He
had surrendered himself as a murderer, and was to be treated as
one. When the time came for the trial, might it not happen with
him as with many another innocent man who has put himself into a
false position? Might he not be condemned? Nothing that he could
say hereafter could remove the impression created by his giving
himself up to justice. Any denial hereafter would be supposed to
proceed from fear and not from innocence. And if he were
condemned, what would become of Corona, of his father, of little
Orsino? He shuddered at the thought.
What, he asked himself, would be the defence? Yesterday afternoon
he had been out of the house during several hours, and had walked
alone, he hardly remembered where. Since the crisis in his life
which had separated him from Corona in fact, if not in appearance,
he often walked alone, wandering aimlessly through the streets.
Would any of his acquaintance come forward and swear to having
seen him at the time Montevarchi was murdered? Probably not. And
if not, how could it be proved, in the face of his own statement
to the cardinal, that he might not have gone to the palace,
seeking an opportunity of expending his wrath on the old prince,
that he might not have lost his self-control in a fit of anger and
strangled the old man as he sat in his chair? As he himself had
said, there was far more reason to believe that the Saracinesca
had killed Montevarchi out of revenge, than that a girl like
Faustina should have strangled her own father because he had
interfered in her love affairs.
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