Saracinesca eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 567 pages of information about Saracinesca.

Saracinesca eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 567 pages of information about Saracinesca.

At the embassy he soon heard all the details, for no one talked of anything else; but Astrardente was ashamed of not having heard it all before, and affected a cynical indifference to the tale which the military attache of the embassy repeated for his benefit.  He vouchsafed some remark to the effect that fighting duels was the natural amusement of young gentlemen, and that if one of them killed another there was at least one fool the less in society; after which he looked about him for some young beauty to whom he might reel off a score of compliments.  He knew all the time that he was making a great effort, that he felt unaccountably ill, and that he wished he had taken his wife’s advice and stayed quietly at home.  But at the end of the evening he chanced to overhear a remark that Valdarno was making to Casalverde, who looked exceedingly pale and ill at ease.

“You had better make your will, my dear fellow,” said Valdarno.  “Spicca is a terrible man with the foils.”

Astrardente turned quickly and looked at the speaker.  But both men were suddenly silent, and seemed absorbed in gazing at the crowd.  It was enough, however.  Astrardente had gathered that Casalverde was to fight Spicca the next day, and that the affair begun that morning had not yet reached its termination.  He determined that he would not again be guilty of not knowing what was going on in society; and with the intention of rising early on the following morning, he found Corona, and rather unceremoniously told her it was time to go home.

On the next day the Duca d’Astrardente walked into the club soon after ten o’clock.  On ordinary occasions that resort of his fellows was entirely empty until a much later hour; but Astrardente was not disappointed to-day.  Twenty or thirty men were congregated in the large hall which served as a smoking-room, and all of them were talking together excitedly.  As the door swung on its hinges and the old dandy entered, a sudden silence fell upon the assembly.  Astrardente naturally judged that the conversation had turned upon himself, and had been checked by his appearance; but he affected to take no notice of the occurrence, adjusting his single eyeglass in his eye and serenely surveying the men in the room.  He could see that, although they had been talking loudly, the matter in hand was serious enough, for there was no trace of mirth on any of the faces before him.  He at once assumed an air of gravity, and going up to Valdarno, who seemed to have occupied the most prominent place in the recent discussion, he put his question in an undertone.

“I suppose Spicca killed him?”

Valdarno nodded, and looked grave.  He was a thoughtless young fellow enough, but the news of the tragedy had sobered him.  Astrardente had anticipated the death of Casalverde, and was not surprised.  But he was not without human feeling, and showed a becoming regret at the sad end of a man he had been accustomed to see so frequently.

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Saracinesca from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.