Chapter 8 of Marietta, A Maid of Venice by Francis Marion Crawford Chapter 8 All through the long Sunday afternoon, Zorzi sat in the laboratory alone. From time to time he tended the fire, which must not be allowed to go down unless the quality of the glass should be injured or at least changed. Then he went back to the master's great chair and allowed himself to think of what was happening in the house opposite. In those days there was no formal betrothal before marriage, at which the intended bride and bridegroom joined hands or exchanged the rings, which were to be again exchanged at the wedding. When a marriage had been arranged, the parents or guardians of the young couple signed the contract before a notary, a strictly commercial and legal formality, and the two families then announced the match to their respective relatives who were invited for the purpose and were hospitably entertained. The announcement was final, and to break off a marriage after it had been announced was a deadly offense and was generally an irreparable injury to the bride. In Baroviero's house the richest carpets were taken from the storerooms and spread upon the pavement and the stairs. Tapestries of great worth and beauty were hung upon the walls. The servants were arrayed in their high day liveries and spoken whispers when they spoke at all. The silver dishes were piled with sweet meats and early fruits, and the silver plates had been not only scoured but had been polished with leather, which was not done every day. In all the rooms that were opened, silken curtains had been hung before the windows in place of those used at other times. In a word, the house had been prepared in a few hours for a great family festivity, and when Marietta got out of the gondola, she set her foot upon a thick carpet that covered the steps and was even allowed to hang down and to dip itself in the water of the canal by way of showing what little value was set upon it by the rich man. Zorzi had known that the preparations were going forward and he knew what they meant. He would rather see nothing of them, and when the guests were gone, old Baroviero would come over and give him some final instructions before beginning his journey, until then he could be alone in the laboratory where only the low roar of the fire in the furnace broke the silence.  She sat in an inner chamber to which only women were admitted. There she sat in a sort of state, a circlet of gold set upon her loosened hair, her dress all of embroidered white silk, her shoulders covered with a wide mantle of green and gold rockade that fell in heavy folds to the floor. She wore many jewels, too, such as she would not have worn in public before her marriage. They had belonged to her mother, like the mantle, and were now brought out for the first time. It was very hot, but the windows were shut lest the sound of the good lady's voices should be heard without. For the news that Marietta was to be married had suddenly gone abroad through Murano and all the idlers and the men from the furnaces where no work was done on Sunday as well as all the poor were assembled on the footway and the bridge and in the narrow alleys round the house. They all pushed and jostled each other to see Baroviero's friends and relations as they emerged from beneath the black felts of their gondolas to enter the house. In the hall the guests divided and the men gathered in a large lower chamber while the women went upstairs to offer their congratulations to Marietta with many set compliments upon her beauty, her clothes and her jewels and even with occasional flattering allusions to the vast dowry her husband was to receive with her. She listened wearily and her head ached more and more so that she longed for the coolness of her own room and for Nella's soothing chatter to which she was so much accustomed that she missed it even if the little brown woman chanced to be silent. The sun went down and wax candles were brought instead of the tall oil lamps that were used on ordinary days. It grew hotter and hotter the compliments of the ladies seemed more and more dull and stale her mantle was heavy and even the gold circled on her hair was a burden. Worse than that she knew that every minute was carrying her further and further into the dominion of the irrevocable whence she could never return. She had looked at the palaces she had passed in Venice that morning some in shadow some in sunlight some with gay faces and some grave but also different from the big old house in Moreno that she did not wish to live in them at all. It would have been much easier to submit if she had been betrothed to a foreigner, a Roman or a Florentine.  That was what Nella had heard but in a sense they were free for they probably did what was good in their own eyes as wicked people often do. Life in Venice was to be lived by rule and everything that tasted of freedom was repressed by law. If it pleased women to wear long trains the council forbade them. If they took refuge in long sleeves thrown back over their shoulders a law was passed which set a measure and a pattern for all sleeves that might ever be worn. If a few rich men indulged their fancy in the decoration of their gondolas now that riding was out of fashion the council immediately determined that gondolas should be black and that they should only be guilt and adorned inside. As for freedom if anyone talked of it he was immediately tortured until he retracted all his errors and was then promptly beheaded for fear that he should fall again into the same mistake. Nella said so and told hideous tales of the things that had been done to innocent men in the little room behind the council chamber in the palace. Besides if one talked of justice there was Zorzi's case to prove that there was no justice at all in Venetian law. Marietta suddenly wished that she were wicked like the Romans and the Florentines and even when she reflected that it was a sin to wish that one were bad she was not properly repentant because she had a very vague notion of what wickedness really was. Righteousness seemed just now to consist of being smothered in heavy clothes in a horribly hot room while respectable women of all ages, fat, thin, fair, red haired, dark, ugly and handsome all chattered at her and overwhelmed her with nauseous flattery. She thought of that morning in the garden three days ago when something she did not understand had been so near just before disappearing forever. Then her throat tightened and she saw indistinctly and her lips were suddenly dry. After that she remembered little of what happened on that evening and by and by she was alone in her own room without a light standing at the open window with bare feet on the cold pavement and the night breeze stirred her hair and brought her the scent of the rosemary and lavender. While she tried to listen to the stars as if they were speaking to her and lost herself in her thoughts for a few moments before going to sleep.  The master was wrapped in a long cloak that covered something which he was carrying. There was no lamp in the laboratory but the three fierce eyes of the furnace shed a low red glare in different directions. Berviero had given orders that the night boy should not come until he sent for them. I thought it wiser to bring this over at night, he said, setting a small iron box on the table. It contained the secrets of Paolo Godi which were worth a great fortune in those times. Of all my possessions, said the old man, laying his hands upon the casket, these are the most valuable. I will not hide them alone as I might because if any harm befell me they would be lost and might be found by some unworthy person. Could you not leave them with someone else, sir? asked Zorzi. No, I trust no one else. Let us hide them together tonight for tomorrow I must leave Venice.  The place will be quite dry from the heat of the oven. Zorzi lit a lamp with a splinter of wood which he thrust into the bokeh of the furnace. He took a small crowbar from the corner and set to work. The laboratory contained all sorts of builders, tools, used when the furnace needed repairing. He raised one of the slabs with difficulty, turned it over, propped it with a billet of beech wood and began to scoop out a hole in the hard earth using a mason's trowel. For a vero watched him holding the box in his hands. The lock is not very good, he said, but I thought the box might keep the packet from dampness. Is the packet properly sealed? asked Zorzi looking up. You shall see, answered the master, and he sat down the box beside the lamp on the broad stone at the mouth of the annealing oven. It is better that you should see for yourself. He unlocked the box and took out what seemed to be a small book, tied up in a sheet of parchment. The ends of the silk cord below the knot were pinched in a broad red seal. Zorzi examined the wax. You sealed it with a glass seal, he observed. It would not be hard to make another. Do you think it would be so easy? asked Vera Vero, who had made the seal himself many years ago. Zorzi held the impression nearer to the lamp and scrutinized it closely. No one will have a chance to try, he said, with a slight gesture of indifference. It might not be so easy. The old man looked at him a moment as if hesitating and then put the packet back into the box and locked the ladder with the key that hung from his neck by a small silver chain. I trust you, he said, and he gave the box to Zorzi to be deposited in the hole. Zorzi stood up and taking a little tow from the supply used for cleaning the blowpipes, he dipped it into the oil of the lamp and proceeded to grease the box carefully before hiding it. It would rust, he explained. He laid the box in the hole and covered it with earth before placing the stone over it. Be careful to make the stone lie quite flat, said Angelo, bending down and gathering his gown off the floor in a bunch at his knees. If it does not lie flat, the stone will move when the boy is tread on it and they may think of taking it up. It is very heavy, answered the young man. It was as much as I could do to keep it up. You need not to be afraid of the boys. It is not a very safe place off here after all return Bero-Vero doubtfully. Be sure to leave no marks of the crowbar and no loose earth near it. The heavy slab slipped into its bed with a soft thud. Zorzi took the lamp and examined the edges. One of them was a little chipped by the crowbar and he rubbed it with the greasy tow and scattered dust over it. The cypress broom and swept the earth carefully away into a heap. Bero-Vero himself brought the shovel and held it close to the stones while Zorzi pushed the loose earth upon it. Carry it out and scatter it in the garden, said the old man. It was the first time that he had allowed his affection for Zorzi to express itself so strongly for he was generally a very cautious person. He took the young man's hand and held it a moment, pressing it kindly. It was not I who made the law against strangers and it was not meant for men like you, he added. Zorzi knew how much this meant from such a master and he would have found words for thanks had he been able but when he tried they would not come. You may trust me, was all he could say. Bero-Vero left him and went down the dark corridor with the firm step of a man who knows his way without light. In the morning when he left the house to begin his journey Zorzi stood by the steps with the servant to steady the gondola for him. His horses were to be in waiting in Venice when he was to go over to the mainland. He nodded to the young man carelessly but said nothing and no one would have guessed how kindly he had spoken to him on the previous night. Giovanni Bero-Vero took ceremoniously of his father, his cap in his hand, bending low, a lean man twenty years older than Marietta with an insignificant brow and clean shaven pointed jaw and greedy lips. Marietta stood within the shadow of the doorway very pale. Nella was beside her and Giovanni's wife and further in at a respectable distance the serving people for the master's departure was an event of importance. The gondola pushed off when Bero-Vero had disappeared under the fells with a final wave of the hand. Zorzi stood still, looking after his master and Marietta came forward to the doorstep and pretended to watch the gondola also. Zorzi was the first to turn and their eyes met. He had not expected to see her still there and he started a little. Giovanni looked at him coldly. You had better go to your work, he said in a sour tone. I suppose my father has told you what to do. The young artist flushed but answered quietly enough. I am going to my work, he said. I need no urging. Before he put on his cap he bent his head to Marietta then he passed on towards the bridge. That fellow was growing insolent, said Giovanni to his sister, but he was careful that Zorzi should not hear the words. I think I shall advise our father to turn him out. Marietta looked at her brother with something like contempt. Since when has our father consulted you or taken your advice, she asked. I presume he takes yours, retorted Giovanni regretting that he could not instantly find a sharper answer for he was not quick-witted though he was suspicious. He needs neither yours nor mine, said Marietta and he trusts whom he pleases. You seem inclined to defend his servants when they are insolent, answered Giovanni. For that matter, Zorzi is quite able to defend himself. She turned her back on her brother and went towards the stairs taking Nella with her. Giovanni glanced at her with annoyance and walked along the footway in the direction of his own glass house, glad to go back to a place where he was absolute despot. But he had been really surprised that Marietta should boldly take the Dalmatian side against him and his narrow brain brooded upon the unexpected circumstances. Besides the dislike he felt for the young artist, his small pride resented the thought that his sister, who was to marry a Contorini, should condescend to the defense of a servant. Zorzi went his way calmly and spent the day in the laboratory. He was in a frame of mind in which such speeches as Giovanni's could make but little impression upon him, sensitive though he naturally was. Really great sorrows or great joys or great emotions make smaller ones almost impossible for the time. Men of vast ambition whose deeds are already moving the world and making history are sometimes as easily annoyed by trifles as a nervous woman, but he who knows that what is dearest to him is slipping from his hold or has just been taken is half paralyzed in his sense of outward things. His own mind alone has power to give him a momentary relief. He analyzed one of the strongest problems of human nature. We say with assurance that the mind rules the body, we feel that the spirit in some way overshadows and includes the mind, yet if this were really true, the spirit that is the will should have power against bodily pain, but not against moral suffering except with some help from a higher source. But it is otherwise. If the will of ordinary human beings could hypnotize the body against material sensation, the credit due to those brave believers in all ages who have suffered cruel torments for their faith would be singularly diminished. If the mind could dominate matter by ordinary concentration of thought, a bad toothache should have no effect upon the delicate imagination of the poet and Napoleon would not have lost the decisive battle of his life by a fit of indigestion as has been asserted. On the other hand, there was never yet a man of genius or even of great talent who was not aware that the most acute moral anguish can be momentarily forgotten as if it did not exist for the time by concentrating the mind upon its accustomed and favorite kind of work. Johnson wrote Rossellus to pay for the funeral of his yet unburied mother and Johnson was a man of heart if everyone lived. He could not have written the book if he had had a headache. Saints and ascetics, without end and of many persuasions, have resorted to bodily pain as a means of deadening the imagination and exalting the will or spirit. Some great thinkers have been invalids, but in every case their food, work, has been done when they were temporarily free from pain. Perhaps the truth is on the side of those mystics who say that although the mind is of a higher nature than matter, it is so closely involved with it that neither can get away from the other and that both together tend to shut out the spirit and to forget its existence, which is a perpetual reproach to them and any ordinary intellectual effort being produced by the joint activity of mind and the matter through which the mind acts. The condition of the spirit at the time is little or no effect upon them nor upon what they are doing. And if one would carry the little theory further, one might find that the greatest works of genius have been produced when the effort of mind and matter has taken place under the inspiration of the spirit so that all three were momentarily involved together. But such thoughts lead far and it may be that they profit little. The best which a man means to do is generally better than the best he does and it is perhaps the best he is capable of doing. Be these things as they may. Zorzi worked hard in the laboratory minutely carrying out the instructions he had received but reasoning upon them with a freshness and keenness of thought of which his master was no longer capable. When he had made the trials and had added the new ingredients for future ones, he began to think out methods of his own which had suggested themselves to him of late but which he had never been able to try. But though he had the furnace to himself to use as long as he could endure the heat of the advancing summer, he was face to face with a difficulty that seemed insuperable. The furnace had but three crucibles, each of which contained one of the mixtures by means of which he and Baroviero were trying to produce the famous red glass. In order to begin to make glass in his own way, it was necessary that one of the three should be emptied but unless he disobeyed his orders this was out of the question. In his train of thought and longing to try what he felt sure must succeed he had forgotten the obstacle. The cheque brought him back to himself and he walked disconsolently up and down the long room by the side of the furnace. Everything was against him, said the melancholy little demon that torments genius on dark days. It was not enough that he should be forced by every consideration of honor and wisdom to hide his love for his master's daughter. When he took refuge in his art and tried to throw his whole life into it he was stopped at the outset by the most impassable barriers of impossibility. The furious desire to create which is the strength as well as the essence of genius surged up and dashed itself to futile spray upon the face of the solid rock. He stood still before the hanging shells on which he had placed the objects he had occasionally made and which his master allowed him to keep there. Lights, air-thin vessels of graceful shapes an ampoule of exquisite outline with a long curved spout that bent upwards and then outwards and over like the stock of a lily of the valley a large drinking glass set on a stem so slender that one would doubt its strength to carry the weight of a full measure yet so strong that the cup might have been filled with lead without breaking it. A broad dish that was nothing but a shadow against the light but in the shadow was a fair design of flowers drawn free with a diamond point. There were a dozen of such things on the shelves not the best that Sorsy had made for those Bero Vero took to his own house and used on great occasions while these were the result of experiments unheard of in those days and which not long afterwards made a school. In his present frame of mind as Sorsy felt a foolish impulse to take them down and smash them one by one in the big jar into which the failures were thrown to be melted again in the main furnace for in a glass house nothing is thrown away. He knew it was foolish and he held his hands behind him as he looked at the things wishing that he had never made them that he had never learned the art he was forbidden by law to practice that he had never left Almeida a little boy long ago that he had never been born. The door opened suddenly and Giovanni entered. Sorsy turned and looked at him in silence. He was surprised but he supposed that the master's son had a right to come in if he chose though he never showed himself in the glass house when his father was in Murano. Are you alone here? Ask Giovanni looking about him. Do none of the workmen come here? The master has left me in charge of his work, answered Sorsy, I need no help. Giovanni seated himself in his father's chair and looked at the table before the window. It is not very hard work I fancy. He observed crossing one leg over the other and pulling up his black hose to make it fit his lean calf better. Sorsy suspected at once that he had come in search of information and paused before answering. The work needs careful attention, he said at last. Most glass work does, observed Giovanni with a harsh little laugh. Are you very attentive then? Do you remember to do all that my father told you? The master only left this morning. So far I have obeyed his orders. I do not understand how a man who is not a glassblower can know enough to be left alone in charge of a furnace, said Giovanni looking at Sorsy's profile. This time Sorsy was silent. He did not think it necessary to tell how much he knew. I suppose my father knows what he is about, continued Giovanni in a tone of disapproval. Sorsy thought so too and no reply seemed necessary. He stood still looking out of the window and wishing that his visitor would go away. But Giovanni had no such intention. What are you making? He asked presently. A certain kind of glass, Sorsy answered. A new color? A certain color. That is all I can tell you. You can tell me what color it is, said Giovanni. Why are you so secret? Even if my father had ordered you to be silent with me about his work, which I do not believe, you would not be betraying anything by telling me what color is he trying to make? I am to say nothing about it, not even to you. I obey my orders. Giovanni was a glassmaker himself. He rose with an air of annoyance and crossed the laboratory to the jar in which the broken glass was kept, took out a piece and held it up against the light. Sorsy had made a movement as if to hinder him, but he realized at once that he could not lay hands on his master's son. Giovanni left contemptuously and threw the fragment back into the jar. Is that all? I can do better than that myself, he said, and he sat down again in the big chair. His eyes fell on the shelves upon which Sorsy's specimens of work were arranged. He looked at them with interest at once understanding their commercial value. My father can make good things when he is not wasting time over discoveries, he remarked, and rising again, he went nearer and began to examine the little objects. Sorsy said nothing, and after looking at them a long time, Giovanni turned away and stood before the furnace. The copper ladle with which the specimens were taken from the pots lay on the brick ledge near one of the bookers. Giovanni took it, looked around to see where the iron plate for testing was placed, and thrust the ladle into the aperture, holding it lightly lest the heat should hurt his hand. You shall not do that, cried Sorsy, who was already beside him. Before Giovanni knew what was happening, Sorsy had struck the ladle from his hand, and it disappeared through the bokeh into the white hot glass within. End of chapter eight. Chapter nine of Marietta, a maid of Venice by Francis Marion Crawford. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Chapter nine. With an oath, Giovanni raised his hand to strike Sorsy in the face, but the quick Dalmatians snatched up his heavy blowpipe in both hands and stood in an attitude of defense. If you try to strike me, I shall defend myself, he said quietly.  He smiled in a sickly fashion. Sorsy set the blowpipe upright against the furnace and watched him, for he saw that the man was afraid of him and might act treacherously. You need not be so violent, said Giovanni, and his voice trembled a little as he recovered himself. After all, my father would not have made any objection to me trying the glass. If I had, I could not have guessed how it was made. Sorsy did not answer, for he had discovered that silence was his best weapon. Giovanni continued in the peevish tone of a man who has been badly frightened and is ashamed of it.  As he still got no reply beyond a shrug of the shoulders, he changed the subject. Did you see my father make any of those things? He asked, pointing to the shelves. No, answered Sorsy. But he made them all here, did he not? Insisted Giovanni, and you were always with him? He did not make any of them. Giovanni opened his eyes in astonishment. In his estimation, there was no man living except his father who could have done such work. Sorsy smiled, for he knew what the other's astonishment meant. I made them all, he said, unable to resist the temptation to take the credit that was justly his. You made those things? Repeated Giovanni incredulously. But Sorsy was not in the least offended by his disbelief. The more skeptical Giovanni was for the greater the honor in having produced anything so rarely beautiful. I made those and many others which the master keeps in his house, he said. Giovanni would have liked to give him the lie, but he dared not just then. If you made them, you could make something of the kind again, he said. I should like to see that. Take your blowpipe and try. Then I shall believe you. There is no white glass in the furnace, answered Sorsy. If there were, I would show you what I can do. Giovanni laughed sourly. I thought you would find some good excuse, he said. The master saw me do the work, answered Sorsy unconcernedly. Ask him about it when he comes back. There are other furnaces in the glass house, suggested Giovanni. Why not bring your blowpipe with you and show the workman as well as me what you can do? Sorsy hesitated. It suddenly occurred to him that this might be a decisive moment in his life in which the future would depend on the decision he made. In all the years since he had been with Vero Vero, he had never worked at one of the great furnaces among the other men. I dare say your sense of responsibility is so great that you do not like to leave the laboratory even for a half an hour, said Giovanni scornfully. But you have to go home at night. I sleep here, answered Sorsy. Indeed, Giovanni was surprised. I see that your objections are insuperable, he added with a laugh. Sorsy was in one of those moods in which a man feels he has nothing to lose. There might, however, be something to gain by exhibiting his skill before Giovanni and the men. His reputation as a glassmaker would be made in half an hour. Since you do not believe me, come, he said at last, you shall see for yourself. He took his blowpipe and thrusted through one of the bocos to melt off the little red glass that adhered to it. Then he cooled it in water and carefully removed the small particles that stuck to the iron here and there, like spots of glazing. I am ready, he said when he finished. Giovanni rose and led the way without a word. Sorsy followed him, shut the door, turned the key twice and thrust it into the bosom of his doublet. Giovanni turned and watched him. You are really very cautious, he said. Do you always lock the door when you go out? Always, answered Sorsy, shouldering his blowpipe. They crossed the little garden and entered the passage that led to the main furnace rooms. In the first they entered eight or ten men and youths, masters and apprentices were at work. The place was higher and far more spacious than the laboratory. The furnace was broader and taller and had four mouths instead of three. The sunlight streamed through the window high above the floor and fell upon the arched back of the annealing oven, the window being so placed that the sun could never shine upon the working end and dazzle the workmen. When Giovanni and Sorsy entered, the men were working in silence. The low and steady roar of the flames was varied by the occasional sharp click of iron or the soft sound of hot glass rolling on the barber or by the hiss of a metal instrument plunged into water to cool it. Every man had an apprentice to help him and two boys tended the fire. The foreman sat at a table busy with an account, a small man even paler than the others and dressed in shabby brown hose and a loose brown coat. The workmen wore only hose and shirts.  One of them was finishing a drinking glass, rolling the ponteel on the arms of the working stool. Another, a beetle-browed fellow, swung his long-glow pipe with its lump of glowing glass in a full circle, high in air and almost to touch the ground. Another was at a bokeh in the low glare. All were busy and the air was hot and close. The men looked grim and ill-tempered. Giovanni explained the object of his coming in a way intended to conciliate them to himself at Zorzi's expense. Their presence gave him courage. This is Zorzi, the man without a name, he said, who has come from Dalmatia to give us a lesson in glass-blowing. One of the men laughed and the apprentices tittered. The others looked as if they did not understand. Zorzi had known well enough what humor he should find among them, but he would not let the taunt go unanswered. Sirs, he said, for they all claim the nobility of the glass-blowers cast. I come not to teach you, but to prove to the master's son that I can make some trifle in the manner of your art. No one spoke. The workmen in the elder Baroviero's house knew well enough that Zorzi was a better artist than they, and they had no mind to let him outdo them at their own furnace. Will any of you gentlemen allow me to use his place? asked Zorzi civilly. Not a man answered. In the silent silence, the busy hands moved with quick skill. The furnace roared. The glowing glass grew in ever-changing shapes. One of you must give Zorzi his place, said Giovanni in a tone of authority.  There was no reply. The pale men went on with their work as if Giovanni were not there, and Zorzi leaned calmly on his blowpipe. Giovanni moved a step forward and spoke directly to one of the men who had just dropped a finished glass into the bed of soft wood ashes to be taken to the annealing oven. Stop working for a while, he said. Let Zorzi have your place. The foreman gives the orders here, not you, answered the man coolly, and he prepared to begin another piece. Giovanni was very angry, but there were too many of the workmen, and he did not say what rose to his lips, but crossed over to the foreman. Zorzi kept his place, waiting to see what might happen. Will you be so good as to order one of the men to give up his place? Giovanni asked. The old foreman smiled at this humble acknowledgement of his authority, but he argued the point before a seating. The men know well enough what Zorzi can do. He answered in a low voice. They dislike him because he is not one of us. I advise you to take him to your own glass house, or if you wish to see him work, you will only make trouble here.  Please do what I ask. Very well I will, but I take no responsibility before the master if there is a disturbance. The men are in a bad humor, and the weather is hot. I will be responsible to my father, said Giovanni. Very well, repeated the old man.  You know how we look upon foreigners who steal their knowledge of our art. I wish to make sure he has really stolen something of it. The foreman laughed outright. You will be convinced soon enough, he said. Give your place to the foreigner, Piero. He added, speaking to the man who had refused to move at Giovanni's bidding. Piero at once chilled the fresh lump of glass he had begun to fashion and smashed it off the tube into the refuse jar. Without a word, Zorzi took his place. While he warmed the end of his blowpipe at the bokeh, he looked to right and left to see where the working stool and marver were placed and to be sure that the few tools he needed were at hand, the pontil, the porchello, that is the small elastic tongs for modeling, and the shears. Piero's apprentice had retired to a distance as he had received no special orders, and the workmen hoped that Zorzi would find himself in difficulty at the moment when he would turn in the expectation of finding the assistant at his elbow. But Zorzi was used to helping himself. He pushed his blowpipe into the melted glass and drew it out, let it cool a moment, and then thrust it in again to take up more of the stuff. The men went on with their work, seeming to pay no attention to him, and Piero turned his back and talked to the foreman in low tones. Only Giovanni watched, standing far enough back to be out of reach of the long blowpipe and should unexpectedly swing it to its full length. Zorzi was confident and unconcerned, though he was fully aware that the men were watching every movement he made, while pretending not to see. He knew also that owing to his being partly self-taught, he did certain things in ways of his own. They should see that his ways were as good as theirs and what was more that he needed no help while none of them could do anything without an apprentice. The glass grew and swelled, lengthened and contracted with his breath and under his touch, and the men, effortlessly watching him, were amazed to see how much he could do while the piece was still on the blowpipe. But when he could do no more, they thought that he would have trouble. He did not even turn his head to see whether anyone was near to help him. At the exact moment when the work was cool enough to stand, he attached the ponteel with its drop of liquid glass to the lower end, as he had done many a time in the laboratory, and before those who looked on could fully understand how he had done it without assistance, the long and heavy blowpipe lay on the floor and Zorzi held his piece on the lighter ponteel, heating it again at the fire. The men did not stop working, but they glanced at each other and nodded when Zorzi could not see them. Giovanni uttered a low exclamation of surprise. The foremen alone now watched Zorzi with genuine admiration. There was no mistaking the jealous attitude of the others. It was not the mean envy of the inferior artist, either, for they were men who in their way loved art as Beraviero himself did. And if Zorzi had been a new companion recently promoted from the state of apprenticeship in the guild, they would have looked on in wonder and delight, even if at the very beginning he outdid them all. What they felt was quite different. It was the deep fierce hatred of the medieval guildsmen for the stranger who had stolen knowledge without apprenticeship and without citizenship. And it was made more intense because the glassblowers were the only guild that excluded every foreign-born man, without any exception. It was a shame to them to be outdone by one who had not their blood, nor their teaching, nor their high acknowledged rights. They were peaceable men in their way, not given to quarreling nor vicious, yet, accepting the mild old foreman, it was not one of them who would not gladly have brought his iron blowpipe down on Zorzi's head with a two-handed swing to strike the life out of the intruder. Zorzi's deft hands made the large piece he was forming spin on itself and take new shape at every turn until it had the perfect curve of those slim-necked eastern vessels for pouring water upon the hands, which have not even now quite degenerated from their early grace of form. While it was still very hot, he took a sharp pointed knife from his belt and with a turn of his hand cut a small round hole, low down on one side. The mouth was widened and then turned in and out like the leaf of a carnation. He left the cooling piece on the panteel, crossed the arms of the stool, and took his blowpipe again. Has the fellow not finished his tricks yet? Asked Piero discontentedly. It would have given him pleasure to smash the beautiful thing to Adams where it lay almost within his reach. Zorzi began to make the spout for it was a large ampoule that he was fashioning. He drew the glass out, widened it, narrowed it, cut it, bent it, and finished off the nozzle before he touched it with wet iron and made it drop into the ashes. A moment later he had heated the thick end of it again and was welding it over the hole he had made in the body of the vessel. The man has three hands, exclaimed the foreman, and two of them are for stealing, added Piero, or all three put in the beetle-browed man who was working next to Zorzi. Zorzi looked at him coldly a moment but said nothing. They did not mean that he was a thief except in the sense that he had stolen his knowledge of their art. He went on to make the handle of the ampoule an easy matter compared with making the spout. But the highest part of glass-blowing lies in shaping graceful curves and it is often in the smallest differences of measurement that the pieces made by Piero Viero and Zorzi, preserved intact to this day, differ from similar things made by lesser artists. Yet in those little variations lies all the great secret that divides grace from awkwardness. Zorzi now had the whole vessel with its spout and handle on the pantil. It was finished but he could still ornament it. His own instinct was to let it alone, leaving its perfect shape and airy lightness to be its own beauty, and he turned it thoughtfully as he looked at it, hesitating whether he should detach it from the iron or do more. If you have finished your nonsense, let me come back to my work," said Piero behind you. Zorzi did not turn to answer for he had decided to add some delicate ornaments merely to show Giovanni that he was a full master of the art. The dark-browed man had just collected a heavy lump of glass on the end of his blowpipe and was blowing into it before giving it the first swing that would lengthen it out. He and Piero exchanged glances, unnoticed by Zorzi, who had become almost unconscious of their hostile presence. He began to take little drops of glass from the furnace on the end of a thin iron, and he drew them out into thick threads and heated them again and laid them on the body of the ampula, twisting and turning each bit till he had no more and forming a regular raised design on the surface. His neighbor seemed to get no further with what he was doing, though he busily heated and reheated his lump of glass and again and again swung his blowpipe around his head and backward and forward. The foreman was too much interested in Zorzi to notice what the others were doing. Zorzi was putting the last touches to his work. In a moment it would be finished and ready to go to the annealing oven, though he was even then reflecting and suddenly breaking up as soon as the foreman turned his back. The man next to him swung his blowpipe again, loaded with red hot glass. It slipped from his hand and the hot mess with the full weight of the heavy iron behind it landed on Zorzi's right foot three paces away with frightful force. He uttered a sharp cry of surprised pain the lovely vessel he had made flew from his hands and broke into a thousand tiny fragments. With excruciating agony he lifted the injured foot from the ground and stood upon the other. Not a hand was stretched out to help him and he felt that he was growing dizzy. He made a frantic effort to hop on one leg towards the furnace so as to lean against the brickwork. Pyrr left. He is a dancer, he cried. He is a ballerino. The others all left too and the name remained his as long as he lived. It was Zorzi Ballerin. The old foreman came to help him seeing that he was really injured for no one had quite realized it at first. Savagely as they hated him the workmen would not have tortured him though they might have killed him outright if they had dared. Accepting Piero and the man who had hurt him the workmen all went on with their work. He was ghastly pale and great drops of sweat rolled down his forehead as he reached the foreman's chair and sat down. But after the first cry he had uttered he made no sound. The foreman could hear how his teeth ground upon each other as he mastered the frightful suffering. Giovanni came and stood looking at the helpless foot smashed by the weight that had fallen upon it and burned to the bone in an instant by the molten glass. I cannot walk. He said at last to the foreman will you help me? His voice was steady but weak. He helped him to stand on his left foot and putting his arms around their necks he swung himself along as he could. The dark man had picked up his blowpipe and was at work again. You will pay for that when the master comes back Piero said to him as Zorzi passed you will starve if you are not careful.  It was an accident he said frankly you did not mean to do it. The man looked away shame-facedly for he knew that even if he had not meant to injure Zorzi for life he had meant to hurt him if he could. As for Giovanni he was puzzled by all that had happened so unexpectedly for he was a dull man though very keen for gain and he did not understand human nature. He disliked Zorzi but during the morning he had become convinced that the gifted young artist was a valuable piece of property and not as he had opposed a clever flatterer who had wormed himself into O'Beroviero's confidence. A man who could make such things was worth much money to his master. There were kings and princes from the pope to the emperor who would have given a round sum in gold for a beautiful ampula of which only a heap of tiny fragments were now left to be swept away. The two men brought Zorzi across the garden to the door leading heavily on the foreman he got out the key and Giovanni turned it in the lock. They would have taken him to the small inner room to lay him on his pallet but he would not go.  We must get a surgeon to dress his wound I will send for one, answered Giovanni. Is there anything you want now? he asked with an attempt to speak kindly to the valuable piece of property that lay helpless before him. Water said Zorzi very faintly and feed the fire. It must be time. The foreman gipped a cup full of water from an earthen jar, held up his head and helped him to drink. Giovanni pushed some wood into the furnace I will send for the surgeon, he repeated and went out. Zorzi closed his eyes and the foreman stood looking at him. Do not stay here, Zorzi said. You can do nothing for me and the surgeon will come presently. Then the foreman also left him and he was alone. It was not in his nature to give way to bodily pain but he was glad the men were gone for he could not have born much more in silence. He found his head to the wall and bit the edge of the leather and cushion now and then his whole body shook convulsively. He did not hear the door open again for the torturing pain that shot through him dulled all his other senses. He wished that he might faint away even for a moment but his nerves were too sound for that. He was recalled to outer things by feeling a hand laid gently on his leg and immediately afterwards he heard a man's voice in a quietly gruff tone that scarcely rose or fell reciting a whole litany of the most appalling blasphemies that ever fell from human lips. For an instant in his suffering Zorzi fancied that he had died and was in the clutches of Satan himself.  For a few moments Zorzi almost forgot that he was hurt as he listened. Not a saint in the calendar seemed likely to escape the porter's fury and he even went to the length of cursing the relatives, male and female of half legendary martyrs and other good persons about whose families he could not possibly know anything. For heaven's sake Pasquale Zorzi you will certainly be struck by lightning. He had always supposed that the porter hated him as everyone else did and he could not understand. By this time he was far more helpless than he had been just after he had been hurt and when he tried to move the injured foot to a more comfortable position it felt like a lump of scorched lead. The porter entered on a final malediction which might be supposed to have gathered destructive force by collecting into itself all those that had gone before and he directed the whole complex anathema upon the soul of the coward who had done this foul deed and upon his mother his sisters and his daughters if he had any and upon the souls of all his dead relations man, woman and children and all of his relations that should ever be born to the end of time. He had been a sailor in his youth. Who did that to you? He asked when he had thus devoted the unknown offender to everlasting perdition. Give me some water please said Zorzi instead of answering him. Water? Oh yes. Pascuali went to the earth and jar. Water?  Zorzi drank eagerly though the water was tepid. Drink my son said Pascuali holding his head up very tenderly with one of his rough hands. I will put more within reach for you to drink while I go and get help. They have sent for a surgeon answered Zorzi. A surgeon? No surgeon shall come here.  If a surgeon comes here I will throw him out into the canal. This is a burn and it needs an old woman to dress it.  I go there is the water. Zorzi called him back when he was already at the door. The fire it must not go down put a little wood in Pascuali. The old porter grumbled it was unnatural that a man so badly hurt should think of his duties but in his heart he admired Zorzi all the more for it. He took some wood and when Zorzi looked he was trying to poke it through the bokeh. Not there cried Zorzi desperately. The small opening on the side near the floor Pascuali uttered several maleditions. How should I know? He asked when he had found the right place. Am I the night boy? Have I ever tended fires for two pence a night and my supper? There I go. Zorzi could hear his voice still as he went out. A surgeon he grumbled. I should like to see the nose of that surgeon at the door.   He saw queer lights in circles and the beams of the ceiling came down very near and then suddenly went very far away so that the room seemed feet high. The pain filled all his right side and he even thought he could feel it in his arm. All at once he started and as he lay on his back his hands tried to grip the flat wood of the bench and his eyes were wide open and fixed in a sort of fright and stare. What if he should go mad with pain? Who would remember the fire in the master's furnace? Worse than that what safety was there that in his delirium he should not speak of the book and under the stone the third from the oven and the fourth from the corner. His brain whirled but he would not go mad nor lose consciousness so long as he had the shadow of free will left. Rather than lie there on his back he would get off this bench cost what it might and drag himself to the mouth of the furnace. There was a supply of wood there piled up by night boys for use during the day. He could get to it even if he had to roll himself over and over on the floor. If he could do that he could keep his hold upon his consciousness. The touch of the billets would remind him. The heat in the roar of the fire would keep him awake and in his right mind. He raised himself slowly and put his uninjured foot on the floor. Then with both hands he lifted the other leg off the bench. He was conscious of an increase of pain which had seemed impossible. It shot through and through his whole body and he saw flames. There was only one way to do it. He must get down upon his hands and his left knee and drag himself to the furnace in that way. It was a thing of infinite difficulty and suffering but he did it. Inch by inch he got narrower as his right hand grasped a billet of wood from the little pile. Something seemed to break in his head. His strength collapsed. He fell forward from his knee to his full length in the ashes and dust and he felt nothing more. End of Chapter 9 This recording by Michelle Fry, Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Chapter 10 of Marietta, a maid of Venice by Francis Marion Crawford. This Levervox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 10 The porter unbarred the door and looked out. It was nearly noon and the southerly breeze was blowing. The footway was almost deserted. On the other side of the canal in the shadow of the Baroviero house, an old man who sold melons and slices had gone to sleep under a bit of ragged awning and the flies had their will of him and his wares. A small boy simply dressed in a shirt and nothing else stood at a little distance, looking at the fruit and listening to the voice of the tempter that bade him help himself. Pascuali looked at the house opposite. Everything was quiet and the shutters were drawn together but not quite closed. The flowers outside Marietta's window waved in the light breeze. Nella cried Pascuali just as he was accustomed to call the maid when Marietta wanted her. At the sound of his voice the little boy who was about to deal effectually with his temptation by yielding to it at once took to his heels and ran away but no one looked out from the house. Pascuali called again, somewhat louder. The shutters of Marietta's windows were slowly opened inward and Marietta herself appeared, all in white and pale looking over the flowers. What is it, she asked? Why do you want Nella? The canal was narrow so that one could talk across it almost in an ordinary tone. Your pardon, lady answered Pascuali. I did not mean to disturb you. There has been a little accident here saving your grace. This he added to avert possible ill-fortune. Marietta instantly thought of Zorzi. She leaned forward upon the windowsill above the flowers and spoke anxiously. What has happened? Tell me quickly. A man has had his foot badly burned. It must be dressed at once. What is it? Zorzi. Pascuali saw that Marietta started a little and drew back. Then she leaned forward again. Wait there a minute, she said, and disappeared quickly. The porter heard her calling Nella from an inner room and then he heard Nella's voice indistinctly. He waited before the open door. Nella was a born chatterer but she had her good qualities and in an emergency she was silent and she said, he will need no surgeon. In her room she had a small store of simple remedies.  She took the sweet oil, she also took a small pair of scissors, which were among her most precious possessions.  When she came back to Marietta's room her mistress was wrapped in a dark mantle that covered her thin white dress entirely and one corner of it was drawn up over her head so as to hide her hair and almost all her face. She was waiting by the door. I am going with you, she said, in a dress that was not very steady. But you will be seen, began Nella. By the porter, your brother may see you. He is welcome. Come, we are losing time. She opened the door and went out quickly. I shall certainly be sent away for letting you come, protested Nella, hurrying after her. Marietta did not even answer this, which Nella thought very unkind of her. From the main staircase Marietta turned off at the first landing and went down a short corridor to the back stairs of the house which led to the narrow lane beside the building. Nella snorted softly in approval, for she had feared that her mistress would boldly pass through the hall where there were always one or two idle men's servants in waiting. The front door was closed against the heat, they had met no one and they reached the door of the glass house without being seen. Miss Quali looked at Marietta but said nothing until all three were inside. Then he took hold of Marietta's mantle at her elbow and held her back. She turned and looked at him in amazement. You must not go in, lady, he said.  Marietta pushed him aside quietly and led the way. Nella followed her as fast as she could and Pasquale came last. He knew that the two women would need help. Zorzi lay quite still where he had fallen with one hand on the billet of beechwood, the other arm doubled under him, his cheek on the dusty stone. With a sharp cry Marietta ran forward and knelt beside his head dropping her long mantle as she crossed the room. Pasquale uttered an uncompromising exclamation of surprise. Almost wholly married, cried Nella, holding up her hands with the things she carried. Marietta believed Zorzi was dead, for he was very white and he lay quite still. At first she opened her eyes wide in horror, but in a moment she sank down, covering her face. Pasquale knelt opposite her on one knee and began to turn Zorzi on his back. Nella was at his feet and she helped with great gentleness. Do not be frightened, lady, said Pasquale reassuringly. He is only fainted. I left him on the bench, but you see he must have tried to get up to feed the fire. While he spoke he was lifting Zorzi as well as he could. Marietta dropped her hands and slowly opened her eyes and she knew that Zorzi was alive when she saw his face, though it was ghastly and smeared with gray ashes. But in those few moments she had felt what she could never forget. It had been as if a vast sword stroke had severed her body at the waist and yet left her heart alive. Can you help a little? Asked Pasquale if I could get him into my arms, I could carry him alone. Marietta sprang to her feet, all her energy and strength returning in a moment. The three carried the unconscious man easily enough to the bench and laid him down as he had lain before with his head on the leather and cushion. Then Nella said to work quickly and skillfully, for she hoped to dress the wound while he was still insensible. Marietta helped her instinctively doing what was right. It was a hideous wound. It will heal more quickly than I think, said Nella confidently. The burning has cauterized it. Marietta delicately reared and unused to such sites would have felt faint if the man had not been Zorzi. As it was she only felt sharp pain each time that Nella touched the foot. Pasquale looked on, helpless but approving. Zorzi groaned, then opened his eyes and moved one hand. Nella had almost finished. If only he can be kept quiet a few more times, it will be well done. Zorzi writhed in pain only half conscious yet. Marietta left Nella to put on the last bandages and came and looked down into his face taking one of his hands in hers. He recognized her and stared in wild surprise. You must try not to move, she said softly. Nella has almost finished. He forgot what he suffered and the agonized contraction of his brows and mouth relaxed. Marietta wiped away the ashes from his forehead and cheeks and smoothed back his thick hair. No woman's hand had touched him thus since his mother's when he had been a little child. He was too weak to question what was happening to him but a soft light came into his eyes and he unconsciously pressed Marietta's hand. She blushed at the pressure without knowing why and first the maiden instinct was to draw away her hand and then she pitted him and let it stay. She thought too that her touch helped to keep him quiet and indeed it did. How do you know? He asked at length for in his half consciousness it had seemed natural that she should have come to him when she heard that he was hurt. Pascuali called Nella she answered simply and I came too. Is the pain still very great? It is much less. Thank you.  His memory all came back now. He knew that she ought not to have been there since her father was away. His expression changed suddenly. What is the matter? asked Marietta. Does it hurt very much? No, he said. I was thinking. He checked himself and glanced at the porter. A distant came was heard at the door. Pascuali shuffled off to see who was there. I will wager that it's the surgeon he grumbled evil before all his soul. We do not want him. What were you going to say? Asked Marietta, bending down. There's only Nella here now. Nella should not have let you come, said Sorzi. If it is known, your father will be very angry. Ah, do you see? cried Nella, rising for she had finished. Did I not tell you so, my pretty lady?  I told you so. And as for your help, indeed, I could have brought another woman. And there was Pascuali too. I suppose he has hands. No, there will be a beautiful revolution in the house when this is known. But Marietta did not mean to acknowledge that she had done anything but what was perfectly right and natural under the circumstances, to admit that would have been to confess that she had not come merely out of pity and human kindness. It is absurd, she said with a little indignation, I shall tell my brother myself that Sorzi was hurt and that I hoped you to dress his wound. And what is more, Nella, you will have to come again, and I shall come with you as often as I please. All Morano may know it for anything I care. And Venice too, asked Nella, in her head in disapproval, what will they say in Casa Contarini when they hear that you have actually gone out of the house to help a wounded young man in your father's glasshouse? If they are human, they will say it was quite right, answered Marietta promptly. If they are not, why should I care what they say? Sorzi smiled. At that moment Pascuali passed the window and then came in by the open door growling.  Animals, beasts, brutes, worse than savages. He was almost incoherent. Well, what has happened now?  Remember the young lady. He would make a lead and statue speak, answered Pascuali. The senior Giovanni sends a boy to say that the surgeon was not at home because he had gone to shave the arch-priest of San Piero. In spite of the great pain he still suffered, Sorzi laughed a little. You said that you would throw him into the canal if he came at all? He said. Yes, and so I meant to do, cried Pascuali, but that is no reason why the inhumane monster should be shaving the arch-priest when a man might be dying for need of him. Oh, let him come here. Oh, I advise him to come. The miserable, cowardly, blood-letting, so upsetting, shaving little beast of a barber. Pascuali do a long breath after this and unclenched his fist, but his lips still moved as he said things to himself which would have shocked Marietta if she could have had the least idea of what they meant. You cannot stay here, she said, turning to Sorzi again. You cannot lie on this bench all day. I shall soon be able to stand, answered Sorzi confidently. I am much better.  Then Pascuali must give me a pair of crutches, replied Sorzi. I cannot lie on my back because I have hurt one foot. I must tend the furnace. I must go on with my work. I must make the tests. I must... He stopped short and bit his lip, and, white again, as a spasm of excruciating pain shot along his right side from his foot upwards. Marietta bent over him, full of anxiety. You are suffering, she said tenderly. You must not try to move. It is nothing, he answered through closed teeth. It will pass, I daresay.  Marietta seemed to feel the pain herself. She smoothed the leather and cushion under his head as well as she could and softly touched his forehead. It was hot and dry now. He is feverish, she said to Nella anxiously. I will bring him barley water with the syrup of poppies. What do you expect?  The man is badly hurt. A decent Christian. Someone must help me with the work, said Zorzi faintly. There is no one but me, answered Marietta after a moment's pause. You, cried Nella, greatly scandalized. Even Pascuali stared at Marietta in silent astonishment. Yes, she said quietly, there is no one else who knows enough about my father's work. That is true, said Zorzi, but you cannot come here Marietta turned away and walked to the window. In her thin dress she stood there a few minutes like a slender lily all white and bold in the summer light. It is out of the question, protested Nella. Her brother will never allow her to come. He will lock her up in her own room for safety till the master comes home. I think I shall always do just what I think right, said Marietta quietly, as if to herself. Right, Nella, the young lady is going mad. Nella was gathering together the remains of the things she had brought. Exhausted by the pain he had suffered and by the efforts he had made to hide it, Zorzi lay on his back, looking with half-closed eyes at the graceful outline of the girl's figure and vaguely wishing that she would never move and that he might be allowed to die while gazing quietly at her. Lady, said Pascuali at last and rather timidly, I will take a good care of him. I will get him crutches tomorrow. I will come in the daytime and keep the fire burning for him. It would be far better to let it go out, observed Nella with much sense. But the experiments, cried Zorzi, suddenly coming back from his dream, I have promised the master to carry them out. You see what comes of your glass working, retorted Nella, pointing to his bandaged foot. How did it happen? asked Marietta suddenly. It was done for him, said Pascuali, and may the last judgment come a hundred times over for him who did it. His intention was clearer than his words. Do you mean that it was done on purpose? Out of spite, asked Marietta, looking from Pascuali to Zorzi. It was an accident, said the latter. I was in the main furnace room with your brother. The blow-pipe with the hot glass slipped from a man's hand. Your brother saw it. He will tell you. I have been porter here for five and twenty years, retorted Pascuali, and there have been several accidents in that time, but I never heard of one like that. It was nothing else, said Zorzi. His voice was weak. Nella had finished collecting her belongings. Marietta saw that she could not stay any longer at present, and she went once more to Zorzi's side. Let's Pascuali take care of you today, as she said, I will come and see how you are tomorrow morning. I thank you, he answered. I thank you with all my heart. I have no words to tell you how much. You need none, she said quietly. I have done nothing. It is Nella who has helped you. Nella knows that I'm very grateful. Of course, of course, answered the woman kindly. You have made him talk too much, she added, speaking to Marietta. Let us go away. I must prepare the barley water. It takes a long time. Is he to have nothing but barley water? asked Pascuali. I will send him what he is to have, answered Nella with an air of superiority. Marietta looked back at Zorzi from the door, and his eyes were following her. She bent her head gravely and went out, followed by the others, and he was alone again. But it was very different now. The spasms of pain came back now and then, but there was rest between them, but there was a potent anodyne in the balsam with which Nella had soaked the first dressing. Of all possible hurts, the pain from burning is the most acute and lasting, and the wise little woman, who sometimes seemed so foolish, had done all that science could have done for Zorzi, even at a much later day. He could think connectedly now, he had been able to talk, had it been possible for him to stand, he might even have gone on for a time, with the preparations for the next experiment.  He was not thinking of experiments just then, he could think of nothing but Marietta. Four or five days had passed since he had talked with her in the garden, and she was now formally promised to Giacopo Contorini. He wondered why she had come with Nella, and he remembered her earnest offer of friendship. She meant to show him that she was still in earnest, he supposed. It had been perfect happiness to feel her cool young hand on his forehead to press it in his own. No one could take that from him as long as he lived. He remembered it through the horrible pain it had soothed, and it was better than the touch of an angel, for it was the touch of a loving woman. But he did not know that, and he fancied that if she had ever guessed that he loved her, she would not have come to him now. She would feel that the mere thought in his heart was an offense. And besides, she was to marry Contorini, and she was not of the kind that would promise to marry one man and yet encourage love in another. It was well thought sourcy that she had never suspected the truth. When Marietta reached her room again, she listened patiently to Nella's scolding and warning, for she did not hear a word the good woman said to her. Nella brushed the dust from the silk mantle and from Marietta's white skirt very industriously, lest it should betray the secret to Giovanni or any other member of the household, for they had escaped being seen, even when they came back. Nella scolded on in a little sing-song voice with many rising inflections. In her whole life, she said, she had never connived at anything more utterly shameless than this. She was humble indeed and of no account in the world, but if she had run out in the middle of the day to visit a young man when she was betrothed to her poor Vito, blessed soul, and the Lord remember him, her poor Vito would have gone to her father, might the Lord refresh his soul, and would have said, what ways are these? Do you think I will marry a girl who runs about in this fashion? That was what Vito would have said and he would have said, give me back the gold things I gave your daughter and go and find a wife who does not run about the city. And it would have been well said. Did Marietta suppose that an educated person like the Lord Jacopo Cantorini would be less particular about his brides' manners than that good soul Vito?  Nella should have liked anyone to dare to say that she had married an ignorant man and so forth and so on. Marietta heard the voice without listening to the words and the gentle, half-complaining, half-proving tone was rather soothing than otherwise. She sat by the half-closed window with her beadwork while Nella talked and brushed and moved about the room, making imaginary small tasks in order to talk the more. But Marietta threaded the red and blue beads and fastened them in patterns upon the piece of stuff she was ornamenting and when Nella looked at her every now and then she seemed quite calm and indifferent. There had always been something inscrutable about Marietta. She was always wondering why she had submitted to be betrothed to Cantorini when she loved Zorzi and the answer did not come. She could not understand why it was that although she loved Zorzi with all her heart she had been convinced that she hated him during four long, miserable days. Then too it was very strange that she should feel happy that she should know she was really happy, her heart brimming over with sunshine and joy while Zorzi, whom she loved, was lying on that uncomfortable bench in dreadful pain. It was true that when she thought of his wound the pain ran through her own limbs and made her move in her seat but the next moment she was perfectly happy again and yet was displeased with herself for it as if it were not quite right. Nella stood still at last, closed to her and spoke to her so directly that she could not help hearing. My little lady said the woman do not forget that the women are coming early tomorrow morning to show you the stuff which her father has chosen for your wedding gown. Yes, I remember. Marietta lay down her work in the little basket of beads and looked away towards the window. Between the shutters she could just see one of the scarlet flowers of the sweet geranium waving in the sunlight. It was true, the women were coming in the morning to begin the work. They would measure her and cut out patterns in buck room and fit them on her making her stand a long time. They would spread out silks and satins on the bed and on the table. They would hold them up and make long draperies with them and make the light flash in the deep folds and they would tell her how beautiful she would be as a bride and that her skin was whiter than lilies and milk and snow and her hair finer than silk and richer than ropes of spun-red gold. While they were saying those things she would look very grave and indifferent and nothing they could show her would make her open her eyes wide but her heart would laugh long and sweetly for she should be infinitely happy though no one would know it. She would give no opinions about the gown no matter how they pressed her with questions. After that the pieces that were to be embroidered would be very carefully weighed in the satin and the weights of the pieces would be written down. Also each of the hired women who were there who were to make the embroidery would receive a certain amount of silver and gold thread of which the weight would be written down under that of the stuff and the two figures added together would mean just what the finished piece of embroidery ought to weigh. For if this were not done the women would of course steal the gold and silver thread a little every day and take it away in their mouths because the housekeeper would always search them every evening in spite of the weighing but they were well paid for the work and did not object to being suspected for it was part of their business. In time Marietta would go to see the work they were doing in the grey cool loft where they would sit all day where the linen presses stood side by side and the great chests which held the hangings and curtains and carpets that were used on great occasions. The housekeeper had her little room up there and could watch the sewing women at their work and scold them if they were idle noting how much should be taken from their pay. The women would sing long songs and sering each other for an hour at a time but no one would hear them below because the house was so big. By and by the work would be almost finished and then it would be quite done and the wedding day would be very near. There Marietta's vision of the future suddenly came to a climax and she tried to imagine what would happen when she should boldly declare that neither her father nor the council of ten nor the doge himself not even his holiness Pope Paul who was a Venetian too could ever make her marriage a copo contorini. There would be such a convulsion of the family as had never taken place since she was born. In her imagination she fancied all Mariano taking sides for her or against her even Venice itself would be amazed at the temerity of a girl who dared to refuse the husband her father had chosen for her. It would be an outrage on all authority, a scandal never to be forgotten an unheard of rebellion against the natural law by which unmarried children were held in bondage as slaves to their parents. But Marietta was not frightened by the tremendous consequences he deduced from her refusal to marry. She was happy. Someday the man she loved would know that she had faced the world for him rather than be bound to anyone else and he would love her all the more dearly for having risked so much. She had never been so happy before. Only now and then when she thought of Zorzi's hurt she felt a sharp thrill of pain run through her. All day the tide of joy was high in her heart. Towards evening she sent Nella over to the glass house to see how Zorzi was doing and as soon as the woman was gone she stood at the open window behind her flowers to watch her go in. The squally would look out the door would be open for a moment she would be a little nearer even in that small anticipation she was not disappointed it was a new joy to be able to look from her window into the dark entry that led to the place where Zorzi was. Tomorrow or the next day he would perhaps come to the door helped by Piskwally but tomorrow morning she would go and see him come what might. She was not afraid of her brother Giovanni and it might be long before her father came back till then at all events she would do what she thought right no matter how Nella might be scandalized. Nella came back and said that Zorzi was better that he had slept all the afternoon and now had very little pain and he was not in any anxiety about the furnace for Piskwally had kept the fire burning properly all day Zorzi had begged Nella to deliver a message of thanks. Try and remember just what he told you said Marietta there was nothing a special answered Nella with exasperated indifference he said I was to thank you very much something like that nothing else why did you forget them if it had been an account of money spent I should remember it exactly answered Nella a penny worth of thread beeswax of arthing so much for needles I should forget nothing but when a man says I thank you what is there to remember but you are never satisfied Nella may work her hands to the bone for you Nella may run errands for you till she is lame you are never pleased with what Nella does it is always the same she tossed her brown head to show that she was offended but Marietta laughed softly and patted the little woman's cheek affectionately you are a dear little old angel she said Nella was pacified end of chapter 10 chapter 11 of Marietta a maid of Venice by Francis Marion Crawford this LibriVox recording is in the public domain chapter 11 the porter kept his word and took good care of Zorzi when the night boys had come he carried him into the inner room and put him to bed like a child Zorzi asked him to tell the boys to wake him at the watches as they had done on the previous night and Pascuali humored him but when he went away he wisely forgot to give the message and the lads who knew that he had been hurt supposed that he was not to be disturbed it was broad daylight when he awoke and saw Pascuali standing beside him are the boys gone already he asked almost as he opened his eyes no they're all asleep in the corner answered the porter I sleep cried Zorzi in sudden anxiety wake them Pascuali and see whether the sand glass has been turned and is running and whether the fire is burning the young good for nothing I will wake them answered Pascuali I suppose that they were allowed to sleep after daylight a moment later Zorzi heard him apostaphizing the three lads with his usual vigor of language judging from the sounds that accompanied the words he was encouraging their movements by other means also presently one of the three set up a howl oh you sons of snails and codfish I will teach you growl to Pascuali and he proceeded to teach them all three howling at once Zorzi knew that they deserved a beating but he was naturally tender hearted Pascuali he called out let them alone let them make up the fire Pascuali came back and the yells subsided I have knocked their empty heads together he observed they will not sleep for a week yes the sand glass has run out but the fire is not very low I will bring you water and when you are dressed I will carry you out into the laboratory the boys did not dare to go away till they had made up the fire then they took themselves off and as Pascuali let them out he treated them to a final expression of his opinion the tallest of the three was bleeding from his nose which had been brought into violent conjunction with the skull of one of his companions when the door was shut and they had gone a few steps along the footway he stopped the others we are glassblower sons and we have been beaten by that swine of a porter let us be revenged on him even Zorzi would not have dared to touch us because he is a foreigner we can do nothing answered the smallest boy disconsolently if I tell my father that we went to sleep he will say that the porter served us right and I shall get another beating you are cowards said the first speaker but I am wounded he continued proudly pointing to his nose I will go to the master and ask redress I will sit down before the door and wait for him do what you please return the others we will go home you have no spirit of honor in you said the tall boy contentiously he turned his back on them in disdain crossed the bridge and sat down under the covered way in front of Baroviaro's house he smeared the blood over his face till he really looked as if he might be badly hurt and he kept up a low tremulous moaning his nose really hurt him and as he was extremely sorry for himself some real tears came into his eyes now and then he waited a long time the front door was opened and two men came out with brooms and began to sweep when they saw him they were for making him go away but he cried out that he was waiting for Sr. Giovanni to show him how a free glassblower's son had been treated by a dog of a foreigner and a swine of a porter over there in the glass house then the servants let him stay for they feared the porter and hated Zorzi for being a Dalmatian at last Giovanni came out and the boy at once uttered a particularly effective moan Giovanni stopped and looked at him and he gulped and sobbed vigorously get up and go away at once said Giovanni much disgusted by the sight of the blood I will not go away until you hear me sir answered the boy dramatically I am a free glassblower's son and I have been beaten like this by the porter of the glass house this is the way we are treated though we work to learn the art as our fathers worked before us you probably went to sleep you little rich observed Giovanni get out of my way and go home justice sir justice moaned the boy dropping himself on his knees Giovanni pushed him aside and began to walk on the boy sprang up and followed him and running beside him as Giovanni tried to get away touched the skirt of his coat respectfully and then kissed the back of his own hand if you will listen to me sir he said in a low voice I will tell you something you wish to know Giovanni stopped short and looked at him with curiosity I will tell you of something the master did on the Sunday night before he went on his journey continued the lad I am one of the night boys in the laboratory and I saw with my own eyes while the others were asleep for we had been told to wait till we were called Giovanni looked about to see whether anyone was within hearing they were still in the covered footway above which the first story of the house was built but were near the end and the shutters of the lower windows were closed I saw said Giovanni but do not speak loud at this moment the other two boys came running up with noisy lamentations with the wisdom of their kind they had patiently watched to see whether their companion would get a hearing of the master and judging that he had been successful at last they came to enjoy the fruit of his efforts we also have been beaten they wailed but they bore no outward invisible signs of ill treatment on them the elder boy turned upon them with righteous fury and to their unspeakable surprise began to drive them away with kicks and blows they could not stand against him and after a brief resistance they turned and ran at full speed the victor came back to Giovanni's side they are cowardly fellows he said with disdain they are ignorant boys what do you expect but they will not come back the story said Giovanni impatiently but speak low it was on Sunday night sir the master came to talk with Zorzi in the laboratory I was in the garden at the entrance of the other passage when the door opened there was not much light and the master was wrapped in his cloak and he turned a little and went in sideways so I knew that he had something under his arm for the door is narrow he was probably bringing over valuable materials said Giovanni I believe he was bringing the great book said the boy confidently but almost in a whisper what great book the lad looked at Giovanni with an expression of cunning on his face as much as to say that he was not to be deceived by such a transparent pretense of ignorance he was afraid to leave it in his house he said less you should find it and learn how to make the gold as he does so he took it over to the laboratory at night Giovanni began to understand though it was the first time he had heard that the boys like the common people suspected Angelo Bero Vero of being an alchemist it was clear that the boy meant the book that contained the priceless secrets for glass making which Giovanni and his brother had so long coveted his interest increased after all he said he saw nothing distinctly my father went in and shut the door I suppose yes answered the boy but after a long time the door opened again he stopped resolved to be questioned in order that his information should seem more valuable the instinct of small boys is often as diabolically keen as that of a grown woman go on said Giovanni more and more interested the door opened again you said then my father came out no sir Zorzi came out into the light that fell from the door the master was inside well what did Zorzi do be quick he brought out a shovel full of earth sir and he carefully scattered it about over the flower bed and then he went back and presently he came out with the shovel again and more earth and so three times they had buried a great book somewhere in the laboratory but the laboratory is paved objected Giovanni to gain time for he was thinking there is earth under the stone sir I remember seeing it last year when the masons put down several new slabs the great book is somewhere under the floor of the laboratory I must have stepped over it in feeding the fire last night and that is why the devils that guarded inspired the porter to beat me this morning it was the devils that sent us to sleep for fear that we should find it I daresay said Giovanni with much gravity for he thought it better that the boy should be kept in awe of an object that possessed such immense value you should be careful in future or ill may befall you is it true sir that I have told you something you wish to know I am glad to know that the great book is safe answered Giovanni ambiguously Zorzi knows where it is suggested the boy in a tone that meant to convey the suspicion that Zorzi might use his knowledge yes yes repeated Giovanni thoughtfully and he is ill he ought to be brought over to the house until he is better then the furnace could be allowed to go out sir could it not yes the weather is growing warm as it is yes the furnace may be put out now Giovanni hardly knew that he was speaking aloud Zorzi will get well much sooner if he is in a good room in the house I will see to it the boy stood still beside him waiting patiently for some reward are we to come as usual tonight sir or will there be no fire go and ask at the usual time I have not decided yet there you are good boy hold your tongue there will be more Giovanni offered the lad a piece of money but he would not take it we are glassblowers son sir we are not poor people he said with theatrical pride for he would have taken the coin without remark if he had not felt that he possessed a secret of great value which might place Giovanni in his power before long Giovanni was surprised what do you want then he asked I am old enough to be an apprentice sir very well answered Giovanni you shall be an apprentice but hold your tongue about what you saw you told me everything did you yes sir and thank you for your kindness sir if I can help you sir he stopped help me I do not work at the furnaces wash your face and come by and by to my glass house and you shall have an apprentice's place I shall serve you well sir you shall see that I am grateful answered the boy he touched Giovanni's sleeve and kissed his own hand and ran back to the steps before the front door there he knelt down leaning over the water and washed his face in the canal well pleased with the price he had got for his bruising Giovanni did not look at him but turned to go on past the corner of the house in deep thought from the narrow line into which the back door opened Marietta and Nella emerged at the same moment Nella had made sure that Giovanni had gone out but she could not foresee that he would stop a long time to talk with the boy in the covered footway she ran against him as he passed the corner for she was walking on Marietta's left side the young girl's face was covered but she knew that Giovanni must recognize her instantly by her cloak and because Nella was with her where are you going she asked sharply to church sir, to church answered Nella in great perturbation the young lady is going to confession ah very good very good exclaimed Giovanni who was very attentive to religious forms by all means go to confession my sister you cannot be too conscientious in the performance of your duties but Marietta left a little under the veil I had not the least intention of going to confession this morning Nella said so because you frightened her what? what is this? Giovanni looked from one to the other then where are you going to the glass house Marietta answered with perfect coolness you are not going to the laboratory Zorzi is living there alone you cannot go there I am not afraid of Zorzi in the first place I wish to know how he is secondly this is the hour for making the tests and as he cannot stand he cannot try the glass alone Giovanni was amazed at her assurance and immediately assumed a grave and authoritative manner befitting the eldest brother who represented the head of the house I cannot allow you to go he said it is most unbecoming our father would be shocked go back at once and never think of going to the laboratory while Zorzi is there do you hear? yes come Nella she added taking her servant woman by the arm before Giovanni realized what she was going to do she was walking quickly across the wooden bridge towards the glass house holding Nella's sleeve to keep her from lagging and Nella trotted beside her mistress like a frightened lamb led by a string Giovanni did not attempt to follow at first for he was utterly nonplussed by his sister's behavior he rarely knew what to do when anyone was beside him he stood still staring after the two and saw Maria to tap upon the door of the glass house it opened almost immediately and they disappeared within as soon as they were out of sight his anger broke out and he made a few quick steps on the bridge then he stopped for he was afraid to make a scandal that at least is what he said to himself but the fact was that he was afraid who was infinitely braver and cooler than he besides he reflected that he could not now prevent her from going to the laboratory since she was already there and that it would be very undignified to make a scene before Zorzi who was only a servant after all this last consideration consoled him greatly in the eyes of the law and therefore in Giovanni's Zorzi was a hired servant now socially speaking Zorzi's servant was not a man and since Zorzi was not a man and Marietta was therefore gone with one servant to a place belonging to her father where there was another servant to go thither and forcibly bring her back would either be absurd or else it would mean that Zorzi had acquired a new social rank which was also absurd there is no such consolation to a born coward as a logical reason for not doing but Giovanni promised himself that he would make his sister pay dearly for having defied him and as he had also made up his mind to have Zorzi removed to the house on pretense of curing his hurt but in reality in order to search for the precious manuscripts it would be impossible for Marietta to commit the same piece of folly a second time but she should pay for the affront she had put upon him he accordingly came back to the footway and walked along toward his own glass house and the boy who had finished washing his face smoothed his hair with his wet fingers and followed him having seen and understood all that had happened Marietta sent Pascuali on to tell Zorzi that she was coming and when she reached the laboratory he was sitting in the master's big chair with his foot on a stool before him his face was pale and drawn from the suffering of the past 24 hours and from time to time he was still in great pain as Marietta entered he looked up with a grateful smile you seem to be glad to see us after all she said yet you protested that I should not come today I cannot help it he answered ah but if you had been with us just now Nella began still frightened but Marietta would not let her go on hold your tongue Nella she said with a little laugh you should know better than to trouble a sick man's fancy with such stories Nella understood that Zorzi was not to know and she began examining the foot to make sure that the bandages had not been displaced during the night tomorrow I will change them she said it is not like a scald the glass has burned you like red hot iron and the wound will heal quickly if you will tell me which crucible to try said Marietta I will make the tests for you then we can move the table to your side and you can prepare the new ingredients according to the writing Pasquale had left them seeing that he was not wanted I fear it is of little use answered Zorzi despondently of course the master is very wise but it seems to me that he has added so much from time to time to the original mixture and so much has been taken away as to make it all very uncertain I dare say assented Marietta for some time I have thought so but we must carry out his wishes to the letter else he will always believe that the experiments might have succeeded if he had stayed here of course said Zorzi we should make tests of all three crucibles today if it is only to make more room for the things that are to be put in where is the copper ladle asked Marietta I do not see it in its place I have none I had forgotten your brother came here yesterday and wanted to try the glass himself in spite of me I knocked the ladle out of his hand and it fell through into the crucible that was like you said Marietta I am glad you did it heaven knows what has happened to the thing Zorzi answered you have been there since yesterday morning for all I know it may have melted by this time it may affect the glass too where can I get another asked Marietta anxious to begin Zorzi made an instinctive motion to rise it hurt him badly and he bit his lip I forgot he said Pascuali can get another ladle from the main glass house go and call Pascuali Nella said Marietta at once asked him to get a copper ladle Nella went out into the garden leaving the two together Marietta was standing between the chair and the furnace two or three steps from Zorzi it was very hot in the big room for the window was still shut tell me how you really feel Marietta said almost at once every woman who loves a man and is anxious about him is sure that if she could be along with him for a moment he will tell her the truth about his condition the experience of thousands of years has not taught women that if there is one person in the world from whom a man will try to conceal his ills and aches it is the woman he loves because he would rather suffer everything than give her a pain I feel perfectly well said Zorzi indeed you are not answered Marietta energetically if you were perfectly well you would be on your feet doing your work yourself why will you not tell me I mean I have no pain said Zorzi you had great pain just now when you tried to move retorted Marietta you know it why do you try to deceive me do you think I cannot see it in your face it is nothing it comes now and then it goes away almost at once Marietta had come close to him while she was speaking one hand hung by her side in his reach he longed to take it with such a longing as he had never felt for anything in his life he resisted with all the strength he had left but he remembered that he had held her hand in his yesterday and the memory was a force in itself outside of him drawing him in spite of himself lifting his arm when he commanded it to lie still his eyes could not take themselves from the beautiful white fingers so delicately curved as they hung down so softly shaded to pale rose color at their tapering tips she stood quite still looking down at his bent head you would not refuse my friendship now she said in a low voice so low that when she had spoken she doubted whether he could have understood he took her hand then for he had no resistance left and she let him take it and did not blush he held it in both his own and silently drew it to him till he was pressing it to his heart as he had never hoped to do you are too good to me he said scarcely knowing that he pronounced the words Nella passed the window coming back from her errand instantly Marietta drew her hand away and when the serving woman entered she was speaking to Zorzi in the most natural tone in the world is the testing plate quite clean she asked and she was already beside it Zorzi looked at her with amazement she had almost been seen with her hand in his a catastrophe which he supposed would have entailed the most serious consequences yet there she was perfectly unconcerned and not even faintly blushing and she had it once pretended that they had been talking about the glass yes I believe it is clean I am not hesitating I cleaned it yesterday morning Nella had brought the copper ladle there were always several in the glass works for making tests Marietta took it and went to the furnace while Nella watched her in great fear lest she should burn herself but the young girl was in no danger for she had spent half her life in the laboratory and the garden watching her father she wrapped the wet cloth around her hand and held the ladle by the end we will begin with the one on the right she said thrusting the instrument through the aperture bringing it out with some glass in it she supported it with both hands as she went quickly to the iron table and instantly she poured out the stuff and began to watch it it is just what you had the other day she said as the glass rapidly cooled Zorzi was seated high enough to look over the table another failure he said it is always the same we have scarcely had any variation in tint in the last week that is not your fault answered Marietta we will try the next as if she had been at the work all her life she chilled the ladle and chipped off the small adhering bits of glass from it and slipped the last test from the table carrying it to the refuge jar with tongs once more she wrapped the damp cloth around her hand and went to the furnace the middle crucible was to be tried next Nella looking on with nervous anxiety was in a profuse perspiration I believe that is the one into which the ladle fell said Zorzi yes I am quite sure of it Marietta took the specimen and poured it out sat down the ladle on the brickwork and watched the cooling glass expecting to see what she had often seen before but her face changed in a look of wonder and delight Zorzi she exclaimed look look see what a color I can't see well he answered straining his neck wait a minute he cried as Marietta took the tongs I see now we've got it I believe we have got it oh if I could only walk patience you shall see it it is almost cool it is quite stiff now she took the little flat cake up with the tongs very carefully and held it before his eyes the light fell through it from the window and her head was close to his and they both looked at it together I never dreamed of such a color said Zorzi his face flushing with excitement there never was such a color before answered Marietta it is like the juice of a ripe pomegranate that has just been cut only there is more light in it it is like a great ruby the rubies that the jewelers call pigeons blood my father always said it should be blood red said Marietta but I thought he meant something different something more scarlet I thought so too what they call pigeons blood is not the color of blood at all it is more like pomegranates as you said at first but this is a marvelous thing the master will be pleased Nella came and looked too convinced that the glass had in some way turned out more beautiful by the magic of her mistresses touch it is a miracle cried the woman of the people some saint must have made this the glass glowed like a gem and seemed to give out light of its own as Zorzi and Marietta looked its rich glow spread over their faces it was that rare glass which from old cathedral windows casts such a deep stain upon the pavement that one would believe the marble itself died with unchanging color we have found it together said Marietta Zorzi looked from the glass to her face close by his and their eyes met for a moment in the strange glow and it was as if they knew each other in another world do not let the light fall on your faces said Nella crossing herself it is too much like blood good health to you she added quickly for fear of evil she lowered her hand and turned the piece of glass sideways to see how it would look what shall we do with it it must not be left any longer in the crucible no it ought to be taken out at once such a color must be kept for church windows if I were able to stand I would make most of it into cylinders and cut them while hot there are men who can do it in the glass house but the master does not want them here we had better let the fires go out said Marietta it will cool in the crucible as it is I would give anything to have that crucible empty or an empty one in the place answered Zorzi this is a great discovery but it is not exactly what the master expected I have an idea of my own which I should like to try then we must empty the crucible there is no other way the glass will keep its color is there much of it there might be twenty or thirty pounds weight answered Zorzi no one can tell Nala listened in mute surprise she had never seen Marietta with Old Barro Vieiro and she was amazed to hear her young mistress talking about the processes of glass making about crucibles and cylinders and ingredients as familiarly as of domestic things she suddenly began to imagine Barro Vieiro who was probably a magician and an alchemist had taught his daughter the same dangerous knowledge and she felt a sort of awe before the two young people who knew such a vast deal which she herself could never know she asked herself what was to become of this wonderful girl half-woman and half-enchantress who brought the color of the saints blood out of the white flames and understood as much as men did of the art which was almost all made up of secrets what would happen when she was the wife of Jacopo Contarini shut up in a splendid Venetian palace where there were no glass furnaces to amuse her at first she would grow pale thought Nala but by and by would weave spells in her chamber which would bring all Venice to her will and turn it all to gold and precious stones and red glass and the people to fairies subject to her will the husband, the council of ten even the doge himself Nala roused herself and passed her hand over her eyes as if she were waking from a dream and indeed she had been dreaming for she had looked too long into the wonderful depths of the new color and it had dazed her wits End of Chapter 11