The old woman told him the story which she had been instructed in by Zastrozzi.
“Who ordered me to be chained in that desolate and dark cavern?” inquired Verezzi, “where I have been for many years, and suffered most insupportable torments?”
“Lord bless me!” said the old woman; “why, baron, how strangely you talk! I begin to fear you will again lose your senses, at the very time you ought to be thanking God for suffering them to return to you. What can you mean by being chained in a cavern? I declare I am frightened at the very thought; pray do compose yourself.”
Verezzi was much perplexed by the old woman’s assertions. That Julia should send him to a mean cottage, and desert him, was impossible.
The old woman’s relation seemed so well connected, and told with such an air of characteristic simplicity, that he could not disbelieve her.
But to doubt the evidence of his own senses, and the strong proofs of his imprisonment, which the deep marks of the chains had left till now, was impossible.
Had not those marks remained, he would have conceived the horrible events which had led him thither to have been but the dreams of his perturbed imagination. He, however, thought it better to yield, since, as Ugo and Bernardo attended him in the short walks he was able to take, an escape was impossible, and its attempt would but make his situation more unpleasant.
He often expressed a wish to write to Julia, but the old woman said she had orders neither to permit him to write nor receive letters—on pretence of not agitating his mind—and, to avoid the consequences of despair, knives were denied him.
As Verezzi recovered, and his mind obtained that firm tone which it was wont to possess, he perceived that it was but a device of his enemies that detained him at the cottage, and his whole thoughts were now bent upon the means for effecting his escape.
It was late one evening, when, tempted by the peculiar beauty of the weather, Verezzi wandered beyond the usual limits, attended by Ugo and Bernardo, who narrowly watched his every movement. Immersed in thought, he wandered onwards, till he came to a woody eminence, whose beauty tempted him to rest a little, in a seat carved in the side of an ancient oak. Forgetful of his unhappy and dependent situation, he sat there some time, until Ugo told him that it was time to return.