Page 184

"Oh, yes, I understand them," I said.

I turned and went to the window. I unfastened the wooden shutter, and stood looking down into the street.

I saw nothing, but I couldn't reason.

"What became of the woman and her Asian companion?" I asked.

"I don't know. I have seen them in Rome since. Maybe it was fifty years ago. They are easy to recognize, for she is very pale and her companion has a creamy brown skin and while she dresses always as the great lady, he tends toward the exotic. "

I took a deep easy breath.

"And Santino? Where did he go?" I demanded.

"That I can't tell you, except that he had no spirit for anything when I talked to him. He want

ed her love, and nothing else. He said the ancient ones had ruined him for immortality and frightened him as to death. He had nothing. "

I took another deep breath. Then I turned around and fixed this vampire in my gaze with all his considerable details.

"Listen to me," I said. "If you ever see this creature again, the great lady who travels by coach, you must tell her one thing for me and one thing alone. "

"Very well. "

"That Marius lives and Marius is searching for her. "

"Marius!" he said with a gasp. He looked at me respectfully, though his eyes measured me from head to foot, and then hesitantly he said, "But Santino believes you to be dead. I think that this is what he told to the woman, that he had sent the coven members North to hurt you. "

"I think it's what he told her too. Now you remember that you saw me alive and that I search for her. "

"But where can she find you?"

"I can't entrust that knowledge to you," I said. "I would be foolish to do it. But remember what I have said. If you see her speak to her. "

"Very well," he answered. "I hope that you find her. "

With no further words, I left him.

I went out then into the night and for a long time I roamed the streets of Rome, taking stock of how it had changed with the centuries and how so much had remained the same.

I marveled at the relics from my time which were still standing. I treasured the few hours I had to make my way through the ruins of the Colosseum and the Forum. I climbed the hill where I had once lived. I found some blocks still from old walls of my house. I wandered in a daze, staring at things because my brain was in a fever.

In truth I could hardly contain my excitement on account of what I had heard, and yet I was miserable that Santino had escaped me.

But oh, what a rich irony it was that he had fallen in love with her! That she had denied him! And to think he had confessed to her his murderous deeds, how loathsome. Had he been boasting when he spoke with her?

Finally my heart was under my control. I could endure with what I had learnt from the young vampire. I would soon come upon Pandora, I knew it.

As for the other ancient one, she who had walked through the fire, I could not then imagine who it was though I think I know now. Indeed, I'm almost certain of it. I wonder what pulled her out of her secretive ways to visit some merciful release upon Santino's followers.

At last the night was almost spent, and I went home to be with my ever patient Bianca.

When I came down the stone steps of the cellar, I found her asleep against her coffin as if she'd been waiting for me. She was in a long nightgown of sheer white silk, tied at the wrists, and her hair was glossy and flowing.

I lifted her, kissed her closing eyes, and then put her down to her rest, and kissed her again as she lay there.

"Did you find Santino?" she asked in a drowsy voice. "Did you punish him?"

"No," I said. "But I will some night in the years to come. Only time itself can rob me of that special pleasure. "