"Like the sign over the shop-door it proclaims to all the world: 'I am a cardinal. Here indulgences, dispensations, and God's blessings are to be sold! Who will buy, who will buy?' I dare not now enter this scouted and repudiated sacred house. I might be remarked, suspected, and betrayed. Corilla, dear, beautiful woman, it costs me much pains and many efforts to conquer you; will your possession repay me?"The cardinal patiently waited in the shadow of a taxus-bush until the street become for a moment empty and solitary. Then he hastened to a side-door of the building, and, sure of being unobserved, entered.
A deep and quiet silence pervaded these long and deserted cloister-passages. It seemed as if a death-veil lay upon the whole building--as if it were depopulated, desolated. Nowhere the least trace of that busy, stirring life, usually prevailing in these corridors--no longer those bands of scholars that formerly peopled these passages--the doors of the great school-room open, the benches unoccupied, the lecturer's chair, from which the pious fathers formerly with such subtle wisdom explained and defended their dangerous doctrines, these also are desolate. The reign of the Jesuits was over; Ganganelli had thrust them from the throne, and they cursed him as their murderer! He had suppressed their sacred order, he had commanded them to lay aside their peculiar costume and adopt that of other monkish orders, or the usual dress of abbes. But from their property he had not been able to expel them in this college /Il Jesu/--within their cloisters his power had not been able to penetrate. There they remained, what they had been, the holy fathers of Jesus, the pious defenders of craft and Christian deception, the cunning advocates of regicide, the proud servants of the only salvation-dispensing Church!--there, with rage in their hearts, they meditated plans of vengeance against this criminal pope who had condemned them to a living death; who, like a wicked magician, had changed their sacred college into an open grave! He had killed them, and he, should he nevertheless live?
With these fatal questions did the holy fathers occupy themselves, reflecting upon them in their gloomy leisure, and in low whisperings consulting with their prior. And in such secret consultation did Cardinal Francesco Albani find the prior with his confidant in the refectorium.
"Do not let me disturb you," he said laughing; "I see by your faces you are engaged in conversation upon the subject in which I yesterday took a part. That is very well--we can resume it where we yesterday broke off, and again knot the threads which I yesterday so violently rent. With which knot shall we begin?"The eyes of the pious Jesuit father flashed with joy. Francesco Albani was inclined to favor their plans and wishes; they saw that in his cunning smile, in his return to them.
"We were speaking of the sacred and important duty you will have to perform to-morrow, your eminence," said the prior, with a winning smile.
"Ah, yes, I remember," said the cardinal, with apparent indifference.
"We spoke of the to-morrow's communion of his holiness the pope.""And of the fact that you, your eminence, would to-morrow have to discharge the important duty of pouring the sacred wine into the golden chalice of the vicegerent of God," said the prior.
"Yes, yes, I now remember it all," said Albani, with a smile. "You spoke to me of a wonderful flask of wine, which, by means of the golden tube, you would gladly help to the honor of being drunk by his holiness from the communion chalice.""It is so precious a wine that only the vicegerent of God is worthy of wetting his lips with it. It must touch the lips of no other mortal!""I know such a wine," said Albani; "it thrives best in the region of Naples, and whoever drinks of it becomes a partaker of eternal blessedness." The celebrated poison, /Acqua Tofana/, is prepared only in Naples.
"Yes, you are right, it is a wonderfully strengthening wine!" said the prior, folding his hands and directing his eyes toward the heavens.
"We thank God that He has left us in possession of so precious an essence! The pope, they say, is suffering and needs strengthening. See how closely we follow the teaching of Him whose name we bear, and who has commanded, 'Love your enemies, bless those who curse you!' Instead of avenging ourselves, we would be his benefactors, and refresh him with the most precious of what we possess!""And you would be so unselfish as to keep from him all knowledge of your benevolence, you would bless him quite secretly! But how if Ishould betray you, and communicate your precious secret to his holiness the pope? Yes, yes, I shall open my mouth and speak, unless Iam prevented by a golden lock put upon my lips.""We shall willingly apply such a lock!" said the pleased prior.
"But, that it may entirely close my mouth, the lock will need to be very heavy!" responded Albani, with a laugh.
"It is so--it weighs six thousand scudi!" said the prior.
"That is much too light!" exclaimed Albani, laughing; "it will hardly cover my mouth. It still remains that I am to undertake a very hazardous affair. Reflect, if any one should discover my possession of this strange wine; if Ganganelli should perceive that it is not wine from his own cellar that I have poured into the cup for him! It is dangerous work that you would assign to me, a work for which I might lose my head, and you venture to offer me a poor six thousand scudi for it! Adieu, then, pious fathers, keep you your golden lock, and Imy unclosed lips. I shall know when and where to speak!"And the cardinal moved toward the door. Hastening after him, the prior handed him a small flask, the contents of which were clear and pure as crystal water, timidly and anxiously whispering, "Ten drops of this in Ganganelli's communion wine, and ten thousand scudi are yours!""Give the ten thousand scudi at once!" said Albani, with decision.
"And the drops?"
"The pope's wine is too strong: I will reduce it a little with this pure water."
The poison, /Acqua Tofana/, is pure and clear as water, without taste or smell. It is prepared from opium and Spanish flies, combined with some other ingredients, which, however, are only known to the makers of it. That the /Acqua Tofana/ is made from the foam sometimes found upon the lips of the dying, is an idle tale. Allessandro Borgia was the first to bring it into use.
