me so unqualifiedly with your affection, I acknowledge as an inexpressibly great gift, for which, although unworthy of you, I shall thank you as long as I live. But I cannot accept this gift without involving both in ruin. Reflect, my friend, how the scarcely smothered enmity between the two towns would burst forth again if you were thus to insult the house of Scarpa, and with it all the city, by despising your betrothed bride who has never offended against you by word or deed, merely because another face has pleased you better. And this very face, even granting that it does at this time deserve such excessive praise, and the passion it has excited in you, who can say that even in one year all its charms might not be faded, so that you would ask yourself wondering, how was it possible you could have been thus possessed by it? Do we not often see towards the close of summer, one single night of early frost avail to turn the trees that were green but yesterday, suddenly sere and yellow? I have overstept my one-and-thirtieth year; you my friend are in the fulness of your youth, you are still climbing the hill, the summit of which I have reached. Let me, therefore, being the elder, be the wiser as well, and show prudence enough for both. And to this end I declare to you my firm resolve, even were I to discover your love was more than a sudden caprice, and were all opposing circumstances miraculously to conform themselves to your wishes, I would never consent to be your wife, no, not though your parents came to me in person to lend their support to your suit!'
"It was only when she had ended this speech that she ventured to look towards him, and then seeing how pale he was, and how his fine eyes wandered round, as in despair, she felt ready out of very love and pity to contradict all that she had forced herself to utter with incredible firmness.
"'Good-night, Madonna,' Attilio sorrowfully said, and seemed about to leave, but then stood still and looked on the ground. 'You are angry with me, Attilio,' said she. And he--'No, by God, Gianna, I am not; only give me leave to depart, for truly I have tarried but too long, and have spoken like a madman, without considering that what I offered you might prove so worthless in your sight, that you could not even stretch out your hand to take it, far less endure conflict and trouble for its sake. And thus I depart with well-merited humiliation, and it is no one's fault but my own that this my day of triumph, which began so gladly, should have so lamentable an end. Farewell, Gianna. The banner you worked, and which this morning seemed to me the most costly of possessions, I will now bestow upon a chapel, in order that the sight of it may not recall to me the hand which has so coldly rejected and repulsed me.'
"With that he bent low and was nearing the door, when once more he heard his name called. Gianna's heart, which had long been beating wildly, now burst its bounds, and made itself heard in speech. 'Attilio,' said the blushing fair, who had lost all self-control, 'I cannot let you go away thus, and continue to live. What I have said stands firm, nor will you ever change one iota of it, for it behoves your own good which is dearer to me than my own. But I have not yet told you all. Know then that since my betrothed died--it is now twelve years ago--I have never had the thought nor the wish of belonging to any man, and if I have kept the jewel of my honour thus pure, in good sooth it has cost me neither effort nor regret so to do. For I do not lightly esteem myself, not so much because of this poor and transient beauty, as because I know well that mine is a free and strong spirit, which I could never render subservient to the sway of one weaker or lower than myself, as in marriage a wife is often bound to do. And many as my wooers have been, I have never yet found one whom to serve would not have appeared to me a bondage and degradation. It was only to-day that I saw you ride into the town to which you have given back freedom and honour. When I saw how modestly you bent your head beneath so great a triumph, achieved in such early youth--showing neither vanity nor scorn, but receiving like a messenger from God, the gratitude of those whom you had delivered--I could not but say to myself, 'Why art thou no longer young to deserve the love of this youth?' And when I saw the crimson scar on your throat, I felt that I would go barefoot on a pilgrimage to the Holy Sepulchre, if mine might be the bliss of only once daring to press my lips to that sacred wound. And then when I came home, knowing well what had befallen me, I picked up a flower from the street--this one, see--just because it had been trodden under your horse's hoof; and I meant to have it laid under my pillow when I should be borne out hence to my last sleep. And now that I have told you this, Attilio, repeat, if you have the heart, that this hand has coldly drawn itself away from your grasp.'
"Then she held out her arms to her lover, who stood before her in speechless ecstasy, like one doomed to death who had been reprieved at the very edge of the scaffold. She drew down his head on her breast, and kissed the wound for which her lips had yearned. Then freeing herself once more from his embrace, she said, 'What I do, my friend, is done with perfect deliberation and consciousness, and I shall never repent it, although many might censure and condemn my conduct if they knew of it. I give you the only jewel I possess, and which hitherto I have held dearer than my very life. For look you, on the very spot on which you stand, your future brother-in-law, Signor Lorenzaccio, stood and vehemently besought me to be his, and he would lead me to Vicenza as his wife. But what I denied to him, the enemy and oppressor of my city--and I was fain to threaten him with my dagger (the mark of which he bears on his right hand) before he desisted from his wild wooing--I give to you as the saviour of my city, give it in token of your triumph; and require from you in return no reward whatever, but that you forget me when you stand at the altar to plight your faith to another. And do not concern yourself as to what may betide me then. My lot will be blessed through all renunciation, and enviable in all sorrow, since I shall have endowed the noblest man on whom my eyes have ever rested with the free gift of my honour; and before the winter of years has covered this blond head with snows, I shall have enjoyed a late spring, beauteous beyond all I could have dreamed. These eyes and lips are thine, Attilio, and this untouched form is thine, and thine is this heart which, when thou shalt part from me, will never more desire any of the sweetnesses of this world, but like the heart of a widow, will still feed upon its past joys till it beat no longer.'
"Thus saying she led him to the seat in the window, and knelt before him, and he took her head in his two hands, and was never satiated with gazing at her, and kissing her brow, cheeks, and mouth; and long after the moon had set they were still together and immeasurably blest But when the first cock-crow was heard over the plains, Gianna herself constrained him to leave her arms, lest he should be missed in his parent's house. They agreed, however, that he should return the next night and all the following ones, and fixed on the signal at which she should open the door; and so he took his leave; as one intoxicated reels from a banquet: and in the arrogance of his bliss he scorned to descend the winding stairs, although the streets were empty, but swung himself out of the window, and profiting by the foot-hold afforded by the fig-tree, scrambled down to the walls below, often delaying to call out all manner of loving names and to throw the flowers growing on the edge of the moat up to the beloved one in the window, till she, fearing observation, withdrew from it. Then he tore himself away, and crept so carefully along the walls, that he reached the gate unnoticed by any. The sleepy watchman did not recognize him, and no one had missed him at home, so that he entered exultingly into his own room, and throwing himself on his couch, snatched a brief interval of needed sleep.
"With equal skill and secrecy, the lovers contrived their meetings for the nights following, so that no one in the whole town had the least idea of the relations between them; except the nurse Catalina, who was as silent about it as the fig-tree under the window. For the happiness and honour of her mistress were the first thought of her heart; and the sharpest tortures of the rack would never have extorted the youth's name from lips of hers. But one thing did grieve her much, and that was her dear lady's firm resolve that all must be over for ever, so soon as Attilio had exchanged rings with his bride Emilia Scarpa. 'What can you be thinking of?' said the old woman. 'Do you suppose you will be able quietly to endure that another should adorn herself with the flower that you have worn on your breast? As sure as I love you, lady, more than the fruit of my own body, you will die of it, your heart will break in twain like an apple when you run a knife into its midst.' 'Nurse,' said the Blonde, 'you may be right. But what of that? Better that I should be destroyed, than the one I love, and this dear city which is the mother of us both.' 'What folly you utter!' replied the old woman. 'If he love you as he says, and I believe, he will not be able to survive it; and so your obstinacy will bring about the death of two. And as for the city, now that it is defended by such a hero, it may safely challenge the enmity of three cities, each of them mightier than Vicenza.' Such arguments and others did Attilio too urge, and ever more and more pressingly as the time drew near when he must bid an eternal farewell to the eyes he adored.
"He still hoped, as he had hoped from the first day, to conquer her opposition, and was resolved to sacrifice everything for her. Gianna, on the other hand, to whom the bare idea of her lover's heart ever growing cold, and regretting that he had linked his young life with her faded one, was far more bitter than parting or death, tried, whenever he assailed her with fresh entreaties, to turn away his impetuosity by some jest about her age, and the inconstancy of men, and to make the Present so sweet to him, that in it he should forget the bitterness of the Future.
"Meanwhile in both houses, that of the Buonfigli as of the Scarpa, preparations for the marriage were eagerly carried on, and in nine weeks from the triumphal entry of the bridegroom, a no less brilliant reception was accorded by the inhabitants of Treviso to the bride. If, however, amongst the spectators there was even greater general joy than before, because of the now sealed and ratified treaty between the two cities, and also owing to the presence of the young and richly adorned bride with her escort of sixteen bridesmaids, all mounted on white jennets, and wearing costly apparel,--there were two in the festal procession who found it hard to conceal their anger and annoyance, one being the bridegroom himself, who would rather have touched a snake than his bride, and the other, Signor Lorenzaccio, his future brother-in-law, who secretly gnashed his teeth when he reflected that he had to play a quite secondary part to his young rival's, and would have gladly strangled, rather than embraced, him and his kindred. And yet a third heart there was, firmly closed against the rejoicings of the day, and that heart beat in the bosom of the fair Gianna, for she knew that the night that followed would be the last of her bliss. Accordingly she had not as on the former occasion exerted herself to procure a seat in the tribune in front of the town hall, but had kept at home while Attilio rode by the stranger's side through the streets, and a very rain of flowers rustled down about the pair. Even in the afternoon, while all the people were flocking out to the meadow before the town, where within splendidly decorated lists a tournament was to be held, she sat still at home lost in gloomy thoughts, and her tears falling so fast she saw nothing of the brightness of the day. 'O my poor heart!' she sighed, 'Now is the time to prove thyself strong enough to renounce thy own happiness; and thou art so weak, thou meltest away in tears. Thou hast undertaken more than thou art able to perform. True thou knewest not that love is a wine of which every draught but increases the thirst of those who drink. Now the cup of thy bliss is turned to poison that will slowly consume thee, and no leech on earth, nor help of all the Saints in heaven, will avail to heal thee!' At this moment in came Catalina, and persuaded her to go out with her, that at least if she really were resolved to part from her beloved, she might behold him once more in the full splendour of his knightly prowess and beauty, and as conqueror of all assembled. For the kind soul secretly hoped that a miracle would yet take place, and her mistress's mind change. Accordingly she dressed out the mourner (who was passive as a child) with the utmost case, and led her to the tilting-field, which was already swarming with people, and resonant with the neighing of horses and blare of trumpets. There then Gianna, standing amongst the crowd, saw the bride sitting on a raised daïs between the father and uncle of her bridegroom, and heard what people thought of her, some admiring her to the utmost, and others finding this or that to censure as well as to praise. The fair Gianna spoke not a word, and what she thought was never known. Only on two occasions she blushed deeply, when of some young men who passed before her, one exclaimed loud enough to be heard, 'I would give ten Emilias for one Gianna the Fair!' and the other, 'Treviso carries away the palm in women as in arms!' and this led to many eyes being bent on the fair embroideress, whose colour suddenly changed into deadly pallor; for at that moment Signor Attilio rode into the lists armed cap-à-pie, except that his throat instead of being defended by a brass haubergeon, which the French call barbier, was only protected by a slight leathern curtain fastened to the helmet. His visor was up, so that all noticed how pale he was and what sad and searching glances he cast around, and many marvelled at his aspect, seeing that he was such a triumphant young hero and a bridegroom to boot. However he rode up to the daïs on which his betrothed sat, bent before her, and allowed her to wind about his helmet the scarf she had been wearing, in token that he was her knight. Then the trumpeters blew, and from the other side came Signor Lorenzaccio riding into the lists, with visor closed, it is true, but all knew him from his armour and device, and hoped with all their hearts to see him stretched on the sand by the strong arm of his future brother-in-law. It was, however, otherwise decreed in the councils above. For scarcely had the heralds given the signal with their staffs, and the trumpets sounded, than both knights charged with lances in rest, and their horses hoofs raised such a cloud of dust, that for a moment after the shock, they were lost to the view of the spectators, who only heard the sound of lances on shield and coat of mail, followed by sudden silence. But when the cloud dispersed they beheld with horror Attilio, his feet still in the stirrups, thrown backwards on the saddle of his good steed (who stood there motionless), a stream of blood flowing from his throat, the undefended whiteness of which afforded a welcome mark to the cruel weapon of his foe. The conqueror faced him with his visor open, as though desirous to ascertain that his revenge was thoroughly accomplished, and after casting one last look of devilish hatred at his opponent, closed his helmet and rode, no one applauding him, slowly away out of the lists and through the petrified and horror-stricken crowds that could scarcely believe their eyes.
"Meanwhile Attilio's squire and the other attendants hurried into the lists, lifted the groaning man out of the saddle, and spreading a carpet on the sand laid him thereon. And then a loud wailing arose, all order was over, the people rushed wildly over the barriers; those who occupied the tribunes hurried from their seats; and scarcely could the heralds succeed by remonstrance and blows to clear so much space about the dying man, as that his parents, relations, and bride might be able to reach him. He, however, lay still with eyes closed, and while some lamented, and others cursed the fiendish malice of Lorenzaccio, some called aloud for a leech, and others for a priest to afford the last consolations to the soul of the parting hero, no sound of pain came from his lips, nor of regret at having so early to join the heavenly hosts above. Rather did this hard fate appear to him a rescue from hated bonds; and when he heard his name called and recognized the voice of his bride, he endeavoured to shake his head, as though to tell her that he would not breathe away his last breath in a falsehood. Then all at once the crowd that pressed round this spectacle of woe parted asunder with a murmur of amazement, for they saw the fair Giovanna, pale as a spectre, yet crowned by the thorn-crown of woe, queen over all other women, advance and enter the circle. 'Go hence,' said she, stretching out her hand towards the bride, 'this dying man belongs to me, and as during life I was his, body and soul, so in death, too, I will be with him, and no stranger shall rob me of one sigh of his!'