They wore long black gowns.
They bowed gravely and took possession, without saying a word, of the three chairs that were in the room.
"Signor Fabrizio del Dongo," said the eldest of the three, We are pained by the sad duty which we have come to you to perform.
We are here to announce to you the decease of His Excellency the Signor Marchese del Dongo, your father, Second Grand Majordomo Major of the Lombardo-Venetian Kingdom, Knight Grand Cross of the Orders of ——" a string of titles followed.
Fabrizio burst into tears. The judge went on:
"The Signora Marchesa del Bongo, your mother, informs you of this event by a letter missive; but as she has added to the fact certain improper reflexions, by a decree issued yesterday, the Court of Justice has decided that her letter shall be communicated to you only by extract, and it is this extract which the Recorder Bona is now going to read to you."
This reading finished, the judge came across to Fabrizio, who was still lying down, and made him follow on his mother's letter the passages of which copies had been read to him.
Fabrizio saw in the letter the words unjust imprisonment, cruel punishment for a crime which is no crime at all, and understood what had inspired the judges' visit.
However, in his contempt for magistrates without honour, he did not actually say to them any more than:
"I am ill, gentlemen, I am dying of weakness, and you will excuse me if I do not rise."
When the judges had gone, Fabrizio wept again copiously, then said to himself:
"Am I a hypocrite?
I used to think that I did not love him at all."
On that day and the days that followed Clelia was very sad; she called him several times, but had barely the courage to say a few words.
On the morning of the fifth day after their first meeting, she told him that she would come that evening to the marble chapel.
"I can only say a few words to you," she told him as she entered.
She trembled so much that she had to lean on her maid. After sending the woman to wait at the chapel door:
"You are going to give me your word of honour," she went on in a voice that was barely audible, "you are going to give me your word of honour that you will obey the Duchessa, and will attempt to escape on the day when she orders you and in the way that she will indicate to you, or else to-morrow morning I fly to a convent, and I swear to you here and now that never in my life will I utter a word to you again."
Fabrizio remained silent.
"Promise," said Clelia, the tears starting to her eyes and apparently quite beside herself, "or else we converse here for the last time.
The life you have made me lead is intolerable: you are here on my account, and each day is perhaps the last of your existence."
At this stage Clelia became so weak that she was obliged to seek the support of an enormous armchair that had originally stood in the middle of the chapel, for the use of the prisoner-prince; she was almost fainting.
"What must I promise?" asked Fabrizio with a beaten air.
"You know."
"I swear then to cast myself deliberately into a terrible disaster, and to condemn myself to live far from all that I love in the world."
"Make a definite promise."
"I swear to obey the Duchessa and to make my escape on the day she wishes and as she wishes.
And what is to become of me once I am parted from you?"
"Swear to escape, whatever may happen to you."
"What!
Have you made up your mind to marry the Marchese Crescenzi as soon as I am no longer here?"
"Oh, heavens!
What sort of heart do you think I have? … But swear, or I shall not have another moment's peace."
"Very well, I swear to escape from here on the day on which Signora Sanseverina shall order me to do so, and whatever may happen to me between now and then."
This oath obtained, Clelia became so faint that she was obliged to retire after thanking Fabrizio.
"Everything was in readiness for my flight to-morrow morning," she told him, "had you persisted in refusing.
I should have beheld you at this moment for the last time in my life, I had vowed that to the Madonna.
Now, as soon as I can leave my room, I shall go and examine the terrible wall beneath the new stone in the parapet."
On the following day he found her so pale that he was keenly distressed.
She said to him from the aviary window:
"Let us be under no illusion, my dear friend; as there is sin in our friendship, I have no doubt that misfortune will come to us. You will be discovered while seeking to make your escape, and ruined for ever, if it is no worse; however, we must satisfy the demands of human prudence, it orders us to leave nothing untried.
You will need, to climb down the outside of the great tower, a strong cord more than two hundred feet long.
In spite of all the efforts I have made since I learned of the Duchessa's plan, I have only been able to procure cords that together amount to barely fifty feet.
By a standing order of the governor, all cords that may be seen in the fortress are burned, and every evening they remove the well-ropes, which for that matter are so frail that they often break when drawing up the light weight attached to them.
But pray God to forgive me, I am betraying my father, and working, unnatural girl that I am, to cause him undying grief.
Pray to God for me, and, if your life is saved, make a vow to consecrate every moment of it to His Glory.
"This is an idea that has come to me: in a week from now I shall leave the citadel to be present at the wedding of one of the Marchese Crescenzi's sisters.
I shall come back that night, as I must, but I shall try in every possible way not to come in until very late, and perhaps Barbone will not dare to examine me too closely.
All the greatest ladies of the court will be at this wedding of the Marchese's sister, and no doubt Signora Sanseverina among them.
In heaven's name, make one of these ladies give me a parcel of cords tightly packed, not too large, and reduced to the smallest possible bulk.