CHAPTER XXIV.

IN FADED INK

The month of May.

A still and brilliant night in the Umbrian hills.

The whole world of mountain and valley seemed to be lost in a soft veil of blue spangled with gold.

Far away over the jagged crests of the Apennines, like a horn of pallid gold, or a silver sickle for some precious harvest, the moon hung over the world that in her light was visible ever so faintly, as though seen through some impalpable but lovely veil.

Old Don Mario noiselessly let himself out of the battered oaken door of the presbytery. Its hinges had been well oiled long ago, for, truth to tell, he took frequent nocturnal rambles, unknown to old Teresa, to his English guest, or to the slumbering village.

As he halted for a second in the little piazza with its dark shadows beneath the planes, there was no sound except the distant wailing of a dog. Santa Lucia went to bed early, and rose with the dawn. And when it slept, no watch was kept by police.

Therefore Don Mario did not fear observation or comment.

His habit was to rise at half-past one o’clock, dress, and go forth into the night, just as he had now emerged.

As he stood by the wall of the little piazza--the short, low wall beside the church--there spread before him the whole breadth of the great valley. To the right on the hills, like the nest of an eagle, Castellazzara hung above the precipices of Monte Civitella. Dimly in the lonely obscurity of night San Casciano rose behind Celle on the sides of Monte Cetona. Somewhere, lost in the valleys, Proceno hid herself among the vines, Acquapendente behind the fantastic rocks, while far away the Lago di Bolsena shone like a jewel, Monte Limone rose like a ghost beside Monte Venere with Monte Fiascone, and beyond was the desert of the Campagna and that immortal city which it has brought forth.

Over everything lay an unbroken silence.

For fully five minutes the old _curato_ stood gazing away into the night, then, with noiseless tread--for he always wore his felt-soled slippers on his nocturnal excursions--he turned and, descending a short narrow lane, skirted the great ruined walls of the village, and was quickly out in the open country below.

He walked briskly along a by-path through the vines until he had descended the steep hill, then, crossing the maize fields, he entered a small wood of chestnuts, following a narrow, tortuous path, which led at last to a small, half-ruined cottage, the broken windows of which had been boarded up--the house of an old _contadino_ who had died, and whose sons had emigrated to England.

Producing an electric torch from his pocket, the old priest put a key into the latch, and next moment was within.

The lamp, which he lit quickly, revealed a weird, unusual interior; an old kitchen, at one end of which was a long brick stove with four holes for burning charcoal, at the other a table upon which were many glass vessels, a marble mortar and pestle, and some small heaps of dried herbs.

One of the fires, which had apparently been banked up many hours ago, still glowed red, and upon it was a small retort, for some distillation was in progress--some long and elaborate process.

By the light of the lamp the old priest first divested himself of his cassock, then, taking a pair of indiarubber gloves from a drawer in the table, he put them on and began to examine the retort, from which emanated a delicate perfume as pungent and subtle as some new Parisian extract.

A rough-haired terrier, tied up near the stove, whined to be released and licked his hand. He had brought it there on the previous night.

But he cuffed it back roughly, muttering some execration in Italian. A long wooden box stood close by, and the light of the lamp aroused its imprisoned inmates who showed at the bars. They were large brown rabbits.

Don Mario had rolled up his shirt-sleeves and was poking the fire, when suddenly he halted and held his breath.

He thought he detected a noise outside and listened. But at last, after prolonged and careful investigation, he satisfied himself that the wind had suddenly sprung up, and that the branch of a rose tree had struck the boards nailed before the window.

“No,” he murmured to himself in Italian, “nobody dare come here. The people are superstitious. Seven years ago when old Antonio died in this kitchen, I told them that he had been strangled by the devil, and I warned the village that anyone coming to the accursed house might share the same fate. The evil eye would be directed upon them, and ill-fortune would befall them and theirs. And”--he chuckled to himself--“and not man, woman, or child in Santa Lucia dare come near the place. It belongs to no one, and no one dare enter for fear of the devil. The superstition of the _contadini_ is,” he laughed, “often very useful to the _curato_.”

Certainly he had inspired within the people of Santa Lucia a terror of that ruined cottage, now overgrown with weeds and tangled bushes. Old Antonio had been found there one night dead, with dark marks upon his throat and evident signs of strangulation; and the priest, because he desired uninterrupted possession of the house, had declared it to be the work of the Evil One himself, thus striking terror into the hearts of his ignorant and superstitious flock.

Carrying the lamp back to the table, he commenced a careful examination of the various pots and glass phials upon it. In a large glass bowl stood some dark grey liquid with a few small brown leaves floating in it--evidently some decoction in process of manufacture.

Still wearing his rubber gloves, he took a small portion of the liquid and placed it in a test tube. Then, lighting a small spirit lamp, he held it over the blue flame, every now and then carefully testing its temperature by means of a tiny thermometer.

At last, before it boiled, he added ten drops of a colourless liquid, taken from the retort on the fire, counting them as they fell, and again held it up to the lamp-light.

Its colour and character had become entirely changed. It was now perfectly clear and of a deep, bright blue.

“_Benissimo!_” he ejaculated in complete satisfaction. “It is the first step towards success!”

Afterwards he drew a broken, rush-seated chair towards the table, and, taking from his cassock a small roll of brown parchment, spread it out beneath the lamp-light.

It was in Latin--an ancient and much-faded parchment. He had bought it for a few soldi from an old man in Acquapendente, who had discovered it while demolishing an ancient house in the village. The man had found it preserved in a small cylinder of rusty iron and concealed in a hole in the wall.

When opened, it was about ten inches long by five wide, and covered with neat, even writing in ancient characters, much of which was so faded as to be hardly decipherable. One corner was ragged, while upon it were dark brown stains of damp, or of rust from the iron cylinder in which it had been preserved.

“Twelfth century,” the old priest murmured to himself as he put on his big, heavy-rimmed glasses--the magnifying glasses he always used when pursuing his palæographical studies. “That is evident from the signs for ‘et,’ and by the ‘a’s.’” Then he read and re-read several lines, against which he had placed marks.

“Yes,” he went on, “I have carried out all the instructions to the very letter. Soon--very soon--we shall see whether the result is such as is claimed. The man who placed this secret upon record may have done so in order to fool any who might be able to read his abbreviations and understand his cryptic references. Yet, somehow, I’m inclined to think the contrary. The record bears upon its face the mark of being genuine. I am more than ever convinced that it is the actual lost secret of the great Doge Dandolo of Venice, the man who swept away his enemies like flies, and who captured Constantinople! The two Foscari are known to have possessed it and used it, and now--and now it has fallen into my hands! Yes, I am certain it is what I suspect. There is that mysterious passage towards the end which speaks of the Michieli and the Morosini families, plain proof of the motive of such a secret being placed upon record! And I bought it--the secret of the Doge Dandolo--for ten soldi!”

Slowly he deciphered word after word, softly chuckling to himself, his hooked nose the more accentuated until, bent beneath the lamp, he looked like some evil bird of prey, gloating eagerly over the triumph which he knew must be his.

From the pocket of his ragged cassock he took two letters. One was written in German, and as he read it he smiled. Enclosed was a German banknote for five hundred marks.

“To be sent to the poste-restante at Cologne,” he muttered as he read. “I wonder what this Herr Mayer intends? Tired of his wife, perhaps--or waiting for dead men’s shoes! It is always either for love--or for money. Yet I sell them what they want, and it matters not to me to what use it may be put.”

The other letter bore the Paris postmark, a few lines in a well-educated feminine hand, addressed to a certain Signor Corradini at a newspaper shop in Dean Street, Soho, London. A thousand-franc note was enclosed, with a request that “the medicine” be sent to Madame Lambert, in the Rue Muret, at Chartres. The writer, judging from the note-paper, was some elegant Parisienne, who had arranged to have the “medicine” sent to a maid, or some friend in whom she could trust.

At regular intervals letters addressed to that obscure newsvendor’s in Soho in the name of Corradini were sent to him in Italy. Surely it was a strange correspondence.

“_Dio mio!_” he laughed as he turned over the Frenchwoman’s letter. “I have, indeed, a curious _clientèle_! Some of them come again and again, growing more daring when they learn that, in effecting its purpose, it leaves no trace. Parents rid themselves of their children, husbands their wives, women their lovers, men their mistresses or their enemies, and the fatalities are all declared to be due to natural causes! In few cases--only with the foolish bunglers--is the truth suspected, yet it cannot be proved in the absence of any trace.”

And he paused, the Frenchwoman’s letter still in his hand.

“Wants freedom from an odious marriage, without a doubt, and has heard of the marvellous ‘cures’ of Giovanni Corradini,” he went on. “Well, well--if I dared to speak I could tell the police some very strange stories. Most of my clients use fictitious names for obvious reasons, yet in many cases I have made inquiry, and before supplying the ‘medicine’ have ascertained the real name of the person who has sought my assistance. Often have I been utterly staggered. Some of the greatest men and women in Europe have been my clients, and the heart secret of many a bereaved man and woman I could, if I chose, lay bare. Ah! yes,” sighed the old man, “my friends are, indeed, a very strange set.”

The small test tube containing the blue liquid had now cooled, and, replacing the letters in his cassock, he relit the small glass spirit lamp; and after adding twenty drops of a certain red fluid, as set out in the crinkled, half-effaced parchment, he again replaced the tube over the blue flame, and, leaning his elbows on the table, watched it boil.

“_Diavolo!_” he muttered to himself. “How people bungle! Poor Contessa Vanni! What a story in the _Corriere della Sera_ the day before yesterday. A month ago she wrote to London under the name of Annetta Bardi, and gave her address at the Hôtel Europe, in Turin. I sent the extract, and a week later her lover killed her husband, Count Francesco Vanni, in their palazzo at Bologna. But she showed fear, was suspected, arrested, and now has confessed. It is really most annoying. I shall now have to change the address from London to Paris, as she may tell whence she obtained the few drops of extract, and a trap may be set. A trap! And yet I have successfully avoided all traps for the past eleven years!” he laughed harshly. “_Corpo di Bacco!_ I’ve sent out a good many homœopathic doses in that time--I’ve been responsible, I suppose, for a good many mysteries. How often have I seen in the papers accounts of the sudden death of one well-known person or another, and have traced the hand of one or other of my mysterious clients. This world of ours is, indeed, a curious study, and perhaps no more lucrative profession exists than that which I have followed with so much success and in such secrecy!”

He was watching the bubbling of the liquid in the glass tube above the flame. It had turned a bright orange. He placed his watch on the table beside him, and then slowly and very carefully re-read the directions in the ancient manuscript.

Presently, from the capacious pocket of his old cassock as it hung upon a nail, he drew forth a tiny wooden box, which, on being opened, disclosed a few small white crystals. With a pair of tweezers, and still wearing the gloves, he took a single crystal and dropped it into the orange-coloured fluid, when at once it turned a dark, dull green.

He again referred to the manuscript, and, well satisfied at the result obtained, blew out the flame to allow the liquid to cool.

“If it is what it is claimed, then it is a far safer and more potent spinal poison than the other. Against the one I have placed in commerce the difficulty has always been its subcutaneous injection. But this--this is most terrible and fatal--a mere touch externally upon the skin, and the noxious action upon the body will commence, and terminate with death. It is the mysterious poison of the Doge Dandolo, of Venice, and probably, later, of the Borgias themselves. A single touch, and no trace is left, yet death must surely ensue. Unknown to the modern toxicologist, it is the only means of destroying life without arousing the slightest suspicion. So if any previous extract has been worth so much to me, what is this not worth--providing it is what this ancient record claims? But we will see.”

And taking a small quantity of fine white powder, he spread it upon a piece of glass, and upon it poured out a few drops of the dark green liquid, which the powder at once absorbed.

Then releasing the whining dog, which at once turned and tried to lick his face, he took a pair of scissors and clipped off closely a portion of the fur beneath the shoulder, where the skin showed pink and tender.

Then, dabbing one of the fingers of his safety glove into the damp powder spread upon the glass, he carefully applied it to the animal’s skin, stroking it three times across the spot whence the hair had been removed.

Afterwards he released the animal, which began to frisk as before, wagging his tail merrily while the hook-nosed old man watched calmly.

Twenty seconds later by the watch, the animal suddenly halted. A convulsive shiver shook its frame. Its body began to twist with short, spasmodic movements, and it looked up, crying piteously at its torturer. In forty seconds from the time of the deadly application it was lying upon its back, its body writhing and distorted; in seventy seconds it lay stretched out, dead.

“_Benissimo!_” cried the old priest, rubbing his gloved hands enthusiastically. “Here at last have I recovered the secret of the external poison of the ancients--the means by which whole families may, if necessary, be wiped out without the slightest danger, or even suspicion! A new commodity for my clients!” he laughed aloud. “When it becomes known what I can now supply--that a small quantity dusted into a glove, placed upon the handle of a knife, or upon the pages of a book will produce the desired effect--then there will be rush to secure some, just as before.”

He paused, glancing across at the dog’s body lying in the shadow.

“It is really surprising,” he continued, still murmuring to himself, “surprising how, without advertisement, one receives those well-disguised applications, accompanied always by remittances. But this new commodity must be given a real and actual trial--upon the human body as well as upon that of the animal.”

And beneath the lamp-light his aquiline face relaxed into a dark, evil grin.

An owl was hooting mournfully outside. It was the only sound.

In that ruined place a great and appalling fact had been rediscovered--the means by which human life could be destroyed in defiance of detection even by all the tests of the modern analyst.

Surely the thin, gloved right hand of Don Mario Mellini was the Hand of Death!