The Daughter of an Empress Part 48

"Ah, my friend," responded Ganganelli, "I fear the pope has secretly followed brother Clement even to this place, and even here no longer leaves him free! No, no, it is no longer brother Clement who sits groaning here, it is the vicegerent of G.o.d, the father of Christendom, the holy and blessed pope! And if you knew, Lorenzo, what this vicegerent of G.o.d has to suffer and bear, how his blood like streams of fire runs through his veins, carbonizing his entrails and parching the roof of his mouth, so that the tongue fast cleaves to it, and he has no longer the power to complain of his misery! And such a crushed earth-worm this miserable, infatuated people call the vicegerent of G.o.d, before whom they bow in the dust! Ah, foolish children, are you not yourselves disgusted with your masquerade, and do you not blush for this jest?"

"See you not," said Lorenzo, with forced cheerfulness, "that since you are here you have, against your will, again become brother Clement, and inveigh against G.o.d's vicegerent who holds his splendid court in the Vatican and Quirinal! Yes, yes that was what brother Clement used to do in the Franciscan convent; he was always scolding about the pope."

"And yet he let men befool him and make a pope of him," said Ganganelli.

"Ah, Lorenzo, they were indeed good purposes that decided me, and good and holy resolutions were in me when I bore this crown of St. Peter for the first time. Ah, I was then so young, not in years, but in hopes and illusions. I was so enthusiastic for the good and n.o.ble, and I wished to serve it, to honor and glorify it in the name of G.o.d!"

"And in the end you have done so!" solemnly responded Lorenzo.

"I have wished to do so!" sighed Ganganelli, "but there it has ended.

I have been hemmed in everywhere; wherever I wished to press through, I have always found a wall before me--a wall of prejudices, of ancient customs, once received as indifferent, and at this wall my cardinals and officials held watch, taking care that my will should be broken against it, and not be able to speak through, in order to let in a little freedom, a little fresh air, into our walled realm! They have curbed and weakened my will, until nothing more of it subsists, and of my holiest resolutions they have made a scarecrow before which foreign kings and princes cry murder, and prophesy the downfall of their kingdoms if I adhere to my innovations. Ah, the princes, the princes! I tell you, Lorenzo, it is the princes who have undermined the happiness of the world with their ideas of absolute power; they are the robbers of all mankind; for freedom, which is the common property of all men, that have they, like regular lawless highwaymen, appropriated for themselves alone. They plundered the luck-pennies of all mankind, and coined them into money adorned with their likenesses, and now all mankind run after this money, thinking: 'If I gain that, then shall I have recovered my part of human happiness which once belonged to all in common!' It has come to this, Lorenzo, through the rapacity of princes, and yet they still tremble upon their thrones, and fear that the people may one day awake from their stupid slumber, all rising as one man, and cry in the paling faces of their robbers: 'Give back what you have taken from us--we will have what is ours; we require freedom and human right; we will no longer remain slaves to tremble before a bugbear; we will be free children of G.o.d, and have no one to fear but the G.o.d above us and the consciences within our own b.r.e.a.s.t.s!' Come down, therefore, from your usurped thrones, become once more human--labor, enjoy, complain, and rejoice, as other men do; live not upon the sweat of your subjects, but nourish yourselves by your own efforts, that justice may prevail in the world, and humanity regain its rights!"

And Ganganelli's eyes flashed, his sunken cheeks were feverishly flushed, while he was thus speaking. Lorenzo observed it with anxious eyes; and when the pope made a momentary pause, he said: "You are again altogether the good and brave brother Clement, but even he should think about sparing himself!"

"And to what end should he spare himself?" excitedly exclaimed Ganganelli; "Death sits within me and laughs to scorn all my efforts, burying himself deeper and deeper in my inward life. You must know, Lorenzo, that my cause of sorrow is precisely this, that I now live in vain, and that I cannot finish what I began! I wished to make my people happy and free; that was what alarmed all these princes, that was an unheard-of innovation, and they have all put their heads together and whispered to each other, 'He will betray to mankind that they have rights of which we have robbed them. He wishes to give back to mankind his inherited portion of the booty! But what will then become of us?

Will not our slaves rise up against us, demanding their human rights? We cannot suffer such innovations, for they involve our destruction!' Thus have they cried, and in their anxiety they have decided upon my death!

Then they threw me in a crumb exactly suited to my dreams of improving the happiness of the people; they all consented that I should relieve mankind from that dangerous tapeworm, Jesuitism, and with secret laughter thought, 'It will be the death of him!' And they were right, these sly princes, it will be the death of me! I have abolished the order of Jesuits--in consequence of which I shall die--but the Jesuits will live, and live forever!"

The echo of approaching footsteps was now heard, and, sinking with fatigue, he directed Lorenzo to go and meet the intruder, and by no means to let any one penetrate to him.

Returning alone, Lorenzo handed the pope a letter.

"The courier whom you sent out some days since has returned," said he.

"This is his dispatch."

Taking the letter, with a sad smile, the pope weighed it in his hand.

"How light is this little sheet," said he, "and yet how heavy are its contents! Do you know what this letter contains, Lorenzo?"

"How can I? A poor cloister brother is not all-knowing!"

"This letter," said the pope, with solemnity, "Brings me life or death.

It is the answer of the learned physician, Professor Brunelli, of Bologna!"

"You have written to him?" asked Lorenzo, turning pale.

"I wrote him, particularly describing my condition and sufferings; in G.o.d's name I conjured him to tell me the truth, and Brunelli is a man of honor; he will do it! Am I right, therefore, in saying that the contents of this letter are very heavy?"

Lorenzo trembled, and, grasping the pope's hand, he hastily and anxiously said: "No, read it not. Of what use will it be to learn its contents? It is tempting G.o.d to endeavor to learn the future in advance!

Let me destroy this fatal letter!"

And, while his faithful servant respectfully stood back, Ganganelli broke the seal.

A pause ensued--a long, excruciating pause! Lorenzo, kneeling, prayed--Pope Ganganelli read the letter of the physician of Bologna. His face had a.s.sumed a mortal pallor; while reading, his lips trembled, and tear-drops rolled slowly down over his sunken cheeks.

Falling from his hand, the letter rustled to the earth; with hanging head and folded hands sat the pope. Lorenzo was still upon his knees praying. Ganganelli suddenly raised his head, his eyes were turned heavenward, a cheerful, G.o.d-given peace beamed from his eyes, and with a clear, exulting voice, he said: "Lord, Thy will be done! I resign myself to Thy holy keeping."

"The letter, then, brings good news?" asked Lorenzo, misled by the joyfulness of the pope. "There is, then, no ground for the presentiments of death, and the learned doctor says you will live?"

"The life eternal, Lorenzo!" said Ganganelli. "This letter confirms my suppositions! Brunelli is a man of honor, and he has told me the truth. Lorenzo, would you know what signifies this consuming fire, this weariness and relaxation of my limbs? It is the effect of _Acqua Tofana_!"

"Oh, my G.o.d," shrieked Lorenzo, "you are poisoned!"

"Irretrievably," calmly responded the pope; "Brunelli says it, and I feel in my burning entrails that he speaks the truth."

"And are there no remedies?" lamented Lorenzo, wringing his hands. "No means at least of prolonging your life?"

"There is such a means; and Brunelli recommends it. The application of the greatest possible heat, the production of a continual perspiration, which may a little r.e.t.a.r.d the progress of the evil, and perhaps prolong my life for a few weeks!

"Lorenzo, it is my duty to struggle every day with death. I have yet much to complete before I die, yet much labor before I go to my eternal rest, and, as far as I can, I must bring to an end what I have commenced for the welfare of my people! Come, Lorenzo, let us return to the Vatican; set pans of coals in my room, procure me furs and a glowing hot sun! I would yet live some weeks!"

With feverish impetuosity Ganganelli grasped Lorenzo's arm and drew him away. Then, suddenly stopping, he turned toward his favorite place.

"Lorenzo," he said in a low tone, and with deep sadness, "it was yet very pleasant in the Franciscan cloister. Why did we not remain there?

Only see, my friend, how beautifully the sun glitters there among the pines, and how delightfully this air fans us! Ah, Lorenzo, this world is so beautiful, so very beautiful! Why must I leave it so soon?"

Lorenzo made no answer; he could not speak for tears.

Ganganelli cast a long and silent glance around him, greeting with his eyes the trees and flowers, the green earth and the blue sky.

"Farewell, farewell, thou beautiful Nature!" he whispered low. "We take our leave of each other. I shall never again see these trees or this gra.s.sy seat. But you, Lorenzo, will I establish as the guardian of this place, and when you sometimes sit here in the still evening hour, then will you think of me! Now come, we must away. Feel you not this cool and gentle air? Oh, how refres.h.i.+ngly it fans and cools, but I dare not enjoy it--not I! This cooling cuts off a day from my life!"

And with the haste of a youth, Ganganelli ran down the alley. Bathed with perspiration, breathless with heat, he arrived at the palace.

"Now give me furs, bring pans of coals, Lorenzo, shut all the doors and windows. Procure me a heat that will shut out death--!"

But death nevertheless came; the furs and coverings, the steaming coal-pans with which the pope surrounded himself, the glowing atmosphere he day and night inhaled, and which quite prostrated his friends and servants, all that could only keep off death for some few weeks, not drive it away. More dreadful yet than this blasting heat with which Ganganelli surrounded himself, yet more horrible, was the fire that consumed his entrails and burned in his blood.

Finally, withered and consumed by these external and internal fires, the pope greeted Death as a deliverer, and sank into his arms with a smile.

But no sooner had he respired his last breath, no sooner had the death-rattle ceased in this throat, and no sooner had death extinguished the light in his eyes, than the cold corpse exhibited a most horrible change.

The thin white hair fell off as if blown away by a breath of air, the loosened teeth fell from their sockets, the formerly quietly smiling visage became horribly distorted, the nose sank in and the eyes fell out, the muscles of all his limbs became relaxed as if by a magic stroke, and the rapidly putrefying members fell from each other.

The pope's two physicians, standing near the bed, looked with terror upon the frightful spectacle.

"He was, then, right," murmured the physician Barbi, folding his hands, "he was poisoned. These are the effects of the _Acqua Tofana_!"

Salicetti, the second physician, shrugged his shoulders with a contemptuous smile. "Think as you will," said he, "for my part I shall prove to the world that Pope Clement XIV. died a natural death."

Thus saying, Salicetti left the chamber of death with a proud step, betaking himself to his own room, to commence his history of Ganganelli's last illness, in which, despite the a.r.s.enic found in the stomach of the corpse and despite the fact that all Rome was convinced of the poisoning of the pope, and named his murderer with loud curses, he endeavored to prove that Ganganelli died of a long-concealed scrofula!

And while Ganganelli breathed out his last sigh, resounded the bells of St. Peter's, thundered the cannon of Castle Angelo, and the curious people thronged around the Vatican, where the conclave was in solemn session for the choice of a new pope. Thousands stared up to the palace, thousands prayed upon their knees, until at length the doors of the balcony, behind which the conclave was in session, were opened, and the papal master of ceremonies made his appearance upon it.

At a given signal the bells became silent, the cannon ceased to thunder, and breathlessly listened the crowd.

The master of ceremonies advanced to the front of the balcony. A pause--a silent, dreadful pause! His voice then resounded over the great square, and the listeners heard these words: "_Habemus pontificem maximum Pium VI.!_" (We have Pope Pius VI.)

And the bells rang anew, the cannon thundered, drums beat, and trumpets sounded; upon the balcony appeared the new pope, Juan Angelo Braschi, Pius VI., bestowing his blessing upon the kneeling people.