Of course I might go away without writing a word, but that would
be brutal and my idea was still to exclude brutal solutions.
As my confusion cooled I was lost in wonder at the importance I
had attached to Miss Bordereau's crumpled scraps; the thought
of them became odious to me, and I was as vexed with the old
witch for the superstition that had prevented her from destroying
them as I was with myself for having already spent more money
than I could afford in attempting to control their fate.
I forget what I did, where I went after leaving the Lido
and at what hour or with what recovery of composure I made
my way back to my boat. I only know that in the afternoon,
when the air was aglow with the sunset, I was standing
before the church of Saints John and Paul and looking up
at the small square-jawed face of Bartolommeo Colleoni,
the terrible condottiere who sits so sturdily astride
of his huge bronze horse, on the high pedestal on which
Venetian gratitude maintains him. The statue is incomparable,
the finest of all mounted figures, unless that of Marcus Aurelius,
who rides benignant before the Roman Capitol, be finer:
but I was not thinking of that; I only found myself staring
at the triumphant captain as if he had an oracle on his lips.
The western light shines into all his grimness at that hour
and makes it wonderfully personal. But he continued to look
far over my head, at the red immersion of another day--
he had seen so many go down into the lagoon through the centuries--
and if he were thinking of battles and stratagems they
were of a different quality from any I had to tell him of.
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