Tales of the Caravan, Inn, and Palace

by Wilhelm Hauff

Two hours after my arrest I was led out of my chamber. Passing down several steps, we entered a large hall. Twelve men, most of them of advanced age, sat at a long table, covered with a black cloth. On the side of the hall were ranged rows of benches, filled with the aristocracy of Florence. High up, in the galleries the spectators were crowded close together. When I was brought before the black-covered table, a man of dark and sad aspect arose. It was the Governor. He told those assembled that he, being the father of the murdered girl, could not preside over this case, and that he would vacate his seat, for the present, in favor of the oldest senator. The oldest senator was a man of at least ninety years. He was bent with age, and his temples were fringed with thin white hairs; but his eyes were still brilliant, and his voice was clear and strong.

He began by asking me if I confessed to the murder. I besought him to give me his attention, and related fearlessly and in distinct tones what I had done. I noticed that as I proceeded, the Governor first turned pale and then red; and when I had finished, he sprang up in a rage. "What, wretch!" he exclaimed to me, "it is your intention, then, to impute this crime, that you committed in a spirit of avarice, to another?"

The presiding senator reproved him for this outburst, and reminded him that he had of his own accord renounced his right to direct the trial; nor did it appear, he said, that I contemplated robbery, as, by his own admission, nothing was stolen from his daughter. The senator declared to the Governor that he must give an account of his daughter's past life, as this was the only means of judging whether I had spoken the truth or not. At the same time he would close the court for that day, in order, as he said, to get some further information from the papers of the deceased, which the Governor should turn over to him. I was led back to my prison, where I passed a miserable day, occupied with the eager wish that some connection might be established between the man in the red mantle and the deceased.

Full of expectation, I entered the hall of justice on the following day. There were several letters on the table. The aged senator asked me whether they were in my hand-writing. I looked at them, and found that they must have been written by the same hand that wrote me the two notes I had received. I expressed this belief to the senators, but they paid no attention to my opinion, and answered that I both could and did write those notes myself, as the signature at the end of the letters was certainly a Z, the initial letter of my name. And then the letters contained threats against the deceased, and warnings against the wedding which was about to take place.

The Governor seemed to have made some strange disclosures about me, as I was on this day treated more sternly and suspiciously. To justify myself, I called for all the papers that were to be found in my room. But I was told that search had already been made there, and nothing found. When the court broke up, my hope had entirely vanished; and when I was led back to the hall on the third day, the verdict was communicated to me. I had been convicted of willful murder, and sentenced to death. To this, then, I had come at last! Deprived of every thing that was still dear to me on earth, far from my home, I should die innocent of crime, and, in the bloom of my youth, under an ax!

I was sitting in my lonely prison on the evening of the day that had decided my fate, with my hopes all dissipated, and my thoughts earnestly turned on death, when my prison door opened, and a man entered, who regarded me long and silently. "And thus I find you once more, Zaleukos?" said he. I had not recognized him by the dull gleam of my lamp, but the tone of his voice awoke old memories in me. It was Valetty, one of the few friends I had made during my studies in Paris. He said that happening to come to Florence, where his father, who was a man of prominence, lived, he heard of my story; he had come to see me, to learn from my own lips how I had come to commit so terrible a crime. I told him the whole story. He seemed very much astonished, and implored me to tell him, my only friend, the whole truth, and not die with a lie on my lips, I swore to him by every thing that was sacred that I had spoken the truth, and that the only burden on my conscience was that, dazed by the glitter of the gold, I had not perceived the improbabilities in the stranger's story. "Then you did not know Bianca?" asked he. I assured him that I had never seen her before. Valetty then told me that a deep secret hung over the deed, that the Governor had passed sentence on me very hastily, and there was a rumor among the people that I had known Bianca for a long time, and had murdered her out of revenge for her approaching marriage with another. I remarked to him that all this might apply to the man in the red mantle, but that I was unable to prove his participation in the deed. Valetty embraced me, weeping, and promised to make every effort to save my life. I had but little hope, yet I knew that Valetty was a wise man and experienced in the laws, and that he would do his best to save me.

For two long days I remained in uncertainty. At last Valetty appeared. "I bring you consolation, even though it be painful," said he. "You will live and be set at liberty; but with the loss of a hand."

Joyfully I thanked my friend for my life. He told me that the Governor was inexorably opposed to opening the case again, but that finally, in order not to appear unjust, he agreed that if a similar case could be found in any books of Florentine history, then my punishment should be regulated by the punishment there recorded. Valetty and his father had thereupon looked through the old books by day and night, and finally found a case the exact counterpart of mine. The punishment there awarded was stated thus: "His left hand shall be amputated, his goods confiscated, and he himself banished forever." This was now to be my punishment; and I had to prepare myself for the painful ordeal that awaited me. But I will not dwell on that terrible hour when I stood on the public square, laid my hand on the block, and felt my own blood stream over me.

Valetty took me to his own house until I had recovered; then he generously provided me with money for my journey; as all that I had acquired in my years of labor was forfeited to the State. I traveled from Florence to Sicily, and there embarked on the first ship for Constantinople. My hopes were turned upon the money I had given into the keeping of my friend; I also asked permission to live with him, but he astounded me with the question, why I did not occupy my own house? He informed me that a strange man had bought a house in my name in the Greek quarter, and had told the neighbors that I would soon be there to take possession of it. I immediately went there with my friend, and was warmly welcomed by all my old acquaintances. An old merchant gave me a letter, left by the man who had bought the house for me.

The letter was as follows: "Zaleukos, two hands will be always ready to provide so tirelessly for you that you will not feel the loss of one. The house that you see, and all it contains, is yours; and every year you will be given enough to place you in the ranks of your wealthiest countrymen. May you forgive him who is more unfortunate than yourself."