Page:Blackwood's Magazine volume 046.djvu/262

254 good sirs? What can have bewitched these pumpkins of heads of yours? Take another look at him, and tell me whether the man before you be not the renowned Pietro d'Abano, the great artist of Padua?"

Castalio had sunk down into a chair, trembling violently, while the muscles of his countenance worked so frightfully, that not a feature could be rightly distinguished; but, after the young men had viewed him attentively for some time, they traced with horror, in the distorted lineaments of his face, the expression of the old sorcerer of Abano.

The magician started from his seat, and, rising into giant stature, exclaimed, in a voice of thunder, "Yes, Iam that Pietro! and you, caitiff; you have crossed me in the schemes by which I intended to have crushed these youths into the dust—tremble, worm, before the vengeance of your master!"

Berecynth again laughed a loud laugh of mockery: "The vengeance of my master!" echoed he —"Fool without an equal, to apply such language unto me! Knowest thou not, thou wretched juggler, that one glance of my eyes——one grasp of my hand, can blast you for ever? —Thou earth-born tamperer with the things of hell—were not all thy power and success derived from me?"

A phantom of horror filled the hall in which they stood. Its eyes streamed with fire, and its arms were stretched forth like eagles' wings. Pietro prostrated himself shrieking for mercy at its feet. "It was my might," said the demon, "which upheld thy hellish machinations; it was I that gave success to the jugglery with which thou didst dazzle the eyes of men. But all the while thou madest me thy scoff; and didst trample me under foot. Now my time has come, and thou must be my servant. Thou must go down with me into my kingdom, to be my slave throughout eternity. Begone, ye strangers!" continued he, addressing the young men. "He and I have accounts to settle, and ye may not be present at the reckoning." A violent peal of thunder shook the house to its foundation, as Antonio and Alphonso rushed out of it in terror. They got into the streets they knew not how, and fled to a neighbouring church, while the storm broke over their heads with ever increasing fury. They looked back to the house from which they had fled, and saw that it was enveloped in flames. Two dark shadows were seen wavering and wrestling among the blazing rafters; and howlings of despair, blended with the loud laughter of scorn, drifted towards them between the pauses of the loud-raging tempest.

It was a considerable time before Antonio was strong enough to go in quest of the old woman whose house had been pointed out to him. When he did so, he found the old lady gaily attired, and she welcomed him with smiles.

"Ah! my young Florentine," said she, "have you again come to pay a visit to your old friend of the forest?"

"Where is your daughter?" asked Antonio, trembling with anxiety.

"If you are determined to have her," said the old woman, "I won't keep her back from you. But either you or the Podesta family must pay for her right handsomely, for she is their child, having been kidnapped by me in her infancy, under the temptation of a large bribe which I received from the family of Marconi."

"How can you prove that she is their child?" asked Antonio.

"In a hundred ways," answered the old woman. "I have still by me the dress she wore when I carried her off. She has a mole upon her right shoulder, which her mother cannot fail to remember; and besides, I still have in my possession the letters themselves of the Marconi family, urging me to the deed. All these shall be laid before you; but I must have gold in a good round sum—mind you that."

Antonio told down all the money be had with him, and added a diamond ring—and golden chain to the heap. The old woman greedily scraped the gold towards her, and laughed as she said, "Do not be surprised that I am so easily satisfied; the truth is, the girl has fled from me, because she did