of lost knowledge. But more than that--once or twice, when
he had been strongly excited, he had seemed momentarily to be in entire
possession of his past self, as old men doze for an instant and get back
the consciousness of their youth: he seemed again to see Greek pages and
understand them, again to feel his mind moving unbenumbed among familiar
ideas. It had been but a flash, and the darkness closing in again
seemed the more horrible; but might not the same thing happen again for
longer periods? If it would only come and stay long enough for him to
achieve a revenge--devise an exquisite suffering, such as a mere right
arm could never inflict!

He raised himself from his stooping attitude, and, folding his arms,
attempted to concentrate all his mental force on the plan he must
immediately pursue. He had to wait for knowledge and opportunity, and
while he waited he must have the means of living without beggary. What
he dreaded of all things now was, that any one should think him a
foolish, helpless old man. No one must know that half his memory was
gone: the lost strength might come again; and if it were only for a
little while, _that_ might be enough.

He knew how to begin to get the information he wanted about Tito. He
had repeated the words "Bratti Ferravecchi" so constantly after they had
been uttered to him, that they never slipped from him for long together.
A man at Genoa, on whose finger he had seen Tito's ring, had told him
that he bought that ring at Florence, of a young Greek, well-dressed,
and with a handsome dark face, in the shop of a _rigattiere_ called
Bratti Ferravecchi, in the street also called Ferravecchi. This
discovery had caused a violent agitation in Baldassarre. Until then he
had clung with all the tenacity of his fervent nature to his faith in
Tito, and had not for a moment believed himself to be wilfully forsaken.
At first he had said, "My bit of parchment has never reached him; that
is why I am still toiling at Antioch, But he is searching; he knows
where I was lost: he will trace me out, and find me at last." Then,
when he was taken to Corinth, he induced his owners, by the assurance
that he should be sought out and ransomed, to provide securely against
the failure of any inquiries that might be made about him at Antioch;
and at Corinth he thought joyfully, "Here, at last, he must find me.
Here he is sure to touch, whichever way he goes." But before another
year had passed, the