Chapter Five
Shows Something Suspicious
Life has no labyrinth but one’s steps can track it, and mind acts on mind though bodies be far divided.
Following the strange sensation that crept upon me while examining that half-faded, uneven screed came a complete blank. My muscles were paralysed, my breathing difficult, my throat contracted, and my manhood’s energy utterly sapped, until I was helpless as a child. It seemed as though the unseen power had touched me with the finger of death, and I had withered and fallen.
Yet slowly and painfully I struggled back to a sense of my hapless position, and on opening my eyes, sore in their sockets, I found, to my amazement, that I was lying in a heap on the carpet beside my overturned chair, my head close to the carved leg of my writing-table. The light dazzled me, and I quickly became aware that I was lying full in the morning sunshine which streamed in at the open window.
I had fallen from my chair and remained insensible the whole night. Nello had not discovered me, as I had dismissed him, wishing to be alone.
In Tuscany it is light early in summer, and the July sun soon gathers power. I glanced at the clock, and saw that it was already a quarter to five.
Outside, a fisherman was singing a gay song as he unloaded his boat, and children were already shouting as they bathed in the sunlit water; but the brightness in the world beyond only jarred upon me, soured and embittered man that I was. Could that curious sensation be a precursory sign of some terrible malady – epilepsy or paralysis, perhaps?
I struggled to my feet and stood beside the table, dazed, unbalanced, and so weak of limb that my legs could scarcely bear me. I felt as though I had just risen from a sick-bed after months of suffering.
The book lay open at the final page whereon the writer of the record, Godfrey Lovel, had inscribed his name and date as already reproduced here. My thoughts ran back to the moment when I had experienced that sudden seizure, and I recollected how interested I had been in the few lines I had succeeded in deciphering.
The unmistakable paralysis that had stricken me down at the very moment my curiosity was aroused was certainly alarming, and even mysterious, especially after the prior’s hints as to the evil that would pursue me if I determined to continue in possession of that fine old volume.
The fat priest’s words recurred to me with a deep and hidden meaning, and I admit that my spirit was mightily disturbed. It seemed that I had raised a foe where I might have won a friend.
I locked the book away in my safe, and went forth upon the balcony and breathed the fresh air of morning. Across the sparkling waters of the tideless sea the islands stood grey and mysterious in the blue haze, Gorgona, peopled only by its convict-gangs, showing most distinctly of all. A veil of mystery seemed to have fallen upon everything – upon all save a mighty battleship, with black smoke belching from her three yellow funnels and flying the white ensign of England as she approached an anchorage outside the port.
A desire for fresh air seized me; therefore, feeling faint, I took a liqueur glass of neat brandy, and then descended to the big marble entrance-hall that always echoed so dismally to my lonely footsteps. Recollect that I was a man without kith or kin, self-exiled for private reasons over which I had been unable to exercise control, and although living among a people that I loved because of their sympathy and charm, I was yet homesick for England and suffering from the nostalgia that those whose lot it is to spend their lives abroad know, alas! too well.
Outside I took the old sea-road – that shadeless road that runs with so many windings away along the edge of the deadly Maremma and on to Rome. I walked it often, for it led out along the edge of the brown cliffs through a wild and uninhabited tract of country, a district which until ten years ago had been dangerous on account of a band of lawless brigands. The latter had, however, all been exterminated by the carabineers, and the loneliness of the country suited well my frame of mind.
I met no one save an old barefooted fishwife whom I knew, trudging onward with her basket poised on her head. So I lit my pipe and gave myself up to reflection, trying to account for my strange seizure. I hesitated to consult a doctor, for I entertained an Englishman’s want of faith in the Italian medico. I longed to be able to consult my own doctor in London, and ask his opinion whether the strange stupor were an actual warning.
Although Italy possesses such distinct charm; although Tuscany was the home of my youth; although I had hosts of friends among the fishermen and honest contadini about me; although my friends at the white old monastery away among the olives on the side of the Black Mountain were always warm in their welcome and eager to render me the very smallest and humblest service, yet I was suddenly tired of it all. Sweet as were the pleasures of Tuscany, as Byron, Shelley, Smollett, and George Eliot had found, yet I was English, and England was my home.
I threw myself down on the grass of the cliff-top and thought it all out. Through seven long years I had led that life of utter loneliness, returning to London only for a fortnight or so each year, and then sadly leaving Charing Cross again for another twelve months of exile. I had my work, the writing of romance, to absorb my attention, it was true; but the writer of novels must live in congenial surroundings, otherwise the influence of a solitary life must show in his work.
Letters I had received from home during the past few days showed, too, that there was really no further reason why I should not return and live in England among my friends; therefore, after long reflection and carefully considering the whole question, I at length made up my mind to pack up my collection of pictures, old furniture, manuscripts, and antiques, and remove them to some country home in England.
I have a habit of acting with precipitation. My father, full of old-fashioned caution, used to chide me for it. In his day there was no such thing as smartness. But in the profession, as in business, old-fashioned stolidity has now passed away. Today, if one sees the legend, “Established 1792,” over a shop, one avoids it, knowing that its proprietor is not content with up-to-date small profits. Time was when the solid professional or business man was as black-coated and serious as an undertaker; but it is all of the past. The smart, speculative man, who acts promptly and has the courage of his own convictions, is the man who succeeds in the present scramble for daily bread. In every walk of life one must keep abreast of the flood; hence, with my mind made up, I entered the consulate at eleven o’clock and announced my immediate departure to my old friend and confidant, Jack Hutchinson, one of the most popular of his Majesty’s representatives abroad, and whose name with every skipper up and down the Mediterranean is synonymous with geniality of manner and kindliness of heart.
When I sank into a chair in his private room and announced to him that I was going his face fell. I knew well that he had no other English friend there, and my departure would leave him utterly alone. He was an exile, like myself; only, there was for him a comfortable pension at the end of it.
“Well,” he exclaimed after a moment, “I’m awfully sorry you’re going, my dear old fellow – awfully sorry. But I think you are acting wisely. You’ve been here too long, and have grown misanthropic. A little London life will take you out of yourself. Besides, of late you’ve been working far too hard.”
I told him of my strange seizure; and, having heard me, he said:
“Exactly. Just what I expected. Pellegrini, the doctor, feared a collapse, and told me so weeks ago. That I’m very sorry to lose you, old chap, you know too well. But you’ll be better in England. You’re homesick, and that never does in Italy, you know. I and my wife both were so when I was first appointed here twelve years ago; but we’ve got over it – you never have.” Then he added: “By the way, have you seen old Graniani today? He stopped me half an hour ago in the Corso Umberto and asked if I had seen you this morning.”
It was on the point of my tongue to tell Hutchinson all that had passed in Florence on the previous day, but I thought it useless to trouble him with what seemed but vague suspicions.
“Why does he want to see me?” I inquired.
“Oh, he has got something or other to sell you, I suppose,” was the consul’s reply. “Somehow, Kennedy, I don’t like the old fellow. Whether it’s his ugliness, his deformity, or his manner, I can’t tell; only, I instinctively dislike him – and more than ever when I met him just now.”
“Why?”
“Well, to me his manner was as though he expected to hear some grave news regarding you.”
“Grave news?” I echoed. Then it occurred to me that the old hunchback was, of course, privy to the mysterious evil following the possession of the “Book of Arnoldus.”
“What grave news did he expect?”
“How do I know, my dear fellow? These Italians, and especially men of his class, are so subtle and cunning that you can never get at the bottom of their motives.”
“But I’ve always given Graniani his price – with a little bargaining, of course. Why, I’ve paid him hundreds of francs. You recollect what I paid for that miniature of the missing dauphin of France?”
“But you obtained a gem, even though you had to pay heavily for it,” was my friend’s answer. “If it had been in old Confessini’s hands you’d have had to pay double, or he would have sent it to London.”
“I know that,” I laughed. “Graniani has had some good things now and then, and I’ve been a good customer; therefore I can’t see why he should entertain any hostile thought towards me.”
“As I’ve already said, you never know the Italian character. The man who is your best friend today will be your worst enemy tomorrow. That’s what makes life so insecure here and affrays with the knife so frequent. All I can say is that I noticed about the old scoundrel a distinct expectation to hear bad news of you, and I judged from his manner that he was disappointed when I told him that for aught I knew you were all right. If I were you I wouldn’t have any more dealings with him. Now you’re leaving Antignano, cut him. He has served your purpose well, and you can’t afford to be mixed up in any quarrel with a man of his stamp.”
“Yes, I will,” I answered. “I don’t like him myself. Of late he has been far from straight.”
“And of late, it seems, he has been making secret inquiries of one of the Italian clerks here about your antecedents in England.”
“Whatever for? How can my antecedents concern him?”
“Ah, that’s the point, my dear Kennedy. He’s forming some ingenious plot or other; therefore we must be on the alert. When a man bribes one of the clerks to obtain information about an Englishman’s past, his parentage, and all the rest of it, there’s something devilish suspicious about it.”
“I should think so! I wonder what the old scoundrel is up to?”
“Some blackmailing business or other, most probably. If so, act with discretion, and we’ll have a chat with the chief of police. The present questore is terribly down on blackmailers.”
“But what can be the motive?”
“That’s more than either of us can tell. We must watch and form our own conclusions,” was the consul’s reply, leaning back in his white linen suit and stretching his arms above his head. “You see now,” he added, “why I am in favour of your leaving Tuscany without delay.”
“Yes, I see. But there’s some mystery about old Graniani, and we ought to clear it up.”
“Why should we trouble to do so?” he asked.
I had told him nothing about the incident which had occurred to arouse my suspicions while I was waiting for the fat prior of San Sisto; therefore, in a few words I briefly recounted what I had witnessed.
“Strange?” he exclaimed. “Remarkably strange! We must watch him, Kennedy. It almost looks as if, for some mysterious reason, he means mischief.”
We agreed as to this, and then fell to discussing the best means by which I might get rid of my house and have my collection of antiques packed for transmission to England.
Soon after noon I returned home to luncheon, and in crossing the Piazza Vittorio Emanuelle to take the electric tram my eyes caught a glimpse of a neat female figure in black, which struck me as strangely similar to that of the dark-eyed woman who had been closeted with the fat prior in Florence on the previous day. My first impulse was to turn and follow her, but not being sufficiently certain of her identity, I stepped upon the tram, although sorely puzzled. Was she in Leghorn for some secret purpose? I wondered. Somehow I felt convinced it was she.
On my arrival home, however, my suspicion became more than ever aroused, for I found old Nello in a terrible state of anxiety. On getting up he had discovered that my bed had not been slept in, and that I was absent. Being Italian, he feared that some disgrazia had happened to me.
Then, when I assured him that I had merely been out for a long walk instead of sleeping, he said:
“The hunchback antique-dealer is awaiting you, signore. He says it is most important that he should see you, so I have shown him upstairs to the study.”
His announcement took me aback. The old scoundrel was the last visitor I expected. Nevertheless, I drew a long breath to steady my nerves, and with calm resolution mounted the stairs.
Chapter Six
The Opening of the Book
“Scusi, signore!” exclaimed the ugly, disreputable-looking old man, holding his battered straw hat behind him, and bowing with as much studied grace as his deformity would allow. The Tuscan, always the essence of politeness, is a marvellous diplomatist. “I regret to disturb the signore,” he went on in his soft, musical speech; “but I was anxious to know if he met yesterday in Florence the prior of San Sisto?”
“I did,” I replied, amused at his ingenious attempt to affect ignorance of our meeting.
“And did you make any purchases?”
“I bought one book – a rare Arnoldus.”
“In manuscript?”
“Yes.”
“Bound in original oak boards, with an old brass clasp – eh?” he inquired, with a queer smile about the corners of his mouth. “May I be permitted to see it?”
His demand aroused my suspicions at once. It was evident that the prior had regretted having sold it to me, and had sent his agent to endeavour to get it back at any cost. Therefore, knowing the unscrupulous ways of some Italians in a cosmopolitan city like Leghorn, I did not intend to give the cunning old fellow sight of it.
“Why do you wish to inspect it? I’ve packed it away, and it would give me great trouble to get at it again.”
“Then the signore does really send things to England to sell again, as I have heard the people say?” suggested the old man somewhat rudely.
“No, I’m not a dealer,” I responded angrily. “Who told you so?”
“It is common gossip, signore,” replied the queer old fellow blandly. “But if you wish it, I’ll take steps to correct public opinion on that point.”
“Let the gossips say what pleases them,” I snapped. “I’ve never yet sold anything I’ve bought. I suppose they think that by the quantity of my purchases I must be going to set up a curiosity shop. But,” I added, “tell me, Graniani, why do you wish to see the manuscript I bought yesterday?”
“Oh, mere curiosity,” was his quick answer. “You know I’m interested in such things, and wanted to know how the prior treated you after my recommendation.”
“He treated me well enough, and I brought a bargain.”
“A bargain?” he echoed, and I fancied I detected a strange curl in his lip. “The reverendo does not sell many bargains. How much did you pay?”
“Ah!” I laughed, “I suppose you want to charge him commission – eh?”
The hunchback grinned, displaying his toothless gums, whereupon I took up the receipt and showed him the amount I had paid.
Again he expressed a desire to be allowed to see the book; but, feeling certain that he had come to me with some hidden motive, and at the same time wondering what plot against me the evil-looking old fellow was forming, I point-blank refused. I did not tell him that I knew of his presence in Florence on the previous day, deeming it best to reserve the knowledge to myself. Without doubt he had seen the book in Landini’s possession, and the desire to inspect it again was only a clever ruse.
“I think, signore, that hitherto my dealings with you have shown me to be trustworthy,” he said in a tone of complaint, “and yet you refuse to allow me to see a volume that I understand is most interesting.”
“And rare,” I added. “It has already been valued by Olschki, who declares it to be a unique specimen, and worth very much more than I gave for it.”
“I know, I know,” he replied with a sly wink. “The person who sold it to the prior knew its value and told me. But it is not a bargain, signore – depend upon it that you never get a bargain from the signor reverendo.”
“To whom, then, did it originally belong?”
“Ah, that I regret I am not at liberty to say, signore. I gave my word not to divulge the name. Our nobility who become so poor that they are compelled to sell their treasures to the rich foreigners, like yourself, are naturally very reticent about allowing themselves to be known as needy.” True, I had believed that the old fellow himself was a broken-down noble, some count or marquis who had a knowledge of antiques and who had fallen upon evil times; but the events of the last couple of days had caused me to change my opinion, and to regard him rather as a clever and crafty adventurer.
I could see by his manner that he was ill at ease, and after some conversation regarding an old Montelupo plate he had offered me at a fabulous price, I waited for him to speak.
“I really wish, signore, you would show me the manuscript,” he blurted forth at last. “Believe me, I have always acted in your best interests, and surely you will not refuse me such a small favour?”
“But why are you so desirous of seeing it?” I demanded.
“In order to verify a suspicion,” was his response.
“Suspicion of what?”
“A suspicion which I entertain, and of which, if true, you should be warned.”
I was surprised at his words. Had not the actual seller of it warned me by strange hints?
But an instant later, on reflection, I saw the cunning of the two men, who, acting in collusion, wished to repossess themselves of the book, and I resolved to combat it.
“I have no use for any warning,” I laughed. “I suppose you’ll tell me some fairy story or evil pursuing the man in whose possession the volume remains – eh?”
The hunchback raised his shoulders and exhibited his grimy palms, saying:
“I have come to the signore as a friend. I regret if he should seek to treat me as an enemy.”
“Now, look here,” I exclaimed, rather warmly, “I’ve no time to waste over useless humbug like this! I’ve bought the book at the price asked, and neither you nor the prior will get it back again. Understand that! And further,” I added, “I shall not require anything more that you may have to sell. I’ve finished buying antiques in Leghorn. You can tell all the touts in the piazza that my purse is closed.”
Again the ugly old man raised his shoulders expressively and opened out his hands – this time, however, in silence.
I rang the bell for Nello to show the fellow out. Then, when I had done this, he turned to me with knit brows and asked:
“Does the signore refuse absolutely to show me the ‘Book of Arnoldus’?”
“Absolutely.”
“Then it must be at the signore’s peril,” he said slowly, with a strange, deep meaningness and a curious expression on his brown, wrinkled face.
“I don’t believe in prophecy,” I cried in anger. “And if you mean it for a threat – well, only your age saves you from being kicked downstairs.”
The old fellow muttered beneath his breath some words I did not catch, then bowed as haughtily as though he were a courtier born, and, turning, followed the silent Nello through the long white door.
I believe it was a threat he uttered at the moment of parting; but of that I was not quite sure, therefore was unable to charge him with it.
Still the strange warning caused me to reflect, and the old hunchback’s movements and his secret inquiries about my antecedents all combined to induce within me a vague sense of anxiety and insecurity.
Through an hour in the blazing, breathless afternoon I dozed with cigarettes and my three-day-old English newspaper, as was my habit, for one cannot do literary work when the sun-shutters are closed and the place in cooling darkness. I was eager now to get back to England, and had already ordered Nello to make preparations for my departure. He was to go into town that afternoon and inform the professional packer to call and see me with a view to making wooden cases and crates for my collection of old furniture and pictures, all of which I intended to ship direct to London. Italy was a lovely country, I reflected, but, after all, England was better, especially when now, through no fault of my own, I had stumbled into a slough of mystery.
The faithful old man was heart-broken at my sudden decision to leave.
“Ah, signor padrone,” he sighed, when he returned to report, “this is a sorry day for me! To think – the signore goes to England so far off, and I shall never see him again! I have told them in the town, and everyone regrets.”
“No doubt,” I answered, smiling. “I suppose I’ve been a pretty paying customer to the tradespeople. They must have made good profit out of me – eh, Nello?”
“They did, signor padrone, before I came to you; but of late it has been different. I’ve continually threatened to tell you when I’ve found them attempting to cheat. They don’t like to be thought thieves by an Englishman, signore.”
(A section of five lines missing, page 52.)
Faltered the white-haired old man. “Ah, signore, you don’t know – indeed you don’t. You have always been so good to me that somehow – well, to tell the truth, I’ve served you as though you were my own son. Could you not take me with you to England?”
“Impossible!” I said. “You don’t know English, in the first place; besides, you have your family here. You’ll be far better off in Leghorn than in England, with its grey skies and damp climate. You, a Tuscan, couldn’t stand it a month.”
“But Beppo Martini, from the Hotel Campari, went to London, and now he’s one of the head-waiters at the Hotel Carlton – a splendid post, they say,” urged Nello.
“I know. But he was younger, and he’d been in Paris years before,” I answered decisively. “I regret, Nello, but to take you to England is utterly impossible. When I am gone, however, I hope to hear of you often through the signor console.”
“But you do not know,” he urged. “You can’t know. All I can tell you is that when we part you will be in peril. While I am at your side nothing can happen. If you discharge me, then I fear for your safety.”
I laughed at him, deeming his words but a blundering attempt to compel me to keep him. Italians are experts in threats and insinuations of evil.
“Well, Nello, I haven’t any fear, I assure you,” I replied. “You’ve been a most excellent servant to me, and I much regret that we should be compelled to part; but as for evil falling upon me during your absence, I must say frankly that I don’t anticipate anything of the kind.”
“But will not the signor padrone be warned?”
“Warned of what?” I cried, for everyone seemed to have some warning in his mouth for me. “Of what I have told you?”
“You want to go to England as my personal body-servant and guardian – eh?”
“I do,” replied the old man gravely.
“And because of that you’ve hit upon an exceedingly clever ruse by which to induce me to let you have your way,” I laughed. “No, once for all, Nello, you cannot go with me.”
He stood in silence for a few minutes, as still as though he were turned to stone.
Tears stood in the eyes of the affectionate old servitor. A lump had arisen in his throat, and I saw that with difficulty he swallowed it.
“You do not know my fears, signor padrone,” he said huskily. “It is for your own sake that I ask you to keep me as your servant – for the sake of your own future. If, however, you have decided, so it must be. Nello will leave you, signore; but he will not cease to be your humble and devoted servant.”
Then he turned slowly, and went out, closing the doors after him.
I felt sorry that I had jeered at him, for I had not known how deeply he was attached to me. Still, to take a man of his age to England would be an utter folly, and I could not help feeling that the warning he had uttered was a false one, spoken with a motive.
At last I rose, and, ascending to the study, where the windows were still closed against the heat and sun-glare from the sea, took forth my treasured Arnoldus, and seated myself at my writing-table with the determination of deciphering at least some of that record written at the end.
The first line only of the uneven scrawl was in Latin, as I have already given, and for a long time I puzzled over the next, so sprawling and faded was it; but at length I discovered to my utter surprise and satisfaction that the rest was not in Latin, but in the early sixteenth-century English.
Then slowly and with infinite pains I gradually commenced to transcribe the mysterious record, the opening of which read as follows:
“For soe much as the unskilfull or the ungodly cannot of themselves conceyve the use of thys booke, I have thought it good to note unto them what fruite and comoditie they maye tayke thereof in soe plane forme of manner as I can devise.
“Fyrst, therefore, they maye here lerne who and what manner of man I am. Next, they maye knowe of mi birthe and station, of mi lyfe at the Courte of mi Lorde Don Giovanni Sforza, Tyrant of Persaro, of mi confydences wyth mi ladie Lucrezia, of my dealynges with the greate Lorde Alexandra P.P. VI., the terryble Pontiff, of mi adventures among the fayre ladyes of Pesaro and Rome, and of dyvers strange thynges in Yngolande.”
Written in rather difficult sixteenth-century English, which I have modernised somewhat, it continued:
“Then may they further mark the deep significance of this my secret record, and of how with speed I made amends for my slowness beforetime. Lastly have I here noted at the request of certain that by their own labour and without instruction or help they cannot attain the knowledge of The Secret Hidden. The studious man, with small pains, by help of this book, may gather unto himself such good furniture of knowledge as shall marvellously enrich the commonplace.
“Do you, my reader, think of death? The very thoughts disturb one’s reason; and though man may have many excellent qualities, yet he may have the weakness of not commanding his sentiments. Nothing is worse for man’s health than to be in fear of death. Some are so wise as neither to hate nor fear it; but for my part I have an aversion to it, for it is a rash, inconsiderate thing that always cometh before it is looked for; always cometh unseasonable, parteth friends, ruineth beauty, jeereth at youth, and draweth a dark veil over the pleasures of life. Yet this dreadful evil is but the evil of a moment, and that which we cannot by any means avoid; and it is that which makes it so terrible for me, sinner that I am; for were it certain, hope might diminish some part of the fear; but when I think I must die, and that I may die every moment, and that too in a thousand different ways, I am in such a fright the which you cannot imagine. I see dangers where perchance there never were any. I am persuaded ’tis happy to be somewhat dull of mind in this case; and yet the best way to cure the pensiveness of the thoughts of death is to think or it as little as possible.
“Let him that learneth this my secret, and surviveth, seek and so gain his just reward. But if thou, my reader, hath terror of the grave seek not to learn the contents of this closed book. Tempt not the hidden power that lieth therein, but rather let the clasp remain fastened and the secret ever concealed from thy knowledge and understanding.
“I, Godfrey Lovel, one time of the Abbey of Croylande, brother of the Order of the Blessed Saint Benedict, warneth thee to stay thy curiosity, if thou fearest death as I do fear it.
“TO SEEK FURTHER IS AT THINE OWN PERIL.”