The Gadfly - E. L. Voynich (phonics readers .txt) 📗
- Author: E. L. Voynich
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false and slavish people, these dumb and soulless
gods—that he had suffered all these tortures of
shame and passion and despair; had made a rope
to hang himself, forsooth, because one priest was
a liar. As if they were not all liars! Well, all that
was done with; he was wiser now. He need only
shake off these vermin and begin life afresh.
There were plenty of goods vessels in the docks;
it would be an easy matter to stow himself away
in one of them, and get across to Canada, Australia,
Cape Colony—anywhere. It was no matter
for the country, if only it was far enough; and, as
for the life out there, he could see, and if it did not
suit him he could try some other place.
He took out his purse. Only thirty-three paoli;
but his watch was a good one. That would help
him along a bit; and in any case it was of no
consequence—he should pull through somehow. But
they would search for him, all these people; they
would be sure to make inquiries at the docks. No;
he must put them on a false scent—make them
believe him dead; then he should be quite free—
quite free. He laughed softly to himself at the
thought of the Burtons searching for his corpse.
What a farce the whole thing was!
Taking a sheet of paper, he wrote the first words
that occurred to him:
“I believed in you as I believed in God. God
is a thing made of clay, that I can smash with a
hammer; and you have fooled me with a lie.”
He folded up the paper, directed it to Montanelli,
and, taking another sheet, wrote across it:
“Look for my body in Darsena.” Then he put on
his hat and went out of the room. Passing his
mother’s portrait, he looked up with a laugh
and a shrug of his shoulders. She, too, had lied
to him.
He crept softly along the corridor, and, slipping
back the door-bolts, went out on to the great,
dark, echoing marble staircase. It seemed to
yawn beneath him like a black pit as he descended.
He crossed the courtyard, treading cautiously
for fear of waking Gian Battista, who slept on the
ground floor. In the wood-cellar at the back was
a little grated window, opening on the canal and
not more than four feet from the ground. He
remembered that the rusty grating had broken away
on one side; by pushing a little he could make an
aperture wide enough to climb out by.
The grating was strong, and he grazed his
hands badly and tore the sleeve of his coat; but
that was no matter. He looked up and down the
street; there was no one in sight, and the canal
lay black and silent, an ugly trench between two
straight and slimy walls. The untried universe
might prove a dismal hole, but it could hardly be
more flat and sordid than the corner which he was
leaving behind him. There was nothing to regret;
nothing to look back upon. It had been a pestilent
little stagnant world, full of squalid lies and clumsy
cheats and foul-smelling ditches that were not
even deep enough to drown a man.
He walked along the canal bank, and came out
upon the tiny square by the Medici palace. It was
here that Gemma had run up to him with her vivid
face, her outstretched hands. Here was the little
flight of wet stone steps leading down to the moat;
and there the fortress scowling across the strip of
dirty water. He had never noticed before how
squat and mean it looked.
Passing through the narrow streets he reached
the Darsena shipping-basin, where he took off his
hat and flung it into the water. It would be
found, of course, when they dragged for his body.
Then he walked on along the water’s edge, considering
perplexedly what to do next. He must
contrive to hide on some ship; but it was a difficult
thing to do. His only chance would be to
get on to the huge old Medici breakwater and
walk along to the further end of it. There was a
low-class tavern on the point; probably he should
find some sailor there who could be bribed.
But the dock gates were closed. How should
he get past them, and past the customs officials?
His stock of money would not furnish the high
bribe that they would demand for letting him
through at night and without a passport. Besides
they might recognize him.
As he passed the bronze statue of the “Four
Moors,” a man’s figure emerged from an old house
on the opposite side of the shipping basin and
approached the bridge. Arthur slipped at once
into the deep shadow behind the group of statuary
and crouched down in the darkness, peeping
cautiously round the corner of the pedestal.
It was a soft spring night, warm and starlit.
The water lapped against the stone walls of the
basin and swirled in gentle eddies round the steps
with a sound as of low laughter. Somewhere near
a chain creaked, swinging slowly to and fro. A
huge iron crane towered up, tall and melancholy
in the dimness. Black on a shimmering expanse of
starry sky and pearly cloud-wreaths, the figures
of the fettered, struggling slaves stood out in
vain and vehement protest against a merciless
doom.
The man approached unsteadily along the water
side, shouting an English street song. He was
evidently a sailor returning from a carouse at some
tavern. No one else was within sight. As he
drew near, Arthur stood up and stepped into the
middle of the roadway. The sailor broke off in
his song with an oath, and stopped short.
“I want to speak to you,” Arthur said in
Italian. “Do you understand me?”
The man shook his head. “It’s no use talking
that patter to me,” he said; then, plunging into
bad French, asked sullenly: “What do you want?
Why can’t you let me pass?”
“Just come out of the light here a minute; I
want to speak to you.”
“Ah! wouldn’t you like it? Out of the light!
Got a knife anywhere about you?”
“No, no, man! Can’t you see I only want your
help? I’ll pay you for it?”
“Eh? What? And dressed like a swell,
too––” The sailor had relapsed into English.
He now moved into the shadow and leaned against
the railing of the pedestal.
“Well,” he said, returning to his atrocious
French; “and what is it you want?”
“I want to get away from here–-”
“Aha! Stowaway! Want me to hide you?
Been up to something, I suppose. Stuck a knife
into somebody, eh? Just like these foreigners!
And where might you be wanting to go? Not
to the police station, I fancy?”
He laughed in his tipsy way, and winked one eye.
“What vessel do you belong to?”
“Carlotta—Leghorn to Buenos Ayres; shipping
oil one way and hides the other. She’s over
there”—pointing in the direction of the breakwater
—“beastly old hulk!”
“Buenos Ayres—yes! Can you hide me anywhere on board?”
“How much can you give?”
“Not very much; I have only a few paoli.”
“No. Can’t do it under fifty—and cheap at
that, too—a swell like you.”
“What do you mean by a swell? If you like my
clothes you may change with me, but I can’t give
you more money than I have got.”
“You have a watch there. Hand it over.”
Arthur took out a lady’s gold watch, delicately
chased and enamelled, with the initials “G. B.” on
the back. It had been his mother’s—but what
did that matter now?
“Ah!” remarked the sailor with a quick glance
at it. “Stolen, of course! Let me look!”
Arthur drew his hand away. “No,” he said.
“I will give you the watch when we are on board;
not before.”
“You’re not such a fool as you look, after all!
I’ll bet it’s your first scrape, though, eh?”
“That is my business. Ah! there comes the
watchman.”
They crouched down behind the group of statuary
and waited till the watchman had passed.
Then the sailor rose, and, telling Arthur to follow
him, walked on, laughing foolishly to himself.
Arthur followed in silence.
The sailor led him back to the little irregular
square by the Medici palace; and, stopping in a
dark corner, mumbled in what was intended for a
cautious whisper:
“Wait here; those soldier fellows will see you
if you come further.”
“What are you going to do?”
“Get you some clothes. I’m not going to take
you on board with that bloody coatsleeve.”
Arthur glanced down at the sleeve which had
been torn by the window grating. A little blood
from the grazed hand had fallen upon it. Evidently
the man thought him a murderer. Well,
it was of no consequence what people thought.
After some time the sailor came back, triumphant,
with a bundle under his arm.
“Change,” he whispered; “and make haste
about it. I must get back, and that old Jew has
kept me bargaining and haggling for half an
hour.”
Arthur obeyed, shrinking with instinctive disgust
at the first touch of second-hand clothes.
Fortunately these, though rough and coarse, were
fairly clean. When he stepped into the light in
his new attire, the sailor looked at him with tipsy
solemnity and gravely nodded his approval.
“You’ll do,” he said. “This way, and don’t
make a noise.” Arthur, carrying his discarded
clothes, followed him through a labyrinth of winding
canals and dark narrow alleys; the mediaeval
slum quarter which the people of Leghorn call
“New Venice.” Here and there a gloomy old
palace, solitary among the squalid houses and
filthy courts, stood between two noisome ditches,
with a forlorn air of trying to preserve its ancient
dignity and yet of knowing the effort to be a hopeless
one. Some of the alleys, he knew, were
notorious dens of thieves, cut-throats, and smugglers;
others were merely wretched and poverty-stricken.
Beside one of the little bridges the sailor
stopped, and, looking round to see that they were
not observed, descended a flight of stone steps to
a narrow landing stage. Under the bridge was a
dirty, crazy old boat. Sharply ordering Arthur
to jump in and lie down, he seated himself in the
boat and began rowing towards the harbour’s
mouth. Arthur lay still on the wet and leaky
planks, hidden by the clothes which the man had
thrown over him, and peeping out from under
them at the familiar streets and houses.
Presently they passed under a bridge and
entered that part of the canal which forms a moat
for the fortress. The massive walls rose out of
the water, broad at the base and narrowing upward
to the frowning turrets. How strong, how
threatening they had seemed to him a few hours
ago! And now–-
He laughed softly as he lay in the bottom of the
boat.
“Hold your noise,” the sailor whispered, “and
keep your head covered! We’re close to the
custom house.”
Arthur drew the clothes over his head. A few
yards further on the boat stopped before a row of
masts chained together, which lay across the surface
of the canal, blocking the narrow waterway
between the custom house and the fortress wall.
A sleepy official came out yawning and bent over
the water’s edge with a lantern in his hand.
“Passports, please.”
The sailor handed up his official papers.
Arthur, half stifled under the clothes, held his
breath, listening.
“A nice time of night to come back
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