Page:Manzoni - The Betrothed, 1834.djvu/86

 instant, and with unscathed limbs, or we shall see." So saying, he pointed imperiously to an opposite door. The friar bowed his head, and departed, leaving Don Roderick to measure with hasty and agitated steps the field of battle.

When he had closed the door behind him, the father perceived a man stealing softly away through another, and he recognised him as the aged domestic who had been his guide to the presence of Don Roderick. Before the birth of that nobleman, he had been in the service of his father, who was a man of a very different character. At his death, the new master expelled all the domestics, with the exception of this one, whom he retained on account of two valuable qualifications; a high conception of the dignity of the house, and a minute knowledge of the ceremonial required to support that dignity. The poor old man had never dared even to hint disapprobation of the daily proceedings at the castle before the signor, but he would sometimes venture to allow an exclamation of grief and disapproval to escape him before his fellow servants, who were infinitely diverted by his simple honesty, and his warm love of the good old times. His censures did not reach his master's ears unaccompanied by a relation of the raillery bestowed upon them, so that he became an object of general ridicule. On the days of formal entertainment, therefore, the old man was a person of great importance.

Father Christopher bowed to him as he passed by him, and pursued his way; but the old man approached him with a mysterious air, and made a sign that he should follow him into a dark passage, where, speaking in an under tone, he said, "Father! I have heard all, and I want to speak to you."

"Speak at once, then, good man."

"Here! oh no! Woe be to us if the master suspect it! But I shall be able to discover much, and I will endeavour to come to-morrow to the convent."

"Is there any base plot?"

"There is something hatching, certainly; I have long suspected it; but now I shall be on the look out, and I will come at the truth. These are strange doings—I live in a house where But I wish to save my soul."