e!"

"I promise thee nothing. I but show thee only what is written."

"And when and how shall this be effected?"

"How, I know not," answered the woman, "this is withheld from me. Fate
shows what her work is only as it appears when done, but not the
manner of the doing."

"But when will this be?" was the question.

"It must be ere she marries with Ulric Barberigo, for him she will
never marry."

"And it is appointed that he weds with her on the day of St. Mary's
Eve. That is but a week from hence, and the ceremony takes place--"

"At Olivolo."

"Ha! at Olivolo!" and a bright gleam of intelligence passed over the
features of the stranger, from which his cloak had by this time
entirely fallen. The woman beheld the look, and a slight smile, that
seemed to denote scorn rather than any other emotion, played for a
moment over her shriveled and sunken lips.

"Mother," said the stranger, "must all these matters be left to fate?"

"That is as thou wilt."

"But the eye of a young woman may be won--her heart may be touched--so
that it shall be easy for fate to accomplish her designs. I am young;
am indifferently well fashioned in person, and have but little reason
to be ashamed of the face which God has given me. Beside, I have much
skill in music, and can sing to the guitar as fairly as most of the
young men of Venice. What if I were to find my way to the damsel--what
if I play and sing beneath her father's palace? I have disguises, and
am wont to practice in various garments; I can--"

The woman interrupted him.

"Thou mayest do as thou wilt. It is doubtless as indifferent to the
fates what thou doest, as it will be to me. Thou hast seen what I have
shown--I can no more. I am not permitted to counsel thee. I am but a
voice; thou hast all that I can give thee."

The stranger lingered still, but the woman ceased to speak, and
betrayed by her manner that she desired his departure. Thus seeing, he
took a purse from his bosom and laid it before her. She did not seem
to notice the action, nor did she again look up until he was gone.
With the sound of his retreating footsteps, she put aside the brazen
volume of strange characters which seemed her favorite study, and her
lips slowly parted in soliloquy,

"Ay! thou exultest, fierce ruffian that thou art, in the assurance
that fate yields herself to thy will! Thou shall, indeed, have the
maiden in thy arms, but it shall profit thee nothing; and that single
triumph shal