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 the second Italian war had just commenced, he easily obtained permission to precede the troops he was to command, and to make inquiry at Venice for the count, for whom he was charged with a letter from the king himself. He hastened through the Trevisan to the residence of the countess, which he had so often heard named. There he was told that she had accompanied her husband on his embassy. Oppressed by the most dismal forebodings, he pursued his route to Venice, and hurried to the Frangipani palace. At its gate, he learned the intelligence which extended him, as if thunderstruck, upon the marble pavement. Apollonia and her husband had disappeared, and the senate—so the porter informed him with tears in his eyes—had summoned the nearest relatives to take possession of the Frangipani property, unless the count made his appearance within the space of a year. “But,” added the old man in a tremulous and hollow tone, “the year will pass away, and they will neither of them be seen again.”

Whoever had beheld the unfortunate Camillo when he awoke from a deep swoon in the porter’s lodge, would have felt sincere compassion for him. He was no longer the same man. His haggard eyes were deeply sunk in their sockets, and his deathly pale brow was covered with perspiration. His dark hair stood erect; his