e foundations of the palaces and of the
great prison, the door of the underground dungeon in which I lay
confined sprang open of itself, and I staggered up out of my grave as
it were through rubbish and ruins.[21] O Tonino, you called me an old
woman of ninety; I am hardly more than fifty. This lean, emaciated
body, this hideously distorted face, this icicle-like hair, these lame
feet--no, it was not the lapse of years, it was only unspeakable
tortures which could in a few months change me thus from a strong woman
into the monstrous creature I now am. And my hideous chuckling and
laughing--this was forced from me by the last strain on the rack, at
the memory of which my hair even now stands on an end, and I feel
altogether as if I were locked in a red-hot coat of mail; and since
that time I have been constantly subject to it; it attacks me without
my being able to check it. So don't stand any longer in awe of me,
Tonino, Oh! it was indeed your heart which told you that as a little
boy you lay on my bosom." "Woman," said Antonio hoarsely, wrapped up in
his own thoughts, "woman, I feel as if I must believe you. But who was
my father? What was he called? What was the awful fate which overtook
him on that terrible night? Who was it who adopted me? And--what was
that occurrence in my life which now, like some potent magical spell
from a strange and unknown world, exercises an irresistible sway over
my soul, so that all my thoughts are dissipated into a dark night-like
sea, so to speak? When you tell me all this, you mysterious woman, then
I will believe you." "Tonino," replied the old crone, sighing, "for
your own sake I must keep silent; but the time when I may speak will
soon come. The Fontego--the Fontego--keep away from the Fontego."

"Oh!" cried Antonio angrily, "you need not begin to speak your dark
sentences again to enchant me by some devilish wile or other. My heart
is rent, you must speak, or"---- "Stop," interrupted she, "no
threats--am I not your faithful nurse, who tended you?"---- Without
waiting to hear what the old woman had got further to say, he picked
himself up and ran away swiftly. From a distance he shouted to her,
"You shall nevertheless have a new hood, and as many sequins besides as
you like."

It was in truth a remarkable spectacle, to see the old Doge Marino
Falieri and his youthful wife: he, strong enough and robust enough in
very truth, but with a grey beard, and innumerable wrinkles in his
r