But, oaths or no oaths, Fabrizio’s presence in the Torre Farnese had restored to Clelia all her old habits and activities. Normally she passed all her days in solitude, in her room. No sooner had she recovered from the unforeseen disturbance in which the sight of Fabrizio had plunged her, than she began to wander through the palazzo, and, so to speak, to renew her acquaintance with all her humble friends. A very loquacious old woman, employed in the kitchen, said to her with an air of mystery: “This time, Signor Fabrizio will not leave the citadel.”
“He will not make the mistake of going over the walls again,” said Clelia, “but he will leave by the door if he is acquitted.”
“I say, and I can assure Your Excellency that he will go out of the citadel feet first.”
Clelia turned extremely pale, a change which was remarked by the old woman and stopped the flow of her eloquence. She said to herself that she had been guilty of an imprudence in speaking thus before the governor’s daughter, whose duty it would be to tell everybody that Fabrizio had died a natural death. As she went up to her room, Clelia met the prison doctor, an honest sort of man but timid, who told her with a terrified air that Fabrizio was seriously ill. Clelia could hardly keep on her feet; she sought everywhere for her uncle, the good Don Cesare, and at length found him in the chapel, where he was praying fervently: from his face he appeared upset. The dinner bell rang. At table, not a word was exchanged between the brothers; only, towards the end of the meal, the General addressed a few very harsh words to his brother. The latter looked at the servants, who left the room.
“General,” said Don Cesare to the governor, “I have the honour to inform you that I am leaving the citadel: I give you my resignation.”
“Bravo! Bravissimo! So that I shall be suspect! … And your reason, if you please?”
“My conscience.”
“Go on, you’re only a frock! You know nothing about honour.”
“Fabrizio is dead,” thought Clelia; “they have poisoned him at dinner, or it is arranged for tomorrow.” She ran to the aviary, resolved to sing, accompanying herself on the piano. “I shall go to confession,” she said to herself, “and I shall be forgiven for having broken my vow to save a man’s life.” What was her consternation when, on reaching the aviary, she saw that the screens had been replaced by planks fastened to the iron bars. In desperation she tried to give the prisoner a warning in a few words shouted rather than sung. There was no response of any sort: a deathly silence already reigned in the Torre Farnese. “It is all over,” she said to herself. Beside herself, she went downstairs, then returned to equip herself with the little money she had and some small diamond earrings; she took also, on her way out, the bread that remained from dinner, which had been placed in a sideboard. “If he still lives, my duty is to save him.” She advanced with a haughty air to the little door of the tower; this door stood open, and eight soldiers had just been posted in the pillared room on the ground floor. She faced these soldiers boldly; Clelia counted on speaking to the serjeant who would be in charge of them: this man was absent. Clelia rushed on to the little iron staircase which wound in a spiral round one of the pillars; the soldiers looked at her with great stupefaction but, evidently on account of her lace shawl and her hat, dared not say anything to her. On the first landing there was no one; but, when she reached the second, at the entrance to the corridor which, as the reader may remember, was closed by three barred gates and led to Fabrizio’s cell, she found a turnkey who was a stranger to her, and said to her with a terrified air:
“He has not dined yet.”
“I know that,” said Clelia haughtily. The man dared not stop her. Twenty paces farther, Clelia found sitting upon the first of the six wooden steps which led to Fabrizio’s cell, another turnkey, elderly and very cross, who said to her firmly:
“Signorina, have you an order from the governor?”
“Do you mean to say that you do not know me?”
Clelia, at that moment, was animated by a supernatural force, she was beside herself. “I am going to save my husband,” she said to herself.
While the old turnkey was exclaiming: “But my duty does not allow me. …” Clelia hastened up the six steps; she hurled herself against the door: an enormous key was in the lock; she required all her strength to make it turn. At that moment, the old turnkey, who was half intoxicated, seized the hem of her gown, she went quickly into the room, shut the door behind her, tearing her gown, and, as the turnkey was pushing the door to follow her, closed it with a bolt which lay to her hand. She looked into the cell and saw Fabrizio seated at a small table upon which his dinner was laid. She dashed at the table, overturned it, and, seizing Fabrizio by the arm, said to him:
“Hai mangiato?”
This use of the singular form delighted Fabrizio. In her confusion, Clelia forgot for the first time her feminine reserve, and let her love appear.
Fabrizio had been going to begin the fatal meal; he took her in his arms and covered her with kisses. “This dinner was poisoned,” was his thought: “if I
