Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1895-08-07
copyright by Bachelor johnson s Bachelor
CHAPTER l.

"Oh my necklace" cried a fair woman
as she leaned over the side of her gon-
dola.
A string of opals, linked and set in
gold, had been loosened from her
throat, and had slid down into the
water of the lagoon, midway between
the Lido and the city of Venice. But
the gondola was moving swiftly under
the impulsion of a rover fore and aft,
and, though they stopped few mo-
ments after at her cry, the spot where
it had fallen was already passed and
left behind. She was vexed and pro-
vol.cd. She had many jewels, but the
opal necklace was an heirloom, and of
fine and curious workmanship. The
gondoliers did their best to find it, but
in vain. They We're in the deeper
water of the sailing roads, which were
marked out by the lines of poles, and
the necklace, slight thing, had been
borne away by the current setting in
from the open sea.
Neither of the men could swim;
many Venetians cannot; but they got
over the side, and waded up to their
waists in the water, and with their oars
struck and sounded the sandy bottom;
but the lagoon, which has been the
grave of SO many, kept the drowned
opals.
1--WE will go back and send divers"
she said to her men who, wet to their
waists, were well content to turn the
head of the gondola back to the city.
They wore white clothes with red
sashes and red ribbons round their
straw hats; they We're in her private
service; they steered quickly home
again over the calm waterway, and in
and out the crowded craft by the
schiavone past the customs house, and
S. Giorgio and the Salvatore, until
they reached a palace on the Grand
canal. which was their mistress resi-
dence, with poles painted red and
white, with coronets on their tops,
marking the landing stairs in the old
Venetian fashion.
II have lost my opals in the water!"
she cried to friend who was on one Of
the balconies Of the first floor.
81 am glad you have lost thcm," re.
piled her friend. "They are pie1res de.
n1GlhCur"
Nonsense! They were beautiful, and
they were Ninetta Laranigra's, poor
Carlos Observation-Disclosures; they
were one of her nuptial presents hun
dred years ago Her portrait hangs in
the Belle Arte. She was beautiful, and
I.,1 oCr;, fnfn + ho, II
dive and dreGge till they are found.
The water is so shallow. l cannot
think how they have vanished so COM
pletely in such a moment of time"
On the morrow, when it was known
through Venice that the rich and gem
crous Countess Laranigra had lost her
jewels, all the best divers hurried to
the place where it had dropped and
worked sedulously from day to
find it, sailors and fishermen and boat
men all joining in the search, in hope
to merit the reward she promised. But
no one of them succeeded. Their eff
forts We're useless. The tenacious
water would not yield up its prey. The
opals were gone, like spindrift.
In the hollow of an old oak pile the
opals remained all winter long, lying
like birds eggs in a nest, whilst the
restless waters washed and swirled
above its sanctuary. The worn stump
of the wood had kept its place for cen
turtles, and many corpse had drifted
past it outward to the sea in days when
the white marbles of ST. Marks city
had RIM red with blood II had onpn
been the base of sea shrine, of
madonna of the waters to whom the
boatmen passing had invoked the Stella
Maria Virgins so dear to fishermen and
sailors.
But the painted shrine had long dis
appeared, and only the old piece of tim
Der, down underneath the waters,