Verezzi was slightly surprised, but imputing her manner to indisposition, it passed off. Unmarked by events of importance, a month passed away. Matilda’s passion, unallayed by satiety, unconquered by time, still raged with its former fierceness--still was every earthly delight centred in Verezzi; and in the air-drawn visions of her imagination, she portrayed to herself that this happiness would last for ever. It was one evening that Verezzi and Matilda sat, happy in the society of each other, that a servant entering, presented the latter with a sealed paper. The contents were: “Matilda Contessa di Laurentini is summoned to appear before the Holy Inquisition--to appear before its tribunal, immediately on the receipt of this summons.” Matilda’s cheek, as she read it, was blanched with terror. The summons--the fatal, irresistible summons, struck her with chilly awe. She attempted to thrust it into her bosom; but, unable to conceal her terror, she assayed to rush from the apartment--but it was in vain: her trembling limbs refused to support her, and she sank fainting on the floor. Verezzi raised her--he restored her fleeting senses; he cast himself at her feet, and in the tenderest, most pathetic accents, demanded the reason of her alarm. “And if,” said he, “it is any thing of which I have unconsciously been guilty--if it is any thing in my conduct which has offended you, oh! how soon, how truly would I repent. Dearest Matilda, I adore you to madness: tell me then quickly--confide in one who loves you as I do.” “Rise, Verezzi,” exclaimed Matilda, in a tone expressive of serene horror: “and since the truth can no longer be concealed, peruse that letter.” She presented him the fatal summons. He eagerly snatched it; breathless with impatience, he opened it. But what words can express the consternation of the affrighted Verezzi, as the summons, mysterious and inexplicable to him, pressed upon his straining eyeball? For an instant he stood fixed in mute and agonizing thought. At last, in the forced serenity of despair, he demanded what was to be done. Matilda answered not: for her soul, borne on the pinions of anticipation, at that instant portrayed to itself ignominious and agonizing dissolution. “What is to be done?” again, in a deeper tone of despair, demanded Verezzi. “We must instantly to Venice,” returned Matilda, collecting her scattered faculties; “we must to Venice; there, I believe, we may be safe. But in some remote corner of the city we must for the present fix our habitation; we must condescend to curtail our establishment; and above all, we must avoid particularity. But will my Verezzi descend from the rank of life in which his birth has placed him, and with the outcast Matilda’s fortunes quit grandeur?” “Matilda! dearest Matilda!” exclaimed Verezzi, “talk not thus; you know I am ever yours; you know I love you, and with you, could conceive a cottage elysium.”