CHAPTER XXIII

That night I could not sleep; and, indeed, I had enough to think about as I lay in my troubled bed.

Now I remembered with joy that strange smile of Jacqueline’s, a smile as vague and inscrutable as the immortal smile on the lips of the divine Gioconda, that withholds so much. My dear Jacqueline had promised that she would not pledge herself to the duke for a week. That assurance was infinitely heartening. But I had made my promise before the duke, and so it was but a foolish boast after all. If he had been villain enough to attempt to impose upon her in this way, he was quite capable of setting spies at my heels who would dog my every movement for the next eventful few days. That would make my promise more difficult of achievement. However, the words were spoken. There was nothing for it now but to bend every effort to find the casket. I must make good my word at all costs.

If the casket were actually in existence, and in Venice, I would do that, be the difficulties what they might. The foppish mantle of the 233dilettante had slipped off my willing shoulders. I was aroused at last. We should see now who was the better man–this Latin with feline, sheathed claws, or the Anglo-Saxon with bulldog grip.

When I knew that sleep was quite impossible, I put on my dressing-gown and went into the sitting-room to read. But it was impossible for me to keep my attention on the book. I threw open the heavy shutters and looked out.

The lights of Venice the mysterious glowed dimly in the distance. The newly risen moon shone on campanile, dome and spire. Here and there a gondola, a black speck in a lake of silver, drifted slowly by. I heard the plash of the oars, the fragment of a song. Then my attention was drawn to the fondamenta immediately beneath my window by the sharp, persistent bark of a dog.

A white poodle was leaping in an ecstasy of joy at its master, who was doing his utmost to quiet the beast. He cursed the dog volubly by the evil spirits of his father and grandfather and all his numerous relations and ancestors. At first this little scene only amused me, but my idle amusement gave way to an eager interest when presently I heard my name mentioned. Leaning far out, I saw that Pietro, my gondolier, 234was conversing with the dog’s master. I tried in vain to hear what they were talking about, but almost immediately the dog and his master slunk down the quay, hugging the shadow of the wall. I had not seen the fellow’s face, but something in his gait seemed familiar. I whistled to attract Pietro’s attention, and beckoned to him. Before he had entered my room I had made up my mind that I knew who this prowler was. I was convinced that it was none other than the duke’s servant, whom St. Hilary and I had seen that night the duke had paid his memorable visit to my rooms.

“Pietro,” I said, looking at him steadily, “I have had you in my service ever since you left the penitentiary a few rods down the quay. It was an affair of stabbing, I believe.”

Pietro nodded with unblushing countenance.

“Yes, monsignore, it was an affair of stabbing. But that I was innocent as a three-years-old babe, I swear to you by all the holy saints in the calendar, including the Blessed Virgin herself.”

“Pietro,” I continued, “I have been a fairly good master. You have earned many a buona lira.” I paused suggestively.

He was voluble in his gratitude. Heaven was witness that he had been faithful and honest.

235“Then will you tell me who was talking to you a few minutes ago? Will you tell me exactly what he said to you?”

Certainly he would, and with an ease born of years of careful cultivation he lied as cheerfully and fluently as St. Hilary himself.

“The man, monsignore, is the cousin of the husband of my sister. He is the concierge of the Pallazzina Baroni on the Rio Santa Barbara. Perhaps you have seen, monsignore, the wonderful poodle that is the property of the Principessa Fini, who lives in that palace. I assure you, monsignore, that the Principessa adores the poodle with the woolly coat that hangs in strings at the tail with a devotion that is as great as if the wonderful poodle were her own son. But this poodle, you must understand, is of an intelligence that is marvelous and a badness that is lamentable. He is always running away from his dear mistress. To-night he went for a ride on the steamboat–oh, he is of an intelligence that is truly remarkable, and came to our fondamenta to visit another dog, but a dog of so plebeian a birth as to be disgraceful. And so the concierge has come swearing after the wicked beast, and no doubt the monsignore heard the barking.”

It was useless to get anything out of Pietro. 236He lied because he loved to lie, and then there had been the money that had crossed his palm.

“That will do,” I said gravely.

I did not inform St. Hilary the next morning of my foolish boast to the duke. Nor did I tell him that the duke had already been bribing my servant to spy on me. Hearing that, he would, I was sure, insist upon our postponing the search for the casket until the week was over. That would not suit my plans at all. But I did tell him of the duke’s pseudo casket. He was delighted at this turn of affairs.

“So our friend the comedian has discovered a casket all by himself,” he exclaimed, rubbing his hands with joy. “His object, of course, is to gain the consent of Miss Quintard to marry him. Now that he has obtained that, he will cease to bother us, if, indeed, he has concerned himself about us at all. But I forgot,” he added hypocritically, seizing my hands. “You, my dear Hume, do not consider this good news at all.”

“If it were true that Miss Quintard were actually engaged to the duke,” I replied indifferently, “I should tell you and the casket to go to the devil. But I happen to know that she will wait a week, at least, before binding herself to him or any other.”

237“Capital, my dear Hume, capital! In a quarter of an hour I shall be dressed. A cup of coffee and a cigarette, and we will continue our search. It is early, but not too early to interview a servant mopping a doorstep.”

The Palace C?sarini, as every tourist knows, is one of the most beautiful and historic in Venice. Its distinguishing mark, however, is the square tower that stands at its rear. The campanile, as bare of ornament and as stolid as one of those towers of defence one sees at Regensburg, is no more than a case for the stairway inside. Ugly as it is, it serves to bring into more striking contrast the lightness and delicacy of the Gothic jewel-work of the fa?ade of the palace. Five arches, richly carved with foliage, support the upper stories. The loggia beneath is exquisitely proportioned. The broad marble steps, leading to the water’s edge, extend the whole width of the palace front. The pointed windows, Moorish in the profusion of their carving, are noticeable because of the quaintly grotesque beasts, with monstrous tails and protruding tongues, that are carved in niches between each window.

Our interest in the palace, however, was centered in the tower. From this tower we expected to be led to the eighth landmark. We thought 238it most unlikely that the iron safes had any significance. For no imaginable reason, surely, could the clock-maker have chosen so public a hiding-place. Indeed, the casket might not be in the C?sarini Palace at all; yet we expected to find it there. At first thought this seemed unreasonable. Why should he have hidden the gems in another house? The existence of the iron safes suggests the answer.

St. Hilary had read in the Annals of the Inquisition that the last work Giovanni had undertaken was the building of these safes. When once he had determined to steal the casket he must have thought of a hiding-place. He knew that his own house was impossible. The mechanism of these safes was intricate and delicate. They would require constant attention and repair. The clock-maker would have, therefore, frequent access to the palace, and provided that he was successful in once hiding the casket there, he could take away the stones at his leisure. Here, then, if this theory was correct, the son had hidden the casket. For as his father’s assistant he would naturally have had access to the palace.

St. Hilary and I rang the bell at the side door of the palace on the Calle Bianca Madonna. It 239was a less conspicuous entrance than that on the Grand Canal. The majordomo, summoned by us, peremptorily frowned on our modest request to be permitted to see the curious tower and the safes.

“No, signori,” he protested, swelling out a chest resplendent with gold braid, “this is no time for tourists to visit the palace.”

“Tourists!” cried St. Hilary indignantly. “Have I not told you we are distinguished architects?”

“Because,” continued the majordomo patiently, closing his eyes, as if he had not heard the interruption, “all the palace is in confusion. To-morrow night the Princess C?sarini gives the famous bal masqué. You can understand, then, that this is no time to visit our palace.”

“But we could at least see the safes. They interest us particularly.”

“The safes, signore! Pooh, pooh, they have been made into furnaces long ago.”

“But the tower–we can visit that without troubling you. We are writing a book on curious towers.”

The man shrugged his shoulders obstinately. “After to-morrow night, perhaps. I do not know. Certainly not till then. And even then 240our princess may not care to have the gentlemen come. She goes to Paris the day after, and the palace will be closed.”

This was alarming news.

“Closed!” persisted St. Hilary, and it was impossible to mistake the note of satisfaction in his voice. “Closed! And does no one stay to take care of it?”

“But certainly,” replied the servant suspiciously, “I stay and all the servants; and then, let me tell the gentlemen, unless the princess commands, no one, not even the king, has admittance.”

I thought St. Hilary’s eagerness most indiscreet, but he was in no way abashed.

“It is to be a very exclusive ball, I suppose.”

“Of an exclusiveness that will exclude all Inglesi and forrestieri,” cried the servant maliciously, and shut the door in our faces.

“Do you think your suspicions and vulgar curiosity quite apropos, St. Hilary?” I demanded vexatiously, as we turned from the door.

“Oh, thick of head and slow of understanding,” he retorted in wild good humor. “Do you think that I asked my questions without reason? I wanted to know if it were not better for us to postpone our explorations till after this precious ball. I have learned definitely that it would be 241quite useless. If Madame La Princesse goes to Paris immediately after, it is not likely that she will bother her head giving tourists or architects permission to explore her palace. As to forcing our way in afterward, you heard what the man said. For my part I prefer to enter the palace as a guest. We must resort to the jimmy and the dark-lantern as a last extremity. Certainly we must go to that ball.”

“Without an invitation, and costumes?”

“Assuredly not. And the costumes I have in my mind’s eye for you and myself will fit our figures to a marvel. You, the stolid pig, shall be resplendent as the Doge. As for me, I shall be bravely clad in doublet and hose as the captain of the guard. And behold, in that room yonder probably repose our costumes this very moment.”

St. Hilary had tossed his head to a window of a pretentious apartment on the second story.

“We are going to hire costumes from a shop?”

“What!” he cried in horror. “You have lived in Venice three years, and mistake the apartments of one of the most aristocratic families of Venice for a costumer’s shop. Fie, fie!”

“You are not going to steal the costumes and the tickets?” I cried in dismay. St. Hilary’s 242methods were always so beautifully direct and unscrupulous.

“I am not going to steal them. I am going, as it were, to squeeze the costumes off the noble backs of two gallant cavaliers I know slightly, and the tickets out of their pockets. Oh, they will gladly oblige me, those young gentlemen.”

“But why?”

“Why, my friend? Because it so happens that I hold a little note that is signed jointly in the writing of the noble youths. Now if I were to postpone the necessity of their paying those notes for a month or two, or if I removed the necessity of payment altogether, would they not be duly grateful?”

As I have said, St. Hilary’s methods were always so beautifully direct and unscrupulous.