The monk threw back his cowl for air, and the act discovered the deadly paleness of his features. But his eye, charged with a meaning of horror, rolled over the faces of those who drew around him, as if he struggled with memory to recall their persons. "Ferdinando! Father Anselmo!" cried the Donna Florinda, correcting the unbidden familiarity, though she could not command the anxiety of her rebel features; "Speak to us--thou art suffering!" "Ill at heart, Florinda." "Deceive us not--haply thou hast more evil tidings--Venice--" "Is a fearful state." "Why hast thou quitted us?--why in a moment of so much importance to our pupil--a moment that may prove of the last influence on her happiness--hast thou been absent for a long hour?" Violetta turned a surprised and unconscious glance towards the clock, but she spoke not. "The servants of the state had need of me," returned the monk, easing the pain of his spirit by a groan. "I understand thee, father;--thou hast shrived a penitent?" "Daughter, I have: and few depart more at peace with God and their fellows!" Donna Florinda murmured a short prayer for the soul of the dead, piously crossing herself as she concluded. Her example was imitated by her pupil, and even the lips of Don Camillo moved, while his head was bowed by the side of his fair companion in seeming reverence. "'Twas a just end, father?" demanded Donna Florinda. "It was an unmerited one!" cried the monk, with fervor, "or there is no faith in man. I have witnessed the death of one who was better fitted to live, as happily he was better fitted to die, than those who pronounced his doom. What a fearful state is Venice!" "And such are they who are masters of thy person, Violetta," said Don Camillo: "to these midnight murderers will thy happiness be consigned! Tell us, father, does thy sad tragedy touch in any manner on the interests of this fair being? for we are encircled here by mysteries that are as incomprehensible, while they are nearly as fearful as fate itself." The monk looked from one to the other, and a more human expression began to appear in his countenance. "Thou art right," he said; "such are the men who mean to dispose of the person of our pupil. Holy St. Mark pardon the prostitution of his revered name, and shield her with the virtue of his prayers!" "Father, are we worthy to know more of that thou hast witnessed?" "The secrets of the confessional are sacred, my son; but this hath been a disclosure to cover the living, not the dead, with shame." "I see the hand of those up above in this!" for so most spoke of the Council of Three. "They have tampered with my right for years to suit their selfish purposes, and to my shame must I own it, they have driven me to a submission, in order to obtain justice, that as ill accords with my feelings as with my character." "Nay, Camillo, thou art incapable of this injustice to thyself!"