The sleep of Adrian was at first broken and interrupted—his features, his exclamations, his gestures, all evinced great agony whether mental or bodily—it seemed, as perhaps it was, a fierce and doubtful struggle between life and death for the conquest of the sleeper. Patient, silent, breathing but by long-drawn gasps, Irene sate at the bed-head. The lamp was removed to the further end of the chamber, and its ray, shaded by the draperies, did not suffice to give to her gaze more than the outline of the countenance she watched. In that awful suspense, all the thoughts that hitherto had stirred her mind lay hushed and mute. She was only sensible to that unutterable fear which few of us have been happy enough not to know. That crushing weight under which we can scarcely breathe or move, the avalanche over us, freezing and suspended, which we cannot escape from, with which, every moment, we may be buried and overwhelmed. The whole destiny of life was in the chances of that single night! It was just as Adrian at last seemed to glide into a deeper and serener slumber, that the bells of the death-cart broke with their boding knell the palpable silence of the streets. Now hushed, now revived, as the cart stopped for its gloomy passengers, and coming nearer and nearer after every pause. At length she heard the heavy wheels stop under the very casement, and a voice deep and muffled calling aloud "Bring out the dead!" She rose, and with a noiseless step, passed to secure the door, when the dull lamp gleamed upon the dark and shrouded forms of the Becchini.
"You have not marked the door, nor set out the body," said one gruffly, "but this is the third night! He is ready for us!"
"Hush, he sleeps—away, quick, it is not the Plague that seized him."
"Not the Plague," growled the Becchino in a disappointed tone, "I thought no other illness dared encroach upon the rights of the gavocciolo!"
"Go, here's money, leave us."
And the grisly carrier sullenly withdrew. The cart moved on, the bell renewed its summons, till slowly and faintly the dreadful larum died in the distance.
Shading the lamp with her hand, Irene stole to the bed-side, fearful that the sound and the intrusion had disturbed the slumberer. But his face was still locked, as in a vice, with that iron sleep. He stirred not—his breath scarcely passed his lips—she felt his pulse, as the wand lay on the coverlid—there was a slight heat—she was contented—removed the light, and, retiring to a corner of the room, placed the little cross suspended round her neck upon the table, and prayed—in her intense suffering—to Him who had known death, and who—Son of Heaven though he was, and Sovereign of the Seraphim—had also prayed, in his earthly travail, that the cup might pass away.
The morning broke, not, as in the north, slowly and through shadow, but with the sudden glory with which in those climates Day leaps upon earth—like a giant from his sleep. A sudden smile—a burnished glow—and night had vanished. Adrian still slept; not a muscle seemed to have stirred; the sleep was even heavier than before; the silence became a burthen upon the air. Now, in that exceeding torpor so like unto death, the solitary watcher became alarmed and terrified. Time passed—morning glided to noon—still not a sound nor motion. The sun was mid-way in heaven—the friar came not. And now again touching Adrian's pulse, she felt no flutter—she gazed on him, appalled and confounded; surely nought living could be so still and pale. "Was it indeed sleep, might it not be ——." She turned away, sick and frozen; her tongue clove to her lips. Why did the father tarry—she would go to him—she would learn the worst—she could forbear no longer. She glanced over the scroll the monk had left her: "From sunrise," it said, "I shall be at the Convent of the Dominicans. Death has stricken many of the brethren." The Convent was at some distance, but she knew the spot, and fear would wing her steps. She gave one wistful look at the sleeper, and rushed from the house. "I shall see thee again presently," she murmured. Alas! what hope can calculate beyond the moment. And who shall claim the tenure of "The Again!"
It was not many minutes after Irene had left the room, ere, with a long sigh, Adrian opened his eyes—an altered and another man; the fever was gone, the reviving pulse beat low indeed, but calm. His mind was once more master of his body, and, though weak and feeble, the danger was past, and life and intellect regained.
"I have slept long," he muttered—"and oh such dreams—and methought I saw Irene, but could not speak to her; and while I attempted to grasp her, her face changed, her form dilated, and I was in the clutch of the foul grave-digger. It is late—the sun is high—I must be up and stirring. Irene is in Lombardy. No, no; that was a lie, a wicked lie—she is at Florence—I must renew my search."