Chapter XII: The Isle of Rabbits

In the confusion caused by the dispersal of the crowd in the Square it was useless for the comrades to attempt to follow the Comnenoi or to remind Villehardouin of his promise to present them to the Doge. They made the best of a bad bargain and returned to the fondaco Ziniani as rapidly as their gondolier could contrive a passage through the teeming canals.

Messer Ziniani heard their story with interest, not unmixed with amazement.

"Say you Mocenigo was in the Square of St. Mark, and undisguised?" he exclaimed. "Now, there is more to this than appears upon the surface. He is a bold rascal, but this passes boldness. There are families in Venice would risk outlawry, root and branch, could they dirk him; and the Council of Ten do not love to have their decrees of banishment ignored."

"Will you report it?" asked Hugh.

"No, fair sir. 'Tis an ill task mingling in that which doth not concern one. Also, an you take my counsel, you will be slow to make a declaration to the State."

"Messer Ziniani speaks sober sense," interposed Matteo. "Let us, at least, first corroborate our evidence by finding where Mocenigo is hiding."

"There I can give you some assistance," offered Ziniani. "If he was with the Comnenoi, they should be connected with the reasons which bring him hither, and I will wager the Eastern convoy they are stopping with Zachario Pisano. All the Byzantines traffic with him, and of late he hath come into trouble with the Angeloi in Constantinople. That would be why they are here. Ay, so it must be! Depend upon it, Messers, there is some intrigue afoot."

"I would give much to uncover it," said Hugh, his old hatred of Mocenigo welling up strong in his breast.

"Easier said than done, Messer Englishman," retorted Ziniani. "But my aid, such as it is, is at your disposal. You shall have my own cabined gondola for your search; there are few swifter on the canals."

"Why a cabin?" questioned Hugh curiously.

Messer Ziniani smiled.

"It will be necessary for you to watch the fondaco Pisano, and perhaps to follow people. It would never do if you yourselves were to be seen. You will sit in the curtained cabin, and the gondoliers will pilot you whither you will."

He clapped his hands thrice, and to a servant who appeared in the doorway said:

"Bid Beppo and Giacomo bring the cabined gondola to the garden gate!"

The man bowed and disappeared.

"Beppo and Giacomo are trusty fellows," Ziniani continued. "They will serve you diligently, and if you come to a fight they can make play with their oars and knives. But I pray you, fair sirs, be cautious in your conduct."

"We will be careful," Matteo assured him. "To say truth," the jongleur added with a smile at Hugh, "my comrade hath a reason for desiring speech with this rogue before we slit his throat--if slit it we must."

Ziniani wagged his head reprovingly.

"Talk not to me of slitting throats," he said. "I am a peaceable merchant, and such subjects consort not with my degree. Short of that, you may command me in all things."

"Heard you of any shipping for Constantinople?" enquired Hugh.

"No, Messer Englishman, and after the outcome of to-day's counsel in the Square, I doubt if there will be any for some time. All craft will be used for the Crusade, now that the Republic hath an interest of its own in the affair."

The servant returned to say that the gondola was ready, and the comrades took their leave of the hospitable merchant. On their way through the garden, which stretched behind the fondaco, they met Ralph, very lonely and downcast. His face brightened at sight of them.

"I thought you would never be home, Messer Hugh," he cried. "St. Cuthbert be my witness, I have been like to go mad for want of a human being to talk with! These folk understand less than do the horses. An you please, Messer Hugh, do not leave me again."

Hugh looked at Matteo.

"I see no harm in taking him," replied the jongleur to the unspoken question. "But you must rid yourself of that armour, Ralph, and leave behind your bow. We go upon secret business, which wants not the intrusion of weight or the questionable length of your goose-feathered shafts. So be about your preparations, lad, an you are coming with us."

"That will I, gentles!" exclaimed Ralph with glee. "A minute, by your leave, and I shall be garbed to suit."

He set off at a run towards the stables, and Hugh and Matteo proceeded to the gate in the wall, where the gondola awaited them by the landing-steps. The gondoliers lounged beside it. One was enormous, a giant in stature, thick-thewed and massive. The other was almost a dwarf, nearly as broad as he was tall, but with a chest development equal to his companion's.

"Which is Beppo?" asked Matteo.

The dwarf touched his gaudy cap.

"I am Beppo, lord," he replied, "and I steer. Giacomo, here, pulls the fore-oar."

Giacomo ducked in what he intended for a bow, but it seemed more like the toppling of a stricken pine-tree. He said nothing.

"Has your master told you what we require?" questioned Matteo.

"Only that we are to obey your Magnificences' orders."

"Do you like to fight?"

Beppo grinned from ear to ear.

"We always enjoy a good fight, don't we, Giacomo?" he answered.

Giacomo's face was convulsed by what must have been meant for a grin of approbation, and one hand caressed the hilt of the knife stuck in his sash.

"Well, you are like to get all the fighting you care for," said Matteo. "We have a dangerous venture. Know you the fondaco Pisano?"

"Yes, lord. It is east beyond the Rio di Santa Polo."

"Good. We watch the fondaco Pisano for one who travels in a green gondola. When he appears we follow him wherever he may go. If we can, we will seize him. Is it understood?"

"Perfectly, lord. We are used to all kinds of work, are we not, Giacomo?"

Giacomo bowed and wrinkled up his face, both at the same time, with frightful effect.

"I see you are dependable varlets," remarked Matteo. "You shall not lose by good service."

"Trust us, Magnificence," returned Beppo composedly. "Do we start now?"

"Anon. We must wait--Ah, here he comes."

Ralph ran through the gate, and halted on the landing, somewhat ill at ease in a flat cap and dark cloak such as were worn by the servants of the fondaco.

"Will this do, Messer Hugh?" he panted.

Hugh laughed.

"Well enough," he approved. "What say you, Matteo?"

"By Our Lady, he looks the part better than do we," protested the jongleur. "But in with you, Ralph. It draws toward evening, and we must survey our ground before the light fails."

The comrades settled themselves in the cabin, and the gondola sped over the canals, propelled by the strong arms of the boatmen. It was still sunlight when Beppo parted the aft curtains.

"The fondaco Pisano is ahead, lords," he announced.

Hugh and Matteo peered through the curtains at a gloomy structure, windowless on the ground level and barred at every opening above, which was almost identical in architecture with the fondaco Ziniani--or, for that matter, with scores of houses in Venice.

"Hist, lords," came Beppo's voice behind them, sibilantly imperative. "Lie close. Bide but a moment. So!"

The gondola shot past the fondaco Pisano, and then, in obedience to the pressure of the stern oar, swung to the left and glided into the mouth of a shadow-filled canal which slit a mass of buildings opposite. It came to rest against the dripping, mossy wall of the house on the right of the opening.

"Now, lords, you may study Messer Pisano as you will," chuckled Beppo. "Few come hither, and such as pass will be none the wiser of our purpose."

The comrades applauded his device. But for more than an hour they watched without result. Not a sign of life was visible in the fondaco Pisano. Two gondolas were moored to the landing-steps, but neither was green. No porters or servants gossiped before the broad, brass-bound door. The windows were tenantless.

The sun dropped lower, and Hugh grew discouraged. Soon it would be too dark to see. But in the very moment when he was prepared to give up hope the green gondola came into view on the main canal, and veered across to the landing-steps. Mocenigo sprang out, and ran lightly up the steps to the great door, which opened as he neared it.

"Note, Hugh, his gondolier bides without," said Matteo.

The twilight deepened, turned to dusk. The gondolas that passed now carried flaming torches or cressets to guide them.

"Can you see, lords?" questioned Beppo in a husky whisper.

"Sufficiently," answered Matteo. "What is that?"

A flare of light illumined the portico of the building they were watching.

"They have opened the door," breathed Hugh.

Torches wove a whimsical pattern on the steps; shadows criss-crossed in a grotesque dance macabre; voices faintly called. As through a veil, the comrades glimpsed several figures that descended to where the gondolas lay.

The lights dimmed and the form of a gondola--without a guiding torch--floated away from the steps of the fondaco. It stole by them, ghost-like, leaving hardly a ripple in its wake. When it had almost vanished Beppo and Giacomo backed their craft out upon the main canal, and bent to the oars in swift pursuit. Keen-eyed and vigilant, when the quarry slowed, they slowed. When it sped forward, they put all their energy into the work.

The chase took them through the network of canals in the city proper and out past the Punta della Salute and the Dogana del Mare, then southeast across the Canal della Giudecca and between La Giudecca and San Giorgio Maggiore. The lagoons stretched before them and tiny wavelets slapped against their bow; behind, the lights of Venice gleamed very softly against the purple sky.

Here on the open water they could see much farther than in the huddled canals, and as the gondola ahead turned to the southward, Beppo clucked with his lips.

"Now I know where they are going!" he exclaimed.

"Where?" asked Hugh eagerly.

"They are bound for the Isle of Rabbits, which is the other side of Malamocco, Magnificence. It is a sandbank where the smugglers and pirates meet for trade with the fishermen, when the Lords of the Night are not too vigilant. A bad place, and one where a law-keeping man may come by much harm."

"Are you afraid to go there?"

Beppo chuckled.

"Afraid? Giacomo, the foreign lord asks if we are afraid to go to the Isle of Rabbits."

A grim noise which might have been laughter grated from the unseen bow of the gondola.

"You hear?" said Beppo. "Giacomo says with me, lords, that he will ask nothing better than a fight on the Isle of Rabbits this night."

"You may be assured of your desire," retorted Matteo. "But shall we not be visible to our enemies out here on the expanse of the lagoons?"

"Not so, lord. We will drop behind and approach the Isle from the west. They will expect nobody from that quarter."

Presently, the blurr that was the green gondola disappeared altogether, swallowed in the darkness, and the comrades were alone. It was a calm night, and the water was scarcely ruffled. Once they passed a group of shipping, lying at anchor with riding-lights showing. After that they saw nothing until a long, ragged shadow loomed across their course.

"The Isle of Rabbits," whispered Beppo to the jongleur, who crouched beside him on the raised deck aft.

They approached slowly, never a sound as the gondoliers dipped their sweeps. A belt of reeds fringed the shore, and the gondola slid through these with a gentle hiss.

"So," said Beppo, as the bow ran up on the sand. "We have done our part, lords. We have brought you hither. Now do you give us that fight you spoke of."

"Fear not," answered Matteo. "You shall have your belly-full. But we are not yet at our journey's end."

"Ay, lord. We know the way, Giacomo and I. Follow me."

He led them into a depression between the dunes, where a faint path was trodden in the dank growth of beach-grass.. Winding and twisting amongst the miniature sand mountains, this path debouched at last upon a central hollow, in which the comrades descried vaguely a crude structure which seemed to lean against the shoulder of an overhanging dune. Dim rays of light shone through chinks in the boarded walls.

They stole forward, bared blades ready to meet attack, until they were just outside the ill-fitting door, with the murmur of voices distinct in their ears. There were no windows in the hut, but the gaping cracks afforded excellent opportunities for studying the interior.

Hugh peered in with bated breath. Immediately in front stood Mocenigo, a brace of villainous-looking bravos at his back. On the opposite side of a rough table sat three other men clad in the loose, flowing garments and white turbans of the East. By their fierce, black-bearded faces and jewelled scimiter hilts Hugh knew them for Saracens of high degree, Emirs of one or another of the Sultans who ruled the disjointed Moslem world.

He had no time to consider the mystery of their presence, for the leader of the three was speaking in the lingua franca.

"But we must have certain knowledge of this, Messer Mocenigo. Our lord the Sultan will not put up with rumours."

"And I do not bring you rumours, Sead Eddin," answered Mocenigo. "The Crusade will not sail for Babylon this year--or next."

"It sails first for Zara," replied Sead Eddin. "That much all men know. But after Zara?"

"It will not sail for any port in the Holy Land."

Matteo nudged Hugh and both strained forward.

"Allah!" exclaimed the Saracen impatiently. "A straight answer to a straight question! Can a Christian never tell the truth?"

"I have told you the truth, my head on it," returned Mocenigo. "More I cannot tell."

Sead Eddin shrugged his shoulders and from the folds of his robe produced a weighty bag which he clinked suggestively on the table.

"Malek-Adel pays well for what he needs," he said sternly. "But he pays nought for service which is grudging and incomplete."

"What he asked for I have told you," protested Mocenigo. "Be content with that. I cannot----"

"You cannot serve other masters before my master--and yours."

Mocenigo hesitated. The Moslem returned the bag to its hiding-place.

"Be it so," he commented. "We will seek elsewhere. There is always a Christian who will sell his soul for gold."

By the flickering torch-light in the hut Hugh could see the Italian's face torn by conflicting emotions. Reluctance, hate, fear, desperation, pride and greed struggled one with the other to the end ordained by human weakness.

"Give me the gold," said Mocenigo, and he reached out his hand.

"You will tell?"

"Yes."

Sead Eddin drew forth the bag once more and dropped it on the table so that it sent a mellow clang, like the chiming of mass-bells, through the hut. Whatever reluctance persisted in Mocenigo's mind was banished by that sound.

"The Crusade will sail against Constantinople," he said.

"By the Prophet's Beard!" exclaimed the Saracen. "How know you this?"

"It matters not, save that I do know it," replied Mocenigo shortly.

"In sober truth doth Allah watch over his own! When Christian might becomes too great for the Faithful to resist, he sets them to fighting against each other. God is great!"

"Is great! Is great!" echoed his companions.

There was a moment's silence broken only by the clinking of the gold as the Italian thrust the bag into his jupon.

"You are sure of this?" demanded the Moslem with sudden ferocity.

"Would I dare to lie to Malek-Adel?" returned Mocenigo. "How long would I last after he discovered it?"

"Perchance long enough to order your shroud. But what madness hath possessed the Frank that----"

There was a crash as Ralph, wearied of standing in one position, tripped over a tussock of grass and fell against the hut wall. The men inside leaped to their feet with a flash of steel. But before they could recover from their surprise Matteo had flung wide the door.

"In upon them," he cried. "Christ and the Sepulchre!"

"A Chesby! A Chesby!" shouted Hugh.

He caught a brief glimpse of Mocenigo. Then the torches went out in a shower of sparks, and the darkness was filled with the clash of swordplay.