He had to stop and rest by leaning himself against a column
immediately in front of the gallery that had been indicated to him. All
at once he was plunged in the midst of a bright glare of torches, and
before he could move from the place old Bodoeri stood in front of him,
accompanied by some servants, who bore the torches. Bodoeri fixed his
eyes upon the young man, and then said, "Ha! you are Antonio; you have
been assigned this post, I know; come, follow me." Antonio, convinced
that his proposed interview with the Dogess was betrayed, followed, not
without trembling. But imagine his astonishment when, on entering a
remote room, Bodoeri embraced him and spoke of the importance of the
post that had been assigned to him, and which he would have to maintain
with courage and firm resolution that very night. But his amazement
increased to anxious fear and dismay when he learned that a conspiracy
had been long ripening against the Seignory, and that at the head of it
was the Doge himself. And this was the night in which, agreeably to the
resolutions come to in Falieri's house on Giudecca, the Seignory was to
fall and old Marino Falieri was to be proclaimed sovereign Duke of
Venice.

Antonio stared at Bodoeri without uttering a word; Bodoeri interpreted
the young man's silence as a refusal to take part in the execution of
the formidable conspiracy, and he cried incensed, "You cowardly fool!
You shall not leave this palace again; you shall either take up arms on
our side or die--but talk to this man first" A tall and noble figure
stepped forward from the dark background of the apartment. As soon as
Antonio saw the man's face, which he could not do until he came into
the light of the torches, and recognised it, he threw himself upon his
knees and cried, completely losing his presence of mind at seeing him
whom he never dreamt of seeing again, "O good God! my father, Bertuccio
Nenolo! my dear foster-parent." Nenolo raised the young man up, clasped
him in his arms, and said in a gentle voice, "Aye, of a verity I am
Bertuccio Nenolo, whom you perhaps thought lay buried at the bottom of
the sea, but I have only quite recently escaped from my shameful
captivity at the hands of the savage Morbassan. Yes, I am the Bertuccio
Nanolo who adopted you. And I never for a moment dreamt that the stupid
servants whom Bodoeri sent to take possession of the villa, which he
had bought of me, would turn you out of the house. You infatuated
youth! D