His Giulia had deceived him, she was a criminal, his marriage invalid--the myrmidons of the law were already knocking at the door of his Castle! He repeated all this to himself mechanically, hopelessly, as though he were conning a lesson. It was impossible that all this could concern himself.
After two hours of rapid flight through the night, which just began to yield to the dawn in the east, he returned to the inn, asked for ink and paper, and wrote to Giulia--
"Baluzzi is dead, he fell in a smuggler's fight, and dying confessed to me that you are his wife, and never were divorced from him! Shortly before his death he sent in an accusation against you. It cannot all be true, confirm the untruth with a few lines; they will find me with the proprietor of Opaczno."
He obtained a messenger and despatched him to Kulmitten with his letter.
It would have been impossible for him to return now, look into Giulia's eyes, hear from her own lips that she was the wife of that wretch.
He gave some orders and money for Baluzzi's burial, and then drove to Opaczno.
Fixedly he gazed at the morning, he saw none of the objects past which he drove, for him a heavy shadow lay upon all earthly things.
She whom he had so proudly loved, seemed like a spectre to him, a bride of Corinth, a vampire, which had sucked his blood, his life.
And yet--in the midst of his wrath at the deception, he was seized with fear, with pity for her, an inexpressible feeling of pain, that gnawed at his heart.
He felt as if the mild god of Hindoostan, the old King's son, laid a hand upon his brow like a healing doctor, and whispered to him, "Have pity upon all creation!"