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Memoirs of Casanova — Volume 10: under the Leads by Giacomo Casanova
page 52 of 168 (30%)
Lawrence made him go out, and asked me to put on my shirt to go into the
garret for a moment. Addressing himself to the new prisoner, he said
that, having to get a bed and other necessaries, he would leave us in the
garret till he came back, and that, in the mean time, the cell would be
freed from the bad smell, which was only oil. What a start it gave me as
I heard him utter the word "oil." In my hurry I had forgotten to snuff
the wick after blowing it out. As Lawrence asked me no questions about
it, I concluded that he knew all, and the accursed Jew must have betrayed
me. I thought myself lucky that he was not able to tell him any more.

From that time the repulsion which I had felt for Lawrence disappeared.

After putting on my shirt and dressing-gown, I went out and found my new
companion engaged in writing a list of what he wanted the gaoler to get
him. As soon as he saw me, he exclaimed, "Ah! it's Casanova." I, too,
recognised him as the Abbe and Count Fenarolo, a man of fifty, amiable,
rich, and a favourite in society. He embraced me, and when I told him
that I should have expected to see anybody in that place rather than him,
he could not keep back his tears, which made me weep also.

When we were alone I told him that, as soon as his bed came, I should
offer him the recess, begging him at the same time not to accept it. I
asked him, also, not to ask to have the cell swept, saying that I would
tell him the reason another time. He promised to keep all secrecy in the
matter, and said he thought himself fortunate to be placed with me. He
said that as no one knew why I was imprisoned, everyone was guessing at
it. Some said that I was the heresiarch of a new sect; others that Madame
Memmo had persuaded the Inquisitors that I had made her sons Atheists,
and others that Antony Condulmer, the State Inquisitor, had me imprisoned
as a disturber of the peace, because I hissed Abbe Chiari's plays, and
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