our backs upon the other two, who were bidding each other farewell at
the farther end of the room.

It was the faithless Johann, as I gathered, who was responsible for
this catastrophe. His heart, it appeared, had failed him when he had
discovered that nothing less than a bona-fide marriage was to be the
outcome of the meetings he had shown so much skill in contriving, and,
full of penitence and alarm, he had written to his old master, divulging
the whole project. It so happened that a recent storm in the mountains
had interrupted telegraphic communication, for the time, between Austria
and Venice, and the only course that had seemed open to Herr von Rosenau
was to start post-haste for the latter place, where, indeed, he would
have arrived a day too late had not Albrecht's colonel seen fit to
postpone his leave. In this latter circumstance also the hand of Johann
seemed discernible. As for the marchese, I suppose he must have returned
rather sooner than had been expected from Padua, and finding his
daughter gone, must have extorted the truth from his housekeeper. He did
not volunteer any explanation of his presence, nor were any of us bold
enough to question him.

As I have said before, I have no very clear recollection of how an
understanding was arrived at and bloodshed averted and the padrona and
her satellites hustled downstairs again. Perhaps I may have had some
share in the work of pacification. Be that as it may, when once the
exasperated parents had discovered that they both really wanted the same
thing,--namely, to recover possession of their respective offspring, to
go home, and never meet each other again,--a species of truce was soon
agreed upon between them for the purpose of separating the two lovers,
who all this time were locked in each other's arms, in the prettiest
attitude in the world, vowing loudly that nothing should ever part them.