the pope may change his mind.” Without replying, the terrible Angeli walked impatiently up and down the room, watching for the striking of his clock. He called: a soldier appeared. “Is all prepared?” All was prepared: the attendants, like their master, were only waiting for the hour.
“‘Tis strange,” muttered the governor. “I should have thought – ”
“At least,” interposed Olivarès, “if you will not delay, do not anticipate.” And monsignor resumed his hasty walk between the door and window, listening for the fatal sound which the faithful tongue of the clock still refused to utter.
Despite of the delay, however, the fatal hour approached. Ten minutes more, and Ranuccio’s fate would be sealed.
Meanwhile the cardinal repaired to the pope. As he entered, Sixtus drew out his watch, and his eyes sparkled with revengeful joy. On the testimony of that unerring time-piece Ranuccio was already executed.
“What seek you?” asked his holiness.
“The body of my nephew, that I may convey it to Parma. At least let the unhappy boy repose in the tomb of his ancestors.”
“Did he die like a Christian?”
“Like a saint,” cried the cardinal, trembling at a moment’s delay. Sixtus V. traced the following words: “We order our governor of Fort St. Angelo to deliver up to his eminence the body of Ranuccio Farnese.” Having sealed it with the pontifical signet, he gave it to the cardinal.
Arrived at the palace gates, Farnese, agitated between fear and hope, hastened to demand an entrance. A profound silence reigned within, broken only by the distant note of the “De profundis.” He rushed toward the court. Was he too late? – had his stratagem succeeded? One look would decide. He raised his eyes – his nephew still lived. His neck bare, and his hands tied, he knelt beside the block, between a priest and the executioner, faintly uttering the words of his last prayer. Suddenly the chanting ceased; the cardinal flew toward the governor. Ere he could speak, his gestures and his countenance lied for him:
“A pardon? – a pardon!” exclaimed Olivarès. The soldiers shouted. The executioner began to unloose his victim, when a sign from Angeli made him pause. The governor read and re-read the missive.
“The body of Ranuccio Farnese!” he repeated: “the criminal’s name would suffice. Why these words, ‘The body of?’”
“What stops you?” cried the cardinal, at that perilous moment looking paler than his nephew.
“Read!” replied Angeli, handing him the pope’s letter.
“Is that all?” said his eminence, forcing a smile and pointing to the clock. “Look at the hour: it still wants two minutes of the time, and I received that paper from his holiness more than a quarter of an hour since.”
The governor bowed: the argument was irresistible. Ranuccio was given up to his deliverers. A carriage, with four fleet horses, waited outside the prison, and in a few moments the cardinal and the young prince were galloping along the road to Parma. Just then the clocks of Rome pealed forth in unison, as if rejoicing that by their judicious silence they had gained their master’s cause. It might be well if lawyers in our day would sometimes follow their example.
Monsignor Angeli, as the chronicle relates, was rather astonished at the rapid flight of time after his prisoner’s departure. In fact, the next hour seemed to him as short as its predecessor was long. This phenomenon, due to the simple system of compensation, was ascribed by him to the peaceful state of his conscience. Although inflexible in the discharge of what he esteemed his duty, he was in reality a kind-hearted man, and felt sincere pleasure at what he honestly believed to be Ranuccio’s pardon.
On the morrow the Spanish embassador was the first to congratulate Sixtus V., with admirable sang froid, on his truly pious clemency. Olivarès was only a diplomatist, but he played his part as well as if he had been a cardinal, and made every one believe that he had been the dupe of his accomplice. He had good reasons for so acting. His master, Philip II., seldom jested, more especially when the subject of the joke was the infallible head of the church; and he strongly suspected that the clocks of Madrid might prove less complaisant than those at Rome.
Poor Angeli was the only sufferer. For no other crime than that of not wearing a watch, the pope deprived him of his office, and imprisoned him for some time in Fort St. Angelo. As to Cardinal Farnese, renouncing all the praises and congratulations of his friends at Rome, he prudently remained an absentee.
MAURICE TIERNAY,
THE SOLDIER OF FORTUNE. 3
CHAPTER XLVIII
I sat up all night listening to the soldiers’ stories of war and campaigning. Some had served with Soult’s army in the Asturias; some made part of Davoust’s corps in the north of Europe; one had just returned from Friedland, and amused us with describing the celebrated conference at Tilsit, where he had been a sentinel on the river side, and presented arms to the two emperors as they passed. It will seem strange, but it is a fact, that this slight incident attracted toward him a greater share of his comrades’ admiration than was accorded to those who had seen half the battle-fields of modern war.
He described the dress, the air, the general bearing of the emperors; remarking that, although Alexander was taller and handsomer, and even more soldier-like than our own emperor, there was a something of calm dignity and conscious majesty in Napoleon that made him appear immeasurably the superior. Alexander wore the uniform of the Russian guards, one of the most splendid it is possible to conceive, the only thing simple about him was his sword, which was a plain sabre with a tarnished gilt scabbard, and a very dirty sword-knot; and yet every moment he used to look down at it and handle it with great apparent admiration; and “well might he,” added the soldier, “Napoleon had given it to him but the day before.”
To listen even to such meagre details as these was to light up again in my heart the fire that was only smouldering, and that no life of peasant labor or obscurity could ever extinguish. My companions quickly saw the interest I took in their narratives, and certainly did their utmost to feed the passion – now with some sketch of a Spanish marauding party, as full of adventure as a romance; now with a description of northern warfare, where artillery thundered on the ice, and men fought behind entrenchments of deep snow.
From the North Sea to the Adriatic, all Europe was now in arms. Great armies were marching in every direction; some along the deep valley of the Danube, others from the rich plains of Poland and Silesia; some were passing the Alps into Italy, and some again were pouring down for the Tyrol “Jochs,” to defend the rocky passes of their native land against the invader. Patriotism and glory, the spirit of chivalry and conquest, all were abroad, and his must indeed have been a cold heart which could find within it no response to the stirring sounds around. To the intense feeling of shame which I at first felt at my own life of obscure inactivity, there now succeeded a feverish desire to be somewhere and do something to dispel this worse than lethargy. I had not resolution to tell my comrades that I had served; I felt reluctant to speak of a career so abortive and unsuccessful; and yet I blushed at the half pitying expressions they bestowed upon my life of inglorious adventure.
“You risk life and limb here in these pine forests, and hazard existence for a bear or a chamois goat,” cried one, “and half the peril in real war would perhaps make you a Chef d’Escadron, or even a general.”
“Ay,” said another, “we serve in an army where
Continued from the December Number.
