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Updated: May 4, 2025
The truth was that he saw magnificent possibilities for his masters in Cucurullo's request for protection, and he had not the smallest intention of risking a mistake by answering for them, still less of discouraging Cucurullo's hope that they would protect Ortensia. Cucurullo answered a little despondently. 'I know it, he said. 'All you say is true.
She could have sworn that she had gone up by an ordinary staircase, but instead, it was a winding one, and everything else she saw surprised her in the same way. Cucurullo was standing beside the large sedan chair with the four porters who wore the Cardinal's livery of scarlet and gold.
Cucurullo slipped past the gaoler and spoke to him, and instantly the light flashed in his eyes and he smiled, for the first time since he had been arrested in Ortensia's room. Cucurullo took his hand and kissed it with devotion, as Italian servants often do in great moments. Neither had yet spoken when the heavy door creaked and was slammed, and they were suddenly in the dark.
At the appointed hour Cucurullo crossed the drawbridge of the castle, pushed the small postern, and went in. A hanging iron lamp, fed with mingled olive-oil and tallow, dimly lighted the great archway, where the sentry was pacing up and down. Sergeant Hector came forward as soon as the hunchback appeared, and closed and bolted the postern after him before speaking.
Stradella himself would slip away from the loft as soon as the Benediction began, after Vespers, just when all the other musicians would be very busy. He would probably reach the gondola almost as soon as Ortensia and the two servants, and in five minutes they would be well out of the city. 'And pray, sir, asked Pina, 'what is your man's name? 'Cucurullo, Stradella answered.
On the other hand, it was unsafe to doubt a hunchback openly, and it would be fatal to quarrel with him, because he could cast the spell of the Evil Eye. 'I shall do my best, the innkeeper replied, 'and far more readily for your sake, my dear friend, than for my own, I assure you. Cucurullo smiled quietly, and seemed quite satisfied with this answer.
'That is my master's name, answered Cucurullo, 'not mine, and he is not deformed. Therefore, if you are jesting with me, I beg you to pass on in peace. 'Your pardon, sir, the man said, lifting his hat, 'have I not the honour of addressing Signor Alessandro Guidi, the poet, for whom I have a message from Her Majesty the Queen of Sweden, whose servant I am?
But after all, dearest Cucurullo, they are only two, and I might bear them a hand with my cudgel, and we should be three only three men against the whole army of the Pope, horse, foot, and artillery, besides the Swiss Guard and the five or six hundred sbirri in plain clothes whom the Cardinal maintains in the holy city! It would not be a fair fight, my friend!
The sergeant looked at Cucurullo, and saw that he grew paler, and dead white all round the lips; but the hunchback showed no other sign of emotion, and the goldsmith nodded gravely and went out. 'This is bad news, gentlemen, said Cucurullo. 'Is there any way by which I could send a message to my master? he asked in a low voice.
'Do not mention it, said Cucurullo, breathing quietly. 'I generally walk briskly myself. Thereupon he quickened his stride a little. 'You certainly walk surprisingly fast, said the ex-highwayman, who now had to make an effort himself in order to keep up with his companion.
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