The Finger of Fate Part 38

Slight strategy would suffice for an enemy so insignificant.

It was merely a graceful concession to Catholic Christendom, to make it a pretence of restoring the Pope. The Republic would have been crushed all the same if the Pope had gone to purgatory. The sword was again invoked, and it became a question of who was to wield it. English soldiers could not be sent, for England was a Protestant country, and the thing would have looked queer. But English gold was easily convertible into French soldiers, whose sovereign had no such scruples; and these hirelings were selected to restore the Pope. By them it was ostensibly done; but the act was equally due to the other crowned heads; and its direction specially to the British, diplomate of whom we have spoken. History holds the indisputable proof.

Poor Mazzini, and Saffi, and Aurelli! If there had not been a voice in all Rome against you--in all Italy--you could not have triumphed!

The decree had gone forth for your destruction. Your doom had been pre-ordained, and was p.r.o.nounced in the very hour of your victory; even while the streets of Rome, cleared of the rotten rubbish of despotism, were ringing with that regenerating shout, "Long live the Republic!"

For three months did it resound through the _stradi_ of the cla.s.sic city--the city of the Caesars and Colonnas. It was heard upon bastion and battlement, from behind battery and barricade, amidst scenes of heroic strife that recalled the days of Horatius. It was heard in the eloquent speeches of Mazzini--in the exciting war-cry of Garibaldi!

All in vain! Three short months--and it was heard no more. The Republic was overthrown, less by bayonets than by betrayal; but the rule of the bayonet succeeded, and _Cha.s.seur_ and _Zouave_, _Spahi_ and _Turco_--all ruffians of the truest type--from that day to this have stood guard over the fettered limbs of Roman liberty.

In these troublous times, of three months' duration, Luigi Torreani took part with the Republic. So did his friend, the young Englishman. So, too, did Luigi's father; for the _sindico_, shortly after the affair with the brigands, had transferred his household G.o.ds to the city, which then promised a safe retreat from the insecurity he had long experienced.

But with the Republic at an end, and despotism once more triumphant, Rome itself was only safe for the foes of freedom. As Francesco Torreani was not one of these, another move became necessary. In what direction was it to be made? There was no part of Italy that offered an asylum. The Austrians still held Venice. Carlo Alberto had been beaten in the north, and the brigand's king ruled the Neapolitans with a rod of iron. Turn which way he would, there was no home on Italian soil for a suspected patriot.

Like men similarly situated, his thoughts turned towards the New World; and, not long after, a bark sailed down the Tyrrhenian Sea, and on through the Straits of Gades, bearing him and his to the sh.o.r.es of a far western land.

CHAPTER FIFTY SIX.

NUMBER NINE, STRADA VOLTURNO.

General Harding was not slow in transacting the business that carried him to London. It was too important to admit of delay. Even the old lawyer acknowledged this, after reading the quaint letter of the brigand, and scrutinising its still more quaint enclosure.

Mr Lawson's Italian tour had given him experience to comprehend the case--peculiar as it was--as also enabling him to recommend the steps necessary to be taken.

Five thousand pounds could not well be entrusted to the post; nor yet the management of such a delicate affair--in reality, not a matter of mere fingers and hands, but of life and death. Even a confidential clerk seemed scarce fit for the occasion; and after a short conference between the lawyer and his client, it was determined that the son of the former--Lawson fits--should go to Rome and place himself en rapport with "Signor Jacopi." Who Signor Jacopi was could only be guessed at: in all likelihood, that strange specimen of humanity who had presented himself at Beechwood Park, with a reckless indifference either to kicking or incarceration.

The first train for Dover carried young Lawson en route for Rome, with a portmanteau containing five thousand pounds in gold coin, stamped with the graceful head of England's young Queen.

He thus went fully armed for an interview with Signor Jacopi.

Rome was reached, in due course, by rail and steam; and, within the ten days stipulated for in the letter of the brigand, the Lincoln's Inn lawyer might have been seen with a heavy bag in hand perambulating the streets of the Eternal City, and inquiring for the _Strada Volturno_.

He found the place in some disorder. Instead of the cowled monks and sleek silken-robed cardinals usually seen there--instead of grand _galantuomos_ and gaily-dressed ladies--with here and there a sprinkling of impertinent _sbirri_ and _gendarmerie_--he met men brave, of bold aspect--honest withal--bearded, belted, in costumes half civic, half military, armed to the teeth, and evidently masters of the situation.

He was not astonished to hear from these men the occasional cry, "Long live the Roman Republic!" He had been prepared for this before leaving England; and it was only by a well-attested pa.s.sport that he had been enabled to pa.s.s their lines and set foot upon the pavement of the seven-hilled city, at that moment threatened with siege.

Once in its streets, however, he no longer met any obstruction; and, without loss of time, he commenced searching for Signor Jacopi.

He had very little difficulty in finding the _Strada Volturno_, and still less the domicile numbered 9. The men with long beards, and pistols stuck in their belts, were not morose, nor yet ill-disposed to the answering of his questions. They seemed rather to take a pleasure in directing him, with that hearty readiness that marks the intercourse of those who have been engaged in a successful revolution. He did not ask for the residence of Signor Jacopi; only for the street and the number. Once at the door, it would be time enough to p.r.o.nounce the name of the mysterious individual to whom he was about to deliver a load of golden coins. He had been constantly changing them from arm to arm, and they had almost dragged his elbows out of joint. Without further difficulty than this, he at length reached the _Strada Volturno_--a paltry street as it proved--and discovered at Number 9 the residence of Signor Jacopi.

He needed not to inquire. There could be no mistake as to the owner of the domicile. His name was lettered upon the door, "Signor Jacopi."

The door was close shut and bolted, as if Signor Jacopi could only be seen with some difficulty. The London solicitor knocked, and waited for its opening.

He was, not without some curiosity to make the acquaintance of a member of the fraternity whose practice was of such a peculiar kind; who could demand payment of five thousand pounds, and get it without any appeal to a court--either to judge or jury. So unlike the practice of Lincoln's Inn!

The door was at length opened--not until the knock was repeated; a hag, who appeared at least seventy years old, being the tardy janitrix. But this need not dismay a solicitor of Lincoln's Inn Fields. She was no doubt the housekeeper of the premises.

"Does Signor Jacopi live here?" asked the young English lawyer; who, having accompanied his father on the Italian tour, was able to make his inquiries comprehensible.

"No," was the laconic response.

"_No_! His name is on the door."

"Ah, true!" responded the old woman, with something like a sigh. "They haven't taken it off yet. It's no business of mine. I'm only here to take care of the house."

"Do you mean that the Signor Jacopi doesn't live here any longer?"

"_E cosi_! What a question to ask! You are jesting, signor."

"Jesting! No; I am in earnest--never more so in my life. I have important business with him."

"Business with Signor Jacopi! _Madonna Virgine_!" added the old woman, in a tone of consternation, and making the sign of the Cross.

"Certainly I have. And what is there strange in it?"

"Business with a dead man! That's strange, is it not?"

"Dead! Do you mean to say that Signor Jacopi is dead?"

"_Si_, signor; surely you know that? Don't everybody know that he was killed in the outbreak--the very first day; knocked down, and then taken up again, and then hanged upon a lamp, because they said he was one of the--Oh, signor, I can't tell you what they said about him. I only know they killed him; and he's dead; and I've been put here to keep the house. That's all I know about it."

The young Lincoln's Inn lawyer let his bag of gold drop heavily upon the doorstep. He felt that he had come to Rome upon an idle errand.

And an idle errand it proved. All he could learn of the Signor Jacopi was, that this individual was an Algerine Jew, who had settled in the Holy City and embraced the Holy Faith; that he had practised law--that department of it which in London would have ent.i.tled him to the appellation of a "thieves' lawyer;" that, furthermore, he was accustomed to long and mysterious absences from his office; but where, or wherefore, there was none to tell, since no one could be found who professed intimacy with him.

In consequence of some unexplained act, he had made himself obnoxious to the mob--during the first hours of the revolutionary outbreak--and had fallen a victim to their fury. These, and a few other like facts, were all that the London lawyer could learn about his professional brother of Rome. But not one item of information to a.s.sist him in the errand upon which he had been sent to the Eternal City.

CHAPTER FIFTY SEVEN.

A FRUITLESS SEARCH.

What was the next thing to be done? This was the inquiry which Lawson junior put to himself, as he sat reflecting in his _locanda_.

Should he go back to London, carrying his bag of sovereigns untouched, and along with it the news of the failure of his mission? This course might be fatal in its consequences. The letter of the brigand chief, which of course he had brought with him, plainly stated the conditions.

After ten days from its date the hand of Henry Harding would be sent to his father, enclosed as had been the finger. Nine of these had already elapsed. Only one intervened. And now that the go-between, Jacopi, was no longer in existence, how was he to communicate with those who had threatened the horrible amputation? "A band of brigands on the Neapolitan frontier--about fifty miles from Rome." This extract from Henry Harding's first letter was all the clue he had to guide him to the whereabouts of the bandits. But the description might apply to the whole frontier, from the Tyrrhenian to the north-western angle of the Abruzzi--a line that, from all that he could learn, contained as many bands of brigands as there were leagues in its extent. For the Lincoln's Inn lawyer to make a tour along it, discover the locality of each band, and ascertain which of them held his young countryman in captivity, might possibly have been done at the hourly risk of being made captive himself. But even if successful in the search, it could not be accomplished in time.

In thinking it over, Lawson junior felt himself in a dilemma. Never in his life had his father's firm undertaken such a case. It bristled with difficulties, or, to speak more correctly, impossibilities.

What was he to do? He bethought himself of the application that had been made to the Foreign Office in Downing Street, and the promises there given to communicate with the Papal Government. Had these promises been kept? Had any action been taken in the matter? He rushed to the Vatican to inquire. But the Vatican was now a thing of the past--the _regime_ of Rome was now in Republican hands. And, to his inquiries made in official quarters, he could only obtain the answer, that nothing was known of the matter.

Besides, the new rulers were too busy with their own affairs to take any interest in his. What was the liberty of one person to that of a whole nation, threatened by the approach of the two allied armies--Neapolitan and French--now hastening towards Rome for the destruction of the Republic? Every one was busy upon the barricades. There was no time to spare for the chastis.e.m.e.nt of a score or two of brigands.