She went to make a necessary visit to the village priest of San Nicolo, perhaps a spy of the Jesuits. On returning for dinner at seven o’clock, she found the little room where her lover was hidden deserted. Beside herself, she ran all through the house seeking for him; he was not there. In despair she returned to the little room; only then did she catch sight of a note; she read:
“I am going to surrender myself to the legate; I despair of our cause; Heaven is against us. Who has betrayed us? Apparently the wretch who threw himself into the well. Since my life is useless to poor Italy, I do not wish that my comrades, seeing that I alone have not been arrested, should imagine that I have sold them. Adieu; if you love me, think on how to avenge me. Ruin, annihilate, the infamous wretch that has betrayed us, even though he be my father.”
Vanina fell into a chair, half-fainting and plunged in the most cruel unhappiness. She was unable to utter a word; her eyes were dry and burning.
At last she flung herself on her knees.
“Great God! accept my vow,” she exclaimed; “yes, I will punish the infamous wretch who has been a traitor; but Pietro must first be restored to liberty.”
An hour later she was on her way to Rome. Her father had long been urging her to return. During her absence, he had arranged her marriage with Prince Livio Savelli. Vanina had scarcely arrived when he mentioned it to her, trembling. To his great astonishment, she consented at the first word. That same evening, at Countess Vitteleschi’s house, her father presented Don Livio almost officially to her; she talked a great deal with him. He was a most elegant young man, and kept the finest possible horses; but, though he was admitted to be clever, his character was supposed to be so light that he was not an object of suspicion to the government. Vanina thought that by first turning his head she would make a convenient agent of him. Since he was nephew to Monsignore Savelli-Catanzara, governor of Rome and minister of police, she supposed that the spies would not presume to follow him.
After having treated the amiable Don Livio exceedingly well for some days, Vanina announced to him that he would never be her husband; he was, according to her, empty-headed.
“If you were not a child,” she told him, “your uncle’s clerks would have no secrets from you. For example, what has been decided about the carbonari who were discovered recently at Forli?”
Two days later Don Livio came to tell her that all the carbonari taken at Forli had made their escape. She fastened her great black eyes upon him with the bitter smile of most profound contempt, and did not deign to speak to him all that evening. The next day but one Don Livio came to acknowledge to her with a blush that he had been deceived the first time.
“But,” he said, “I have got the key to my uncle’s study; I have seen from the papers that I found there that a Congregation (or Commission) composed of some of the leading cardinals and prelates is meeting in the strictest secrecy and discussing whether these carbonari should be tried at Ravenna or at Rome. The nine carbonari taken at Forli and their head, one Missirilli, who has been foolish enough to surrender himself, are at the present moment confined in the castle of San Leo.[19]