While Rienzi enjoyed a short, troubled, and restless sleep, over which Nina watched—­unslumbering, anxious, tearful, and oppressed with dark and terrible forewarnings—­the accuser was more happy than the judge.  The last thoughts that floated before the young mind of Angelo Villani, ere wrapped in sleep, were bright and sanguine.  He felt no honourable remorse that he had entrapped the confidence of another—­he felt only that his scheme had prospered, that his mission had been fulfilled.  The grateful words of Rienzi rang in his ear, and hopes of fortune and power, beneath the sway of the Roman Senator, lulled him into slumber, and coloured all his dreams.

Scarce, however, had he been two hours asleep, ere he was wakened by one of the attendants of the palace, himself half awake.  “Pardon me, Messere Villani,” said he, “but there is a messenger below from the good Sister Ursula; he bids thee haste instantly to the Convent—­she is sick unto death, and has tidings that crave thy immediate presence.”

Angelo, whose morbid susceptibility as to his parentage was ever excited by vague but ambitious hopes—­started up, dressed hurriedly, and joining the messenger below, repaired to the Convent.  In the Court of the Capitol, and by the Staircase of the Lion, was already heard the noise of the workmen, and looking back, Villani beheld the scaffold, hung with black—­sleeping cloudlike in the grey light of dawn—­at the same time, the bell of the Capitol tolled heavily.  A pang shot athwart him.  He hurried on;—­despite the immature earliness of the hour, he met groups of either sex, hastening along the streets to witness the execution of the redoubted Captain of the Grand Company.  The Convent of the Augustines was at the farthest extremity of that city, even then so extensive, and the red light upon the hilltops already heralded the rising sun, ere the young man reached the venerable porch.  His name obtained him instant admittance.

“Heaven grant,” said an old Nun, who conducted him through a long and winding passage, “that thou mayst bring comfort to the sick sister:  she has pined for thee grievously since matins.”

In a cell set apart for the reception of visitors (from the outward world), to such of the Sisterhood as received the necessary dispensation, sate the aged Nun.  Angelo had only seen her once since his return to Rome, and since then disease had made rapid havoc on her form and features.  And now, in her shroudlike garments and attenuated frame, she seemed by the morning light as a spectre whom day had surprised above the earth.  She approached the youth, however, with a motion more elastic and rapid than seemed possible to her worn and ghastly form.  “Thou art come,” she said.  “Well, well!  This morning after matins, my confessor, an Augustine, who alone knows the secrets of my life, took me aside, and told me that Walter de Montreal had been seized by the Senator—­that he was adjudged to die, and that one of the Augustine brotherhood had been sent for to attend his last hours—­is it so?”