But murder--and such a murder! It was
difficult to suppose that such a cause should be sufficient to
produce such an effect; yet vanity is a very strong and a very evil-
counselling passion.
Vanity? Ha! could it be? Surely there never was so absurdly, so
grossly, vain a creature, as that Conte Leandro? And the poor
murdered Diva had quizzed, and snubbed, and mortified him again and
again. The lawyer had heard that much; and Leandro was aware of the
fact that Bianca was to be in the Pineta at that time. So much was
clear from what the Marchese had said. But she was to be there with
Ludovico--how could the poet expect to find her alone? Could it be
that he had followed them merely for the sake of making mischief and
rendering himself disagreeable, and had chanced to come upon her
asleep and alone? Could this be the clue?
But it would surely be easy to ascertain to a certainty whether the
Conte Leandro had left the city that morning or not. If only it
could be shown that he had done so? The amount of probability that
he had really been the perpetrator of the crime, or the possibility
of convicting him of it, would signify comparatively little. It
would be sufficient if only a competing theory, based on a
possibility, could be set up; if only such an alternative
possibility could be presented to the minds of the judges as should
justify them in feeling that the matter was too doubtful to warrant
a conviction.
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