United States or Côte d'Ivoire ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Fra Palamone was immediately underneath the window, grinning up, showing his long tooth, and picking at his beard. I do not think I ever saw such a glut of animal enjoyment in a man's face before. There was not the glimmer of a doubt what he intended. Semifonte had been told of his bondslave, and Palamone's hour of triumph was at hand.
The man of position nodded his agreement, acknowledged with another nod a low bow from his inferior, and walked into Florence. As he entered the Via de' Benci I saw him plainly. It was the Marchese Semifonte. I saw his pale, wandering eyes, his moth-white face. So then I knew who was the other, standing out in the Piazza by himself, looking up towards my room.
He was foolhardy to an extraordinary degree; his eyes were unsteady; it seemed to me that he was thinking of something else; and before we had been long engaged I discovered that he was thinking of two things, the first, his own certain death, the second, the state of mind of the Marchese Semifonte.
Or is it that you are belated like my injured friend Semifonte? The smarting of his honour has kept him from his bed, let me tell you. But he has gone thither now, I hope, appeased." "You intend to appease him, I believe, in eight hours from now," said I. "The commissary will be at his chocolate at eight o'clock, at his office by eleven. It is now three."
The second object of each republic was to extend its power at the expense of its neighbors. As Pisa swallowed Amalfi, so Genoa destroyed Pisa, and Venice did her best to cripple Genoa. Florence obliterated the rival burgh of Semifonte, and Milan twice reduced Piacenza to a wilderness.
I told her the shameful turn of affairs, and begged her to take care of Virginia while I was employed in challenging the marchese to fight, and, if possible, in running him through the body. I said that if she had had the eyes to see my masquerade, it was not to be supposed that Semifonte would misunderstand me; but she stopped me at once. "Do no such thing, Don Francis," said she.
"Do not delay a moment. I shall not leave Florence in any case." "Are you mad, my dear?" he cried. I said that I had no notion whether I was mad or not; but that I had work to do in Florence, and intended to finish it. I persuaded him at last to get away to Lucca at once, where I hoped to join him. The doctor came up to report Semifonte quite dead.
I had constituted myself Virginia's champion against the Marchese Semifonte. I had killed Fra Palamone. Now, to take these in order, it was plainly my duty to quit the side of the fair Aurelia. Even though she were and were to remain for me the shining orb of my firmament, in whose beam I must for ever walk I must not see her again.
You will have your mistress at hand, her husband accommodated, and will only need a rival, it seems to me, to stimulate you to a pleasant exertion of your powers. There ought not to be much difficulty in finding one in Florence." He was silent awhile, then said, as if musing on the absurdity, "Semifonte, for example!" I begged him not to mention that man.
The next time, which was at a week's interval, that I presented myself at the Villa San Giorgio, Donna Aurelia, in full reception, turned her back upon me and left the room in company of the Marchese Semifonte. I suffered the indignity as best I might I did not quit the company; nobody, I flatter myself, knew what pangs of mortification I was feeling.
Word Of The Day