Max Pemberton

“ They had seen her dragged from her boat; had followed the phantom gondola and learnt at last that the Palazzo Andrea sheltered the enemies of Venice.
Day had scarcely dawned when a mighty concourse of the people gathered before the booth of Barbarino the clown, and proclaimed with frenzied cries that the night of mystery was no more.
"She has shown to Venice the house of the assassin. Viva! Nina, the dancer. Viva! our daughter! There was no death-ship after all, comrades. It lies yonder at the riva of the Palace. Long life to our father Giovanni." ”

“ He did not wait for any answer, but drew his dagger, and stood anew to the attack. For an instant Nina heard the cries of the four; she beheld the blades flashing as points of silver in the light; she saw the figure of the Lord of Carmagnola as he drew his sword and beat the daggers down. Then, as in some hour of miracle, the great doors of the room were burst open, and she knew that the Guards of Venice were the masters of the house.
"Signori," said the captain of the guard, ironically, "they wait for you at the Palace." ”

“ But now the truth of them came to her in an instant. Frà Giovanni—the great priest who had been her friend when she was friendless—the benefactor who had saved her father from his follies a hundred times—would the unknown assassin strike even at him! The thought brought the blood to her cheeks. From the first moment when she heard the prophet crying, it came to her that God had sent her to the bridge that she might hear the words, and help her friend.
She had left her father's booth in the little boat the clowns used upon the lagoon. ”

“ But the poor, grown old in their superstitions, would listen to no words of reason.
"The death-ship is on the sea!" they cried. "We have looked upon it with our own eyes. Those who have died are but grains of the harvest which must fall. Woe to Venice, for this is the Day of Judgment."
II. The Feast of the Ascension passed, and all day long a crowd of the terrified people gazed seawards over the still lagoon, as though it might see with its own eyes the phantom ship, which had come out of the unknown to warn the city. ”

“ Nina, the child of the people, clung lovingly to her superstitions; but the education, which Venice had given her at the convent of the Cistercian nuns, had done not a little to moderate them.
"Your death-ship is a cloud upon the water," she said quietly; "if the people are frightened to-day, they will laugh to-morrow. He, who sets the red crosses upon the houses, will go presently to the columns of the Piazzetta, and there will be a rope for his neck. Frà Giovanni is in Rome, or we should have come to our senses before this day. ”

“ She laughed at herself afterwards because she had called him 'excellency,' but he was asking himself what courage was that which had carried the dancing-girl where no boatman dared to pass.
"You came alone, Nina; did you not fear the people's stories?" he asked.
She shrugged her shoulders.
"The things we fear need not be true," she said. "I heard the stories—how that men die every day in Venice, and that the death-ship is on the waters. But who will trouble about a dancing-girl? Men do not strike at the poor while there are the rich of the city to think about. ”

“ The cafés, the shops, the theatres were all deserted. In the churches the music of vespers for the dead made a dirge of the night. Men, masked and with their cloaks muffled about their faces, went hurriedly to their homes. The hand of the unknown assassin might be raised for them at any corner. Panic drove them to their houses. A young priest, standing at the door of the church of Santa Maria della Salute, recognised the little dancing-girl as she put off her boat from the quay, and bade her begone.
"It is for such as you that Venice is to perish," he said harshly.
Nina did not answer him. ”

“ Even the educated, who laughed at the fisherman's story, laughed no more when every morning brought some new account of assassination and of fatality.
"A fool's tale," they said; "and yet we see men die. Some enemy of Venice, surely, has come back to reckon with her. She has dealt roughly with the best of her soldiers since the monk Giovanni ruled us. ”

“ If she could but open those windows, and cry out to any gondolier who might pass the house! When she drew back the curtains, the folly of her plan disclosed itself, for the window was boarded over, and bands of iron drew the boards together so that no ray of light could pass the chinks. ”