only to give him the appearance of a roving masnadiero or a cut-throat
for hire. Presently abandoning the comtemplation of Gonzaga he turned to
his companions, and across to the listener floated a coarse and boasting
tale of a plunderous warfare in Sicily ten years agone. Gonzaga became
excited. It seemed indeed as if this were man who might be useful to
him. He made pretence to sip the wine Luciano had brought him, and
listened avidly to that swashbuckling story, from which it appeared that
this knave had once been better circumstanced and something of a leader.
Intently he listened, and wondered whether such men as he boasted he
had led in that campaign were still to be found and could be brought
together.

At the end of perhaps a half-hour the two companions of that thirsty
giant rose and took their leave of him. They cast a passing glance upon
Gonzaga, and were gone.

A little while he hesitated. The ruffian seemed to have lapsed into a
reverie, or else he slept with open eyes. Calling up his courage the
gallant rose at last and moved across the room. All unversed in tavern
ways was the magnificent Gonzaga, and he who at court, in ballroom or
in antechamber, was a very mirror of all the graces of a courtier, felt
awkward here and ill at ease.

At length, summoning his wits to his aid:

“Good sir,” said he, with some timidity, “will you do me the honour to
share a flagon with me?”

The ruffian's eye, which but a moment back had looked vacuous and
melancholy, now quickened until it seemed ablaze. He raised his
bloodshot orbs and boldly encountered Gonzaga's uneasy glance. His lips
fell apart with an anticipatory smack, his back stiffened, and his head
was raised until his chin took on so haughty a tilt that Gonzaga feared
his proffered hospitality was on the point of suffering a scornful
rejection.

“Will I share a flagon?” gasped the fellow, as, being the sinner that he
was and knew himself to be, he might have gasped: “Will I go to Heaven?”
 “Will I--will I----?” He paused, and pursed his lips. His eyebrows were
puckered and his expression grew mighty cunning as again he took stock
of this pretty fellow who offered flagons of wine to down-at-heel
adventurers like himself. He had all but asked what was to be required
of him in exchange for this, when suddenly he bethought him--with the
knavish philosophy adversity had taught him--that were he told for what
it was intended that the wine should bribe him, and did the business
suit him not, he should, in the confession of it, lose the wine; whilst
did he but hold his peace until he had drunk, it would be his thereafter
to please himself about the business when it came to be proposed.

He composed his rugged features into the rude semblance of a smile.

“Sweet young sir,” he murmured, “sweet, gentle and most illustrious
lord, I would share a hogshead with such a nobleman as you.”

“I am to take it that you will drink?” quoth Gonzaga, who had scarce
known what to make of the man's last words.

“Body of Bacchus! Yes. I'll drink with you gentile signorino, until your
purse be empty or the world run dry.” And he leered a mixture of mockery
and satisfaction.

Gonzaga, still half uncertain of his ground, called the taverner
and bade him bring a flagon of his best. While Luciano was about the
fetching of the wine, constraint sat upon that oddly discordant pair.

“It is a chill night,” commented Gonzaga presently, seating himself
opposite his swashbuckler.

“Young sir, your wits have lost their edge. The night is warm.

“I said,” spluttered Gonzaga, who was unused to contradiction from his
inferiors, and wished now to assert himself, “that the night is chill.”

“You lied, then,” returned the other, with a fresh leer, “for, as I
answered you, the night is warm. Piaghe di Cristo! I am an ill man to
contradict, my pretty gallant, and if I say the night is warm, warm it
shall be though there be snow on Mount Vesuvius.”

The courtier turned pink at that, and but for the arrival of
the taverner with the wine, it is possible he might have done an
unconscionable rashness. At sight of the red liquor the fury died out of
the ruffler's face.

“A long life, a long thirst, a long purse, and a short memory!” was his
toast, into whose cryptic meaning Gonzaga made no attempt to pry. As the
fellow set down his cup, and with his sleeve removed the moisture from
his unshorn mouth, “May I not learn,” he inquired, “whose hospitality I
have the honour of enjoying?”

“Heard you ever of Romeo Gonzaga?”

“Of Gonzaga, yes; though of Romeo Gonzaga never. Are you he?”

Gonzaga bowed his head.

“A noble family yours,” returned the swashbuckler, in a tone that
implied his own to be as good. “Let me name myself to you. I am Ercole
Fortemani,” he said, with the proud air of one who announced himself an
emperor.

“A formidable name,” said Gonzaga, in accents of surprise, “and it bears
a noble sound.”

The great fellow turned on him in a sudden anger.

“Why that astonishment?” he blazed. “I tell you my name is both noble
and formidable, and you shall find me as formidable as I am noble.
Diavolo! Seems it incredible?”

“Said I so?” protested Gonzaga.

“You had been dead by now if you had, Messer Gonzaga. But you thought
so, and I may take leave to show you how bold a man it needs to think so
without suffering.”

Ruffled as a turkey-cock, wounded in his pride and in his vanity, Ercole
hastened to enlighten Gonzaga on his personality.

“Learn, sir,” he announced, “that I am Captain Ercole Fortemani. I held
that rank in the army of the Pope. I have served the Pisans and the
noble Baglioni of Perugia with honour and distinction. I have commanded
a hundred lances of Gianinoni's famous free-company. I have fought with
the French against the Spaniards, and with the Spaniards against the
French, and I have served the Borgia, who is plotting against both. I
have trailed a pike in the emperor's following, and I have held the rank
of captain, too, in the army of the King of Naples. Now, young sir, you
have learned something of me, and if my name is not written in letters
of fire from one end of Italy to the other, it is--Body of God!--because
the hands that hired me to the work garnered the glory of my deeds.”

“A noble record,” said Gonzaga, who had credulously absorbed that
catalogue of lies, “a very noble record.”

“Not so,” the other contradicted, for the lust of contradiction that was
a part of him. “A great record, if you will, to commend me to hireling
service. But you may not call the service of a hireling noble.”

“It is a matter we will not quarrel over,” said Gonzaga soothingly. The
man's ferocity was terrific.

“Who says that we shall not?” he demanded. “Who will baulk me if I have
a mind to quarrel over it? Answer me!” and he half rose from his seat,
moved by the anger into which he was lashing himself. “But patience!” he
broke off, subsiding on a sudden. “I take it, it was not out of regard
for my fine eyes, nor drawn by the elegance of my apparel”--and he
raised a corner of his tattered cloak--“nor yet because you wish to
throw a main with me, that you have sought my acquaintance, and called
for this wine. You require service of me?”

“You have guessed it.”

“A prodigious discernment, by the Host!” He seemed to incline rather
tediously to irony. Then his face grew stern, and he lowered his voice
until it was no more than a growling whisper. “Heed me, Messer Gonzaga.
If the service you require be the slitting of a gullet or some kindred
foul business, which my seeming neediness leads you to suppose me
ripe for, let me counsel you, as you value your own skin, to leave the
service unmentioned, and get you gone.”

In hasty, frantic, fearful protest were Gonzaga's hands outspread.

“Sir, sir--I--I could not have thought it of you,” he spluttered, with
warmth, much of which was genuine, for it rejoiced him to see some
scruples still shining in the foul heap of this man's rascally
existence. A knave whose knavery knew no limits would hardly have suited
his ends. “I do need a service, but it is no dark-corner work. It is a
considerable enterprise, and one in which, I think, you should prove the
very man I need.”

“Let me know more,” quoth Ercole grandiloquently.

“I need first your word that should the undertaking prove unsuited to
you, or beyond you, you will respect the matter, and keep it secret.”

“Body of Satan! No corpse was ever half so dumb as I shall be.”

“Excellent! Can you find me a score of stout fellows to form a bodyguard
and a garrison, who, in return for good quarters--perchance for some
weeks--and payment at four times the ordinary mercenaries' rate, will
be willing to take some risk, and chance even a brush with the Duke's
forces?”

Ercole blew out his mottled cheeks until Gonzaga feared that he would
burst them.

“It's outlawry!” he roared, when he had found his voice. “Outlawry, or
I'm a fool.”

“Why, yes,” confessed Gonzaga. “It is outlaw matter of a kind. But the
risk is slender.”

“Can you tell me no more?”

“I dare not.”

Ercole emptied his wine-cup at a draught and splashed the dregs on
to the floor. Then, setting down the empty vessel, he sat steeped in
thought awhile. Growing impatient:

“Well,” cried Gonzaga at last, “can you help me? Can you find the men?”

“If you were to tell me more of the nature of this service you require,
I might find a hundred with ease.”

“As I have said--I need but a score.”

Ercole looked mighty grave, and thoughtfully rubbed his long nose.

“It might be done,” said he, after a pause. “But we shall have to look
for desperate knaves; men who are already under a ban, and to whom it
will matter little to have another item added to their indebtedness to
the law should they fall into its talons. How soon shall you require
this forlorn company?”

“By to-morrow night.”

“I wonder----” mused Ercole. He was counting on his fingers, and
appeared to have lapsed into mental calculations. “I could get
half-a-score or a dozen within a couple of hours. But a score----” Again
he paused, and again he fell to thinking. At last, more briskly: “Let us
hear what pay you offer me, to thrust myself thus blindfolded into
this business of yours as leader of the company you require?” he asked
suddenly.

Gonzaga's face fell at that. Then he suddenly stiffened, and put on an
expression of haughtiness.

“It is my intent to lead this company myself,” he loftily informed the
ruffler.

“Body of God!” gasped Ercole, upon whose mind intruded a grotesque
picture of such a company as he would assemble, being led by this
mincing carpet-knight. Then recollecting himself: “If that be so,” said
he, “you had best, yourself, enrol it. Felicissima notte!” And he waved
him a farewell across the table.

Here was a poser for Gonzaga. How was he to go about such a business as
that? It was beyond his powers. Thus much he protested frankly.

“Now attend to me, young sir,” was the other's answer. “The matter
stands thus: If I can repair to certain friends of mine with the
information that an affair is afoot, the particulars of which I may not
give them, but in which I am to lead them myself, sharing such risk as
there may be, I do not doubt but that by this time to-morrow I can have
a score of them enrolled--such is their confidence in Ercole Fortemani.
But if I take them to enter a service unknown, under a leader equally
unknown, the forming of such a company would be a mighty tedious
matter.”

This was an argument to the force of which Gonzaga could not remain
insensible. After a moment's consideration, he offered Ercole fifty gold
florins in earnest of good faith and the promise of pay, thereafter, at
the rate of twenty gold florins a month for as long as he should need
his services and Ercole, who in all his free-lancing days had never
earned the tenth of such a sum, was ready to fall upon this most noble
gentleman's neck, and weep for very joy and brotherly affection.

The matter being settled, Gonzaga produced a heavy bag which gave forth
a jangle mighty pleasant to the ears of Fortemani, and let it drop with
a chink upon the table.

“There are a hundred florins for the equipment of this company. I do not
wish to have a regiment of out-at-elbow tatterdemalions at my heels.”
 And his eye swept in an uncomplimentary manner over Ercole's apparel.
“See that you dress them fittingly.”

“It shall be done, Magnificent,” answered Ercole, with a show of such
respect as he had not hitherto manifested. “And arms?”

“Give them pikes and arquebuses, if you will; but nothing more. The
place we are bound for is well stocked with armour--but even that may
not be required.”

“May not be required?” echoed the more and more astonished swashbuckler.
Were they to be paid on so lordly a scale, clothed and fed, to induce
them upon a business that might carry no fighting with it? Surely he
had never sold himself into a more likely or promising service, and that
night he dreamt in his sleep that he was become a gentleman's steward,
and that at his heels marched an endless company of lacqueys in
flamboyant liveries. On the morrow he awoke to the persuasion that at
last, of a truth, was his fortune made, and that hereafter there would
be no more pike-trailing for his war-worn old arms.

Conscientiously he set about enrolling the company, for, in his way,
this Ercole Fortemani was a conscientious man--boisterous and unruly
if you will; a rogue, in his way, with scant respect for property; not
above cogging dice or even filching a purse upon occasion when hard
driven by necessity--for all that he was gently born and had held
honourable employment; a drunkard by long habit, and a swaggering
brawler upon the merest provocation. But for all that, riotous and
dishonest though he might be in the general commerce of life, yet to the
hand that hired him he strove--not always successfully, perhaps, but, at
least, always earnestly--to be loyal.

CHAPTER IX. THE “TRATTA DI CORDE”

Whilst the bustle of preparation went on briskly in Urbino, Gian Maria,
on his side, was rapidly disposing of affairs in Babbiano, that he might
return to the nuptials for which he was impatient. But he had chanced
upon a deeper tangle than he had reckoned with, and more to do than he
had looked for.

On the day of his departure from Urbino, he had ridden as far as Cagli,
and halted at the house of the noble Messer Valdicampo. This had been
placed at his disposal, and there he proposed to lie the night. They
had supped--the Duke, de' Alvari, Gismondo Santi, Messér Valdicampo, his
wife and two daughters, and a couple of friends, potential citizens of
Cagli, whom he had invited, that they might witness the honour that was
being done his house. It waxed late, and the torpor that ensues upon the
generous gratification of appetite was settling upon the company when
Armstadt--Gian Maria's Swiss captain--entered and approached his master
with the air of a man who is the bearer of news. He halted a pace or two
from the Duke's high-backed chair, and stood eyeing Gian Maria in stupid
patience.

“Well, fool?” growled the Duke, turning his head.

The Swiss approached another step. “They have brought him, Highness,” he
said in a confidential whisper.

“Am I a wizard that I must read your thoughts?” hectored Gian Maria.
“Who has brought whom?”

Armstadt eyed the company in hesitation. Then, stepping close to the
Duke, he murmured in his ear:

“The men I left behind have brought the fool--Ser Peppe.”

A sudden brightening of the eye showed that Gian Maria understood.
Without apology to the board, he turned and whispered back to his
captain to have the fellow taken to his chamber, there to await him.
“Let a couple of your knaves be in attendance, and do you come too,
Martino.”

Martin bowed, and withdrew, whereupon Gian Maria found grace to crave
his host's pardon, with the explanation that the man had brought him
news he had been expecting. Valdicampo, who for the honour of having a
Duke sleep beneath his roof would have stomached improprieties far more
flagrant, belittled the matter and dismissed it. And presently Gian
Maria rose with the announcement that he had far to journey on the
morrow, and so, with his host's good leave, would be abed.

Valdicampo, himself, then played the part of chamberlain, and taking up
one of the large candle branches, he lighted the Duke to his apartments.
He would have carried his good offices, and his candles, as far as Gian
Maria's very bed-chamber, but that in the ante-room his Highness, as
politely as might be, bade him set down the lights and leave him.

The Duke remained standing for a moment, deliberating whether to afford
knowledge to Alvari and Santi--who had followed him and stood awaiting
his commands--of what he was about to do. In the end he decided that he
would act alone and upon his sole discretion. So he dismissed them.

When they had gone and he was quite alone, he clapped his hands
together, and in answer to that summons the door of his bedroom opened,
revealing Martin Armstadt on the threshold.

“He is there?” inquired the Duke.

“Awaiting your Highness,” answered the Swiss, and he held the door for
Gian Maria to enter.

The bedchamber apportioned the Duke in the Palazzo Valdicampo was a
noble and lofty room, in the midst of which loomed the great carved bed
of honour, with its upright pillars and funereal canopy.

On the overmantel stood two five-armed sconces with lighted tapers. Yet
Gian Maria did not seem to deem that there was light enough for such
purpose as he entertained, for he bade Martin fetch him the candelabra
that had been left behind. Then he turned his attention to the group
standing by the window, where the light from the overmantel fell full
upon it.

This consisted of three men, two being mercenaries of Armstadt's guard,
in corselet and morion, and the third, who stood captive between, the
unfortunate Ser Peppe. The fool's face was paler than its wont, whilst
the usual roguery had passed from his eyes and his mouth, fear having
taken possession of its room. He met the Duke's cruel glance with one of
alarm and piteous entreaty.

Having assured himself that Peppe had no weapons, and that his arms were
pinioned behind him, Gian Maria bade the two guards withdraw, but hold
themselves in readiness in the ante-chamber with Armstadt. Then he
turned to Peppe with a scowl on his low brow.

“You are not so merry as you were this morning, fool,” he scoffed.

Peppino squirmed a little, but his nature, schooled by the long habit of
jest, prompted a bold whimsicality in his reply.

“The circumstances are scarcely as propitious--to me. Your Highness,
though, seems in excellent goodhumour.”

Gian Maria looked at him angrily a moment. He was a slow-witted man, and
he could devise no ready answer, no such cutting gibe as it would have
pleasured him to administer. He walked leisurely to the fire-place, and
leant his elbow on the overmantel.

“Your humour led you into saying some things for which I should be
merciful if I had you whipped.”

“And, by the same reasoning, charitable if you had me hanged,” returned
the fool dryly, a pale smile on his lips.

“Ah! You acknowledge it?” cried Gian Maria, never seeing the irony
intended. “But I am a very clement prince, fool.”

“Proverbially clement,” the jester protested, but he did not succeed
this time in excluding the sarcasm from his voice.

Gian Maria shot him a furious glance.

“Are you mocking me, animal? Keep your venomous tongue in bounds, or
I'll have you deprived of it.”

Peppe's face turned grey at the threat, as well it might--for what
should such a one as he do in the world without a tongue?

Seeing him dumb and stricken, the Duke continued:

“Now, for all that you deserve a hanging for your insolence, I am
willing that you should come by no hurt so that you answer truthfully
such questions as I have for you.”

Peppino's grotesque figure was doubled in a bow.

“I await your questions, glorious lord,” he answered.

“You spoke----” the Duke hesitated a moment, writhing inwardly at the
memory of the exact words in which the fool had spoken. “You spoke this
morning of one whom the Lady Valentina had met.”

The fear seemed to increase on the jester's face. “Yes,” he answered, in
a choking voice.

“Where did she meet this knight you spoke of, and in such wondrous words
of praise described to me?”

“In the woods at Acquasparta, where the river Metauro is no better than
a brook. Some two leagues this side of Sant' Angelo.”

“Sant' Angelo!” echoed Gian Maria, starting at the very mention of the
place where the late conspiracy against him had been hatched. “And when
was this?”

“On the Wednesday before Easter, as Monna Valentina was journeying from
Santa Sofia to Urbino.”

No word spake the Duke in answer. He stood still, his head bowed, and
his thoughts running again on that conspiracy. The mountain fight in
which Masuccio had been killed had taken place on the Tuesday night, and
the conviction--scant though the evidence might be--grew upon him that
this man was one of the conspirators who had escaped.

“How came your lady to speak with this man--was he known to her?” he
inquired at last.

“No, Highness; but he was wounded, and so aroused her compassion. She
sought to minister to his hurt.”

“Wounded?” cried Gian Maria, in a shout. “Now, by God, it is as I
suspected. I'll swear he got that wound the night before at Sant'
Angelo. What was his name, fool? Tell me that, and you shall go free.”

For just a second the hunchback seemed to hesitate. He stood in awesome
fear of Gian Maria, of whose cruelties some ghastly tales were told. But
in greater fear he stood of the eternal damnation he might earn did he
break the oath he had plighted not to divulge that knight's identity.

“Alas!” he sighed, “I would it might be mine to earn my freedom at so
light a price; yet it is one that ignorance will not let me pay. I do
not know his name.”

The Duke looked at him searchingly and suspiciously.

Dull though he was by nature, eagerness seemed now to have set a cunning
edge upon his wits, and suspicion had led him to observe the fool's
momentary hesitation.

“Of what appearance was he? Describe him to me. How was he dressed? What
was the manner of his face?”

“Again, Lord Duke, I cannot answer you. I had but the most fleeting
glimpse of him.”

The Duke's sallow countenance grew very evil-looking, and an ugly smile
twisted his lip and laid bare his strong white teeth.

“So fleeting that no memory of him is left you?” quoth he.

“Precisely, Highness.”

“You lie, you filth,” Gian Maria thundered in a towering rage. “It was
but this morning that you said his height was splendid, his countenance
noble, his manner princely, his speech courtly, and--I know not what
besides. Yet now you tell me--you tell me--that your glimpse of him was
so fleeting that you cannot describe him. You know his name, rogue, and
I will have it from you, or else----”

“Indeed, indeed, most noble lord, be not incensed----” the fool began,
in fearful protestation. But the Duke interrupted him.

“Incensed?” he echoed, his eyes dilating in a sort of horror at the
notion. “Do you dare impute to me the mortal sin of choler? I am
not incensed; there is no anger in me.” He crossed himself, as if to
exorcise the evil mood if it indeed existed, and devotedly bowing his
head and folding his hands--“Libera me a malo, Domine!” he murmured
audibly. Then, with a greater fierceness than before--“Now,” he
demanded, “will you tell me his name?”

“I would I could,” the terrified hunchback began. But at that the Duke
turned from him with a shrug of angry impatience, and clapping his hands
together:

“Olá! Martino!” he called. Instantly the door opened, and the Swiss
appeared. “Bring in your men and your rope.”

The captain turned on his heel, and simultaneously the fool cast himself
at Gian Maria's feet.

“Mercy, your Highness!” he wailed. “Do not have me hanged. I am----”

“We are not going to hang you,” the Duke broke in coldly. “Dead you
would indeed be dumb, and avail us nothing. We want you alive, Messer
Peppino--alive and talkative; we find you very reserved for a fool. But
we hope to make you speak.”

On his knees, Peppe raised his wild eyes to Heaven.

“Mother of the Afflicted,” he prayed, at which the Duke broke into a
contemptuous laugh.

“What has the Heavenly Mother to do with such filth as you? Make your
appeals to me. I am the more immediate arbiter of your fate. Tell me
the name of that man you met in the woods, and all may yet be well with
you.”

Peppino knelt in silence, a cold sweat gathering on his pale brow, and a
horrid fear tightening at his heart and throat.

And yet greater than this horror they were preparing for him was the
horror of losing his immortal soul by a breach of the solemn oath he
had sworn. Gian Maria turned from him, at last, to his bravi, who now
entered silently and with the air of men who knew the work expected
of them. Martino mounted the bed, and swung for an instant from the
framework of the canopy.

“It will hold, Highness,” he announced.

Gian Maria bade him, since that was so, remove the velvet hangings,
whilst he despatched one of the men to see that the ante-chamber door
was closed, so that no cry should penetrate to the apartments of the
Valdicampo household.

In a few seconds all was ready, and Peppino was rudely lifted from his
knees and from the prayers he had been pattering to the Virgin to lend
him strength in this hour of need.

“For the last time, sir fool,” quoth the Duke, “will you tell us his
name?”

“Highness, I cannot,” answered Peppe, for all that terror was freezing
his very blood.

A light of satisfaction gleamed now in Gian Maria's eyes.

“So you know it!” he exclaimed. “You no longer protest your ignorance,
but only that you cannot tell me. Up with him, Martino.”

In a last pitiable struggle against the inevitable, the fool broke from
his guards, and flung himself towards the door. One of the burly Swiss
caught him by the neck in a grip that made him cry out with pain. Gian
Maria eyed him with a sinister smile, and Martin proceeded to fasten one
end of the rope to his pinioned wrists. Then they led him, shivering
to the great bed. The other end of the cord was passed over one of
the bared arms of the canopy-frame. This end was grasped by the two
men-at-arms. Martin stood beside the prisoner. The Duke flung himself
into a great carved chair, an air of relish now investing his round,
pale face.

“You know what is about to befall you,” he said, in tones of chilling
indifference. “Will you speak before we begin?”

“My lord,” said the fool, in a voice that terror was throttling, “you
are a good Christian, a loyal son of Mother Church, and a believer in
the eternal fires of hell?”

A frown settled on Gian Maria's brow. Was the fool about to intimidate
him with talk of supernatural vengeance?

“Thus,” Peppe continued, “you will perhaps be merciful when I confess
my position. I made most solemn oath to the man I met at Acquasparta on
that luckless day, that I would never reveal his identity. What am I to
do? If I keep my oath, you will torture me to death perhaps. If I break
it, I shall be damned eternally. Have mercy, noble lord, since now you
know how I am placed.”

The smile broadened on Gian Maria's face, and the cruelty of his mouth
and eyes seemed intensified by it. The fool had told him that which he
would have given much to learn. He had told him that this man whose
name he sought, had so feared that his presence that day at Acquasparta
should become known, that he had bound the fool by oath not to divulge
the secret of it. Of what he had before suspected he was now assured.
The man in question was one of the conspirators; probably the very
chief of them. Nothing short of the fool's death under torture would now
restrain him from learning the name of that unknown who had done him
the double injury of conspiring against him, and--if the fool were to be
believed--of capturing the heart of Valentina.

“For the damnation of your soul I shall not be called to answer,” he
said at last. “Care enough have I to save my own--for temptations are
many and this poor flesh is weak. But it is this man's name I need,
and--by the five wounds of Lucia of Viterbo!--I will have it. Will you
speak?”

Something like a sob shook the poor fool's deformed frame. But that was
all. With bowed head he preserved a stubborn silence. The Duke made a
sign to the men, and instantly the two of them threw their weight upon
the rope, hoisting Peppe by his wrists until he was at the height of the
canopy itself. That done, they paused, and turned their eyes upon the
Duke for further orders. Again Gian Maria called upon the fool to answer
his questions; but Peppe, a writhing, misshapen mass from which two
wriggling legs depended, maintained a stubborn silence.

“Let him go,” snarled Gian Maria, out of patience. The men released the
rope, and allowed some three feet of it to run through their hands.
Then they grasped it again, so that Peppe's sudden fall was as suddenly
arrested by a jerk that almost wrenched his arms from their sockets. A
shriek broke from him at that exquisite torture, and he was dragged once
more to the full height of the canopy.

“Will you speak now?” asked Gian Maria coldly, amusedly almost. But
still the fool was silent, his nether lip caught so tightly in his teeth
that the blood trickled from it adown his chin. Again the Duke gave the
signal, and again they let him go. This time they allowed him a longer
drop, so that the wrench with which they arrested it was more severe
than had been the first.

Peppe felt his bones starting from their joints, and it was as if a
burning iron were searing him at shoulder, elbow and wrist.

“Merciful God!” he screamed. “Oh, have pity, noble lord.”

But the noble lord had him hoisted anew to the canopy. Writhing there
in the extremity of his anguish, the poor hunchback poured forth from
frothing lips a stream of curses and imprecations, invoking Heaven and
hell to strike his tormentors dead.

But the Duke, from whose demeanour it might be inferred that he was
inured to the effect produced by this form of torture, looked on with
a cruel smile, as of one who watches the progress of events towards the
end that he desires and has planned. He was less patient, and his signal
came more quickly now. For a third time the fool was dropped, and drawn
up, now, a short three feet from the ground.

This time he did not so much as scream. He hung there, dangling at the
rope's end, his mouth all bloody, his face ghastly in its glistening
pallor, and of his eyes naught showing save the whites. He hung there,
and moaned piteously and incessantly. Martin glanced questioningly at
Gian Maria, and his eyes very plainly inquired whether they had not
better cease. But Gian Maria paid no heed to him.

“Will that suffice you?” he asked the fool. “Will you speak now?”

But the fool's only answer was a moan, whereupon again, at the Duke's
relentless signal, he was swung aloft. But at the terror of a fourth
drop, more fearful than any of its three predecessors, he awoke very
suddenly to the impossible horror of his position. That this agony would
endure until he died or fainted, he was assured. And since he seemed
incapable of either fainting or dying, suffer more he could not. What
was heaven or hell to him then that the thought of either could efface
the horror of this torture and strengthen him to continue to endure the
agony of it? He could endure no more--no, not to save a dozen souls if
he had had them:

“I'll speak,” he screamed. “Let me down, and you shall have his name,
Lord Duke.”

“Pronounce it first, or the manner of your descent shall be as the
others.”

Peppe passed his tongue over his bleeding lips, hung still and spoke.

“It was your cousin,” he panted, “Francesco del Falco, Count of Aquila.”

The Duke stared at him a moment, with startled countenance and mouth
agape.

“You are telling me the truth, animal?” he demanded, in a quivering
voice. “It was the Count of Aquila who was wounded and whom Monna
Valentina tended?”

“I swear it,” answered the fool. “Now, in the name of God and His
blessed saints, let me down.”

For a moment yet he was held there, awaiting Gian Maria's signal. The
Duke continued to eye him with that same astonished look, what time he
turned over in his mind the news he had gathered. Then conviction of the
truth sank into his mind. It was the Lord of Aquila who was the idol
of the Babbianians. What, then, more natural than that the conspirators
should have sought to place him on the throne they proposed to wrest
from Gian Maria? He dubbed himself a fool that he had not guessed so
much before.

“Let him down,” he curtly bade his men. “Then take him hence, and let
him go with God. He has served his purpose.”

Gently they lowered him, but when his feet touched the ground he was
unable to stand. His legs doubled under him, and he lay--a little
crook-backed heap--upon the rushes of the floor. His senses had deserted
him.

At a sign from Armstadt the two men picked him up and carried him out
between them.

Gian Maria moved across the room to a tapestried priedieu, and knelt
down before an ivory crucifix to render thanks to God for the signal
light of grace, by which He had vouchsafed to show the Duke his enemy.

Thereafter, drawing from the breast of his doublet a chaplet of gold and
amber beads, he piously discharged his nightly devotions.

CHAPTER X. THE BRAYING OF AN ASS

When on the morrow, towards the twenty-second hour, the High and Mighty
Gian Maria Sforza rode into his capital at Babbiano, he found the city
in violent turmoil, occasioned, as he rightly guessed, by the ominous
presence of Caesar Borgia's envoy.

A dense and sullen crowd met him at the Porta Romana, and preserved a
profound silence as he rode into the city, accompanied by Alvari and
Santi, and surrounded by his escort of twenty spears in full armour.
There was a threat in that silence more ominous than any vociferations,
and very white was the Duke's face as he darted scowls of impotent anger
this way and that. But there was worse to come. As they rode up the
Borgo dell' Annunziata the crowd thickened, and the silence was now
replaced by a storm of hooting and angry cries. The people became
menacing, and by Armstadt's orders--the Duke was by now too paralysed
with fear to issue any--the men-at-arms lowered their pikes in order to
open a way, whilst one or two of the populace, who were thrust too near
the cavalcade by the surging human tide, went down and were trampled
under foot.

Satirical voices asked the Duke derisively was he wed, and where might
be his uncle-in-law's spears that were to protect them against the
Borgia. Some demanded to know whither the last outrageous levy of taxes
was gone, and where was the army it should have served to raise. To
this, others replied for the Duke, suggesting a score of vile uses to
which the money had been put.

Then, of a sudden, a cry of “Murderer!” arose, followed by angry demands
that he should restore life to the valiant Ferrabraccio, to Amerini, the
people's friend, and to those others whom he had lately butchered, or
else follow them in death. Lastly the name of the Count of Aquila rang
wildly in his ears, provoking a storm of “Evviva! Live Francesco del
Falco!” and one persistent voice, sounding loudly above the others,
styled him already “il Duca Francesco.” At that the blood mounted to
Gian Maria's brain, and a wave of anger beat back the fear from his
heart. He rose in his stirrups, his eyes ablaze with the jealous wrath
that possessed him.

“Ser Martino!” he roared hoarsely to his captain. “Couch lances and go
through them at the gallop!”

The burly Swiss hesitated, brave man though he was. Alvaro de' Alvari
and Gismondo Santi looked at each other in alarm, and the intrepid
old statesman, in whose heart no pang of fear had been awakened by the
rabble's threatening bay, changed colour as he heard that order given.

“Highness,” he implored the Duke, “You cannot mean this.”

“Not mean it?” flashed back Gian Maria, his eye travelling from Santi to
the hesitating captain. “Fool!” he blazed at the latter. “Brute beast,
for what do you wait? Did you not hear me?”

Without a second's delay the captain now raised his sword, and his deep,
guttural voice barked an order to his men which brought their lances
below the horizontal. The mob, too, had heard that fierce command, and
awakening to their peril, those nearest the cavalcade would have fallen
back but that the others, pressing tightly from behind, held them in the
death-tide that now swept by with clattering arms and hoarse cries.

Shrieks filled the air where lately threats had been loudly tossed. But
some there were in that crowd that would be no passive witnesses of this
butchery. Half the stones of the borgo went after that cavalcade, and
fell in a persistent shower upon them, rattling like giant hail upon
their armour, dinting many a steel-cap to its wearer's sore discomfort.
The Duke himself was struck twice, and on Santi's unprotected scalp an
ugly wound was opened from which the blood flowed in profusion to dye
his snowy locks.

In this undignified manner they reached, at last, the Palazzo Ducale,
leaving a trail of dead and maimed to mark the way by which they had
come.

In a white heat of passion Gian Maria sought his apartments, and came
not forth again until, some two hours later, the presence was announced
him of the emissary from Caesar Borgia, Duke of Valentinois, who sought
an audience.

Still beside himself, and boiling with wrath at the indignities he
had received, Gian Maria--in no mood for an interview that would
have demanded coolness and presence of mind from a keener brain than
his--received the envoy, a gloomy, priestly-faced Spaniard, in the
throne-room of the Palace. The Duke was attended by Alvari, Santi, and
Fabrizio da Lodi, whilst his mother, Caterina Colonna, occupied a chair
of crimson velvet on which the Sforza lion was wrought in gold.

The interview was brief, and marked by a rudeness at its close that
contrasted sharply with the ceremoniousness of its inception. It soon
became clear that the ambassador's true mission was to pick a quarrel
with Babbiano on his master's behalf, to the end that the Borgia might
be afforded a sound pretext for invading the Duchy. He demanded,
at first politely and calmly, and later--when denied--with arrogant
insistance, that Gian Maria should provide the Duke of Valentinois with
a hundred lances--equivalent to five hundred men--as some contribution
on his part towards the stand which Caesar Borgia meant to make against
the impending French invasion.

Gian Maria never heeded the restraining words which Lodi whispered in
his ear, urging him to temporise, and to put off this messenger until
the alliance with the house of Urbino should be complete and their
position strengthened sufficiently to permit them to brave the anger of
Caesar Borgia. But neither this nor the wrathful, meaning glances which
his cunning mother bent upon him served to curb him. He obeyed only the
voice of his headstrong mood, never dreaming of the consequences with
which he might be visited.

“You will bear to the Duca Valentino this message from me,” he said,
in conclusion. “You will tell him that what lances I have in Babbiano I
intend to keep, that with them I may defend my own frontiers against his
briganding advances. Messer da Lodi,” he added, turning to Fabrizio and
without so much as waiting to see if the envoy had anything further to
say, “let this gentleman be reconducted to his quarters, and see that he
has safe conduct hence until he is out of our Duchy.”

When the envoy, crimson of face and threatening of eye, had withdrawn
under Lodi's escort, Monna Caterina rose, the very incarnation of
outraged patience, and poured her bitter invective upon her rash son's
head.

“Fool!” she stormed at him. “There goes your Duchy--in the hollow of
that man's hand.” Then she laughed in bitterness. “After all, in casting
it from you, perhaps you have chosen the wiser course, for, as truly as
there is a God in Heaven, you are utterly unfitted to retain it.”

“My lady mother,” he answered her, with such dignity as he could muster
from the wretched heap in which his wits now seemed to lie, “you will
be well advised to devote yourself to your woman's tasks, and not to
interfere in a man's work.”

“Man's work!” she sneered. “And you perform it like a petulant boy or a
peevish woman.”

“I perform it, Madonna, as best seems to me, for it happens that I am
Duke of Babbiano,” he answered sullenly. “I do not fear any Pope's son
that ever stepped. The alliance with Urbino is all but completed. Let
that be established, and if Valentino shows his teeth--by God we'll show
ours.”

“Aye, but with this difference, that his are a wolf's teeth, and yours a
lamb's. Besides, this alliance with Urbino is all incomplete as yet. You
had been better advised to have sent away the envoy with some indefinite
promise that would have afforded you respite enough in which to seal
matters with the house of Montefeltro. As it is, your days are numbered.
Upon that message you have sent him Caesar will act at once. For my own
part, I have no mind to fall a prey to the invader, and I shall leave
Babbiano, and seek refuge in Naples. And if a last word of advice I may
offer you, it is that you do the same.”

Gian Maria rose and came down from the dais, eyeing her in a sort of
dull amazement. Then he looked, as if for help, to Alvari, to Santi,
and lastly to Lodi, who had returned while Caterina was speaking. But no
word said any of them, and grave were the eyes of all.

“Poor-spirited are you all!” he sneered. Then his face grew dark and his
tone concentrated. “Not so am I,” he assured them, “if in the past I may
have seemed it sometimes. I am aroused at length, sirs. I heard a voice
in the streets of Babbiano to-day, and I saw a sight that has put a
fire into my veins. This good-tempered, soft, indulgent Duke you knew
is gone. The lion is awake at last, and you shall see such things as you
had not dreamt of.”

They regarded him now with eyes in which the gravity was increased by a
light of fearsome wonder and inquiry. Was his mind giving way under the
prodigious strain that had been set upon it that day? If not madness,
what else did that wild boasting argue?

“Are you all dumb?” he asked them, his eyes feverish. “Or do you deem
that I promise more than is mine to fulfil. You shall judge, and soon.
To-morrow, my lady mother, whilst you journey south, as you have told
us, I go north again, back to Urbino. Not a day will I now waste. Within
the week, sirs, by God's grace, I shall be wed. That will give us Urbino
for a buckler, and with Urbino comes Perugia and Camerino. But more than
that. There is a princely dowry comes to us with the Lady Valentina. How
think you will I spend it? To the last florin it shall go to the arming
of men. I will hire me every free condotta in Italy. I will raise me
such an army as has never before been seen at any one time, and with
this I shall seek out the Duca Valentino. I'll not sit here at home
awaiting the pleasure of his coming, but I'll out to meet him, and with
that army I shall descend upon him as a thunderbolt out of Heaven. Aye,
my lady mother,” he laughed in his madness, “the lamb shall hunt the
wolf, and rend it so that it shall never stand again to prey on other
lambs. This will I do, my friends, and there shall be such fighting as
has not been seen since the long-dead days of Castracani.”

They stared at him, scarce believing now that he was sane, and
marvelling deeply whence had sprung this sudden martial fervour in one
whose nature was more indolent than active, more timid than warlike.
And yet the reason was not far to seek, had they but cared to follow the
line of thought to which he, himself, had given them the clue when he
referred to the voice he had heard, and the sights he had seen in the
streets of Babbiano. The voice was the voice that had acclaimed his
cousin Francesco Duke. That it was through that a fierce jealousy had
fired him. This man had robbed him at once of the love of his people
and of Valentina, and thereby had set in his heart the burning desire
to outdo him and to prove wrong in their preference both his people and
Valentina. He was like a gamer who risks all on a single throw, and his
stake was to be the dowry of his bride, the game a tilt with the forces
of the Borgia. If he won he came out covered with glory, and not only
the saviour of his people and the champion of their liberty, but a
glorious figure that all Italy--or, at least, that part of it that
had known the iron heel of Valentino--should revere. Thus would he
set himself right, and thus crush from their minds the memory of his
rebellious cousin with whom he was about to deal.

His mother turned to him now, and her words were words of caution,
prayers that he should adventure on naught so vast and appalling to her
woman's mind, without due thought and argument in council. A servant
entered at that moment, and approached the Duke.

“Madonna,” Gian Maria announced, breaking in upon her earnest words,
“I am fully resolved upon my course. If you will but delay a moment and
resume your seat, you shall witness the first scene of this great
drama that I am preparing.” Then turning to the waiting servant: “Your
message?” he demanded.

“Captain Armstadt has returned, Highness, and has brought his
Excellency.”

“Fetch lights and then admit them,” he commanded briefly. “To your
places, sirs, and you, my mother. I am about to sit in judgment.”

Amazed and uncomprehending, they obeyed his wild gestures, and resumed
their places by the throne even as he walked back to the dais and sat
himself upon the ducal chair. Servants entered, bearing great candelabra
of beaten gold which they set on table and overmantel. They withdrew,
and when the doors opened again, a clank of mail, reaching them from
without, increased the astonishment of the company.

This rose yet higher, and left them cold and speechless, when into the
chamber stepped the Count of Aquila with a man-at-arms on either side
of him, marking him a prisoner. With a swift, comprehensive glance that
took in the entire group about the throne--and without manifesting the
slightest surprise at Lodi's presence--Francesco stood still and awaited
his cousin's words.

He was elegantly dressed, but without lavishness, and if he had the air
of a great lord, it was rather derived from the distinction of his face
and carriage. He was without arms, and bareheaded save for the gold coif
he always wore, which seemed to accentuate the lustrous blackness of
his hair. His face was impassive, and the glance as that of a man rather
weary of the entertainment provided him.

There was an oppressive silence of some moments, during which his cousin
regarded him with an eye that glittered oddly. At last Gian Maria broke
into speech, his voice shrill with excitement.

“Know you of any reason,” he demanded, “why your head should not be
flaunted on a spear among those others on the Gate of San Bacolo?”

Francesco's eyebrows shot up in justifiable astonishment.

“I know of many,” he answered, with a smile, an answer which by its
simplicity seemed to nonplus the Duke.

“Let us hear some of them,” he challenged presently.

“Nay, let us hear, rather, some reason why my poor head should be so
harshly dealt with. When a man is rudely taken, as I have been, it is
a custom, which perhaps your Highness will follow, to afford him some
reason for the outrage.”

“You smooth-tongued traitor,” quoth the Duke, with infinite malice, made
angrier by his cousin's dignity. “You choicely-spoken villain! You would
learn why you have been taken? Tell me, sir, what did you at Acquasparta
on the morning of the Wednesday before Easter?”

The Count's impassive face remained inscrutable, a mask of patient
wonder. By the sudden clenching of his hands alone did he betray how
that thrust had smitten him, and his hands none there remarked. Fabrizio
da Lodi, standing behind the Duke, went pale to the lips.

“I do not recall that I did anything there of much account,” he
answered. “I breathed the good spring air in the woods.”

“And nothing else?” sneered Gian Maria.

“I can bethink me of little else that signifies. I met a lady there with
whom I had some talk, a friar, a fool, a popinjay, and some soldiers.
But,”--he shifted abruptly, his tone growing haughty--“whatever I did,
I did as best seemed to me, and I have yet to learn that the Count of
Aquila must give account of what he does and where he does it. You
have not told me yet, sir, by what right, or fancied right, you hold me
prisoner.”

“Have I not, indeed? See you no link between your offence and your
presence near Sant' Angelo on that day?”

“If I am to apprehend that you have had me brought here with this
indignity to set me riddles for your amusement, I am enlightened and yet
amazed. I am no court buffoon.”

“Words, words,” snapped the Duke. “Do not think to beguile me with
them.” With a short laugh he turned from Francesco to those upon the
dais. “You will be marvelling, sirs, and you, my lady mother, upon what
grounds I have had this traitor seized. You shall learn. On the night of
the Tuesday before Easter seven traitors met at Sant' Angelo to plot
my overthrow. Of those, the heads of four may be seen on the walls
of Babbiano now; the other three made off, but there stands one of
them--the one that was to have occupied this throne after they had
unseated me.”

The eyes of all were now upon the young Count, whilst his own glance
strayed to the face of Lodi, on which there was written a consternation
so great that it must have betrayed him had the Duke but chanced to look
his way. A pause ensued which none present dared to break. Gian
Maria seemed to await an answer from Francesco; but Francesco stood
impassively regarding him, and made no sign that he would speak. At
length, unable longer to endure the silence:

“E dunque?” cried the Duke. “Have you no answer?”

“I would submit,” returned Francesco, “that I have heard no question.
I heard a wild statement, extravagant and mad, the accusation of one
demented, a charge of which no proofs can be forthcoming, else I take
it you had not withheld them. I ask you, sirs, and you, Madonna,” he
continued, turning to the others, “has his Highness said anything to
which an answer can by any means be necessary?”

“Is it proofs you lack?” cried Gian Maria, but less confidently than
hitherto, and, so, less fiercely. A doubt had arisen in his mind born of
this strange calm on the part of Francesco--a calm that to Gian Maria's
perceptions seemed hardly the garb of guilt, but belonged rather to one
who is assured that no peril threatens him. “Is it proofs you lack?”
 quoth the Duke again, and then with the air of a man launching an
unanswerable question: “How came you by the wound you had that day in
the woods?”

A smile quivered on Francesco's face, and was gone.

“I asked for proofs, not questions,” he protested wearily. “What shall
it prove if I had a hundred wounds?”

“Prove?” echoed the Duke, less and less confident of his ground, fearing
already that he had perhaps gone too fast and too far upon the road of
his suspicions. “It proves to me, when coupled with your presence there,
that you were in the fight the night before.”

Francesco stirred at that. He sighed and smiled at once. Then assuming a
tone of brisk command:

“Bid these men begone,” he said, pointing to his guards. “Then hear me
scatter your foul suspicions as the hurricane scatters the leaves in
autumn.”

Gian Maria stared at him in stupefaction. That overwhelming assurance,
that lofty, dignified bearing which made such a noble contrast with
his own coarse hectoring, were gradually undermining more and more
his confidence. With a wave of his hand he motioned the soldiers to
withdraw, obeying almost unconsciously the master-mind of his cousin by
which he was as unconsciously being swayed.

“Now, Highness,” said Francesco, as soon as the men were gone, “before
I refute the charge you make, let me clearly understand it. From the
expressions you have used I gather it to be this: A conspiracy was laid
a little time ago at Sant' Angelo which had for object to supplant you
on the throne of Babbiano and set me in your place. You charge me with
having had in that conspiracy a part--the part assigned to me. It is so,
is it not?”

Gian Maria nodded.

“You have put it very clearly,” he sneered. “If you can make out your
innocence as clearly, I shall be satisfied that I have wronged you.”

“That this conspiracy took place we will accept as proven, although to
the people of Babbiano the proof may have seemed scant. A man, since
dead, had told your Highness that such a plot was being hatched. Hardly,
perhaps, in itself, evidence enough to warrant setting the heads of four
very valiant gentlemen on spears, but no doubt your Highness had other
proofs to which the rest of us had no access.”

Gian Maria shivered at the words. He recalled what Francesco had said
on the occasion of their last talk upon this very subject; he remembered
the manner of his own reception that day in Babbiano.

“We must be content that it is so,” calmly pursued Francesco. “Indeed,
your Highness's action in the matter leaves no doubt. We will accept,
then, that such a plot was laid, but that I had a part in it, that I was
the man chosen to take your place--need I prove the idleness of such a
charge?”

“You need, in truth. By God! you need, if you would save your head.”

The Count stood in an easy posture, his hands clasped behind his back,
and smiled up at his cousin's pale face and scowling brow.

“How mysterious are the ways of your justice, Cousin,” he murmured, with
infinite relish; “what a wondrous equity invests your methods! You have
me dragged here by force, and sitting there, you say to me: 'Prove that
you have not conspired against me, or the headsman shall have you!' By
my faith! Soloman was a foolish prattler when compared with you.”

Gian Maria smote the gilded arm of his chair a blow for which he was to
find his hand blackened on the morrow.

“Prove it!” he screamed, like a child in a pet. “Prove it, prove it,
prove it!”

“And have my words not already proven it?” quoth the Count, in a voice
of such mild wonder and gentle protest that it left Gian Maria gasping.

Then the Duke made a hasty gesture of impatience.

“Messer Alvari,” he said, in a voice of concentrated rage, “I think you
had best recall the guard.”

“Wait!” the Count compelled him, raising his hand. And now it was
seen that the easy insouciance was gone from his face: the smile had
vanished, and in its place there was a look of lofty and contemptuous
wrath. “I will repeat my words. You have dragged me here before you by
force, and, sitting there on the throne of Babbiano, you say: 'Prove
that you have not conspired against me if you would save your head.'”
 A second he paused, and noted the puzzled look with which all regarded
him.

“Is this a parable?” sneered the uncomprehending Duke.

“You have said it,” flashed back Francesco. “A parable it is. And if you
consider it, does it not afford you proof enough?” he asked, a note of
triumph in his voice. “Do not our relative positions irrefutably show
the baselessness of this your charge? Should I stand here and you
sit there if what you allege against me were true?” He laughed almost
savagely, and his eyes flashed scornfully upon the Duke. “If more
plainly still you need it, Gian Maria, I tell you that had I plotted to
occupy your tottering throne, I should be on it now, not standing here
defending myself against a foolish charge. But can you doubt it? Did you
learn no lesson as you rode into Babbiano to-day? Did you not hear them
acclaim me and groan at you. And yet,” he ended, with a lofty pity,
“you tell me that I plotted. Why, if I desired your throne, my only need
would be to unfurl my banner in the streets of your capital, and within
the hour Gian Maria would be Duke no more. Have I proved my innocence,
Highness?” he ended quietly, sadly almost. “Are you convinced how little
is my need for plots?”

But the Duke had no answer for him. Speechless, and in a sort of dazed
horror, he sat and scowled before him at his cousin's handsome face,
what time the others watched him furtively, in silence, trembling for
the young man who, here, in his grasp, had dared say such things to him.
Presently he covered his face with his hands, and sat so, as one
deeply in thought, a little while. At last he withdrew them slowly and
presented a countenance that passion and chagrin had strangely ravaged
in so little time. He turned to Santi, who stood nearest.

“The guard,” he said hoarsely, with a wave of the hand, and Santi went,
none daring to utter a word. They waited thus an odd group, all very
grave save one, and he the one that had most cause for gravity. Then the
captain re-entered, followed by his two men, and Gian Maria waved a hand
towards the prisoner.

“Take him away,” he muttered harshly, his face ghastly, and passion
shaking him like an aspen. “Take him away, and await my orders in the
ante-chamber.”

“If it is farewell, Cousin,” said Francesco, “may I hope that you will
send a priest to me? I have lived a faithful Christian.”

Gian Maria returned him no answer, but his baleful eye was upon Martino.
Reading the significance of that glance, the captain touched Francesco
lightly on the arm. A moment the Count stood, looking from the Duke to
the soldiers; a second his glance rested on those assembled there; then,
with a light raising of his shoulders, he turned on his heel, and with
his head high passed out of the ducal chamber.

And silence continued after he was gone until Caterina Colonna broke it
with a laugh that grated on Gian Maria's now very tender nerves.

“You promised bravely,” she mocked him, “to play the lion. But so far,
we have only heard the braying of an ass.”

CHAPTER XI. WANDERING KNIGHTS

That taunt of his mother's stirred Gian Maria. He rose from his ducal
chair and descended from the dais on which it stood, possessed by a
tempestuous mood that would not brook him to sit still.

“The braying of an ass?” he muttered, facing Caterina. Then he laughed
unpleasantly. “The jaw-bone of an ass did sore execution on one
occasion, Madonna, and it may again. A little patience, and you shall
see.” Next, and with a brisker air, he addressed the four silent
courtiers, “You heard him, sirs,” he exclaimed, “How do you say that I
shall deal with such a traitor?” He waited some seconds for an answer,
and it seemed to anger him that none came. “Have you, then, no counsel
for me?” he demanded harshly.

“I had not thought,” said Lodi hardily, “that this was a case in which
your Highness needed counsel. You were drawn to conclude that the Lord
of Aquila was a traitor, but from what we have all heard, your Highness
should now see that he is not.”

“Should I so?” the Duke returned, standing still and fixing upon
Fabrizio an eye that was dull as a snake's. “Messer da Lodi, your
loyalty is a thing that has given signs of wavering of late. Now, if
by the grace of God and His blessed saints I have ruled as a merciful
prince who errs too much upon the side of clemency, I would enjoin you
not to try that clemency too far. I am but a man, after all.”

He turned from the fearless front presented by the old statesman, to
face the troubled glances of the others.

“Your silence, sirs, tells me that in this matter your judgement runs
parallel with mine. And you are wise, for in such a case there can be
but one course. My cousin has uttered words to-day which no man has ever
said to a prince and lived. Nor shall we make exception to that rule. My
Lord of Aquila's head must pay the price of his temerity.”

“My son,” cried Caterina, in a voice of horror. Gian Maria faced her in
a passion, his countenance grown mottled.

“I have said it,” he growled. “I will not sleep until he dies.”

“Yet never may you wake again,” she answered. And with that preamble
she launched upon his head the bitterest criticism he had ever heard. By
stinging epithets and contemptuous words, she sought to make him see the
folly of what he meditated. Was he indeed tired of ruling Babbiano?
If that were so, she told him, he had but to wait for Caesar Borgia's
coming. He need not precipitate matters by a deed that must lead to a
revolt, a rising of the people to avenge their idol.

“You have given me but added reasons,” he answered her stoutly. “There
is no room in my Duchy for a man whose death, if it pleased me to
encompass it, would be avenged upon me by my own people.”

“Then send him from your dominions,” she urged. “Banish him, and all may
be well. But if you slay him, I should not count your life worth a day's
purchase.”

This advice was sound, and in the end they prevailed upon him to adopt
it. But it was not done save at the cost of endless prayers on the part
of those courtiers, and the persuasions of Caterina's biting scorn and
prophecies of the fate that surely awaited him did he touch the life of
one so wellbeloved. At last, against his will, he sullenly consented
that the banishment of his cousin should content him. But it was with
infinite bitterness and regret that he passed his word, for his jealousy
was of a quality that nothing short of Francesco's death could have
appeased. Certain it is that nothing but the fear of the consequences,
which his mother had instilled into his heart, could have swayed him to
be satisfied that the Count of Aquila should be banished.

He sent for Martino and bade him return the Count his sword, and he
entrusted the message of exile to Fabrizio da Lodi, charging him to
apprise Francesco that he was allowed twenty-four hours' grace in which
to take himself beyond the dominions of Gian Maria Sforza.

That done--and with an exceedingly ill grace--the Duke turned on his
heel, and with a sullen brow he left the ducal chamber, and passed,
unattended, to his own apartments.

Rejoicing, Fabrizio da Lodi went his errand, which he discharged with
certain additions that might have cost him his head had knowledge of
them come to Gian Maria. In fact, he seized the opportunity to again
press upon Francesco the throne of Babbiano.

“The hour is very ripe,” he urged the Count, “and the people love you
as surely prince was never loved. It is in their interests that I plead.
You are their only hope. Will you not come to them?”

If for a moment Francesco hesitated, it was rather in consideration of
the manner in which the crown was offered than in consequence of any
allurement that the offer may have had for him. Once--that night at
Sant' Angelo--he had known temptation, and for a moment had listened to
the seductions in the voice that invited him to power. But not so now.
A thought he gave to the people who had such faith in him, and showered
upon him such admiring love, and whom, as a matter of reciprocity, he
wished well, and would have served in any capacity but this. He shook
his head, and with a smile of regret declined the offer.

“Have patience, old friend,” he added. “I am not of the stuff that goes
to make good princes, although you think it. It is a bondage into which
I would not sell myself. A man's life for me, Fabrizio--a free life that
is not directed by councillors and at the mercy of the rabble.”

Fabrizio's face grew sad. He sighed profoundly, yet since it might not
be well for him that he should remain over-long in talk with one who,
in the Duke's eyes, was attainted with treason, he had not leisure to
insist with persuasions, which, after all, he clearly saw must in the
end prove barren.

“What was the salvation of the people of Babbiano,” he murmured, “was
also your Excellency's, since did you adopt the course I urge there
would be no need to go in banishment.”

“Why, this exile suits me excellently well,” returned Francesco. “Idle
have I been over-long, and the wish to roam is in my veins again. I'll
see the world once more, and when I weary of my vagrancy I can withdraw
to my lands of Aquila, and in that corner of Tuscany, too mean to draw
a conqueror's eye, none will molest me, and I shall rest. Babbiano, my
friend, shall know me no more after to-night. When I am gone, and the
people realise that they may not have what they would, they may
rest content perhaps with what they may.” And he waved a hand in the
direction of the doors leading to the ducal chamber. With that he took
his leave of his old friend, and, carrying in his hand the sword and
dagger which Captain Armstadt had returned to him, he repaired briskly
to the northern wing of the Palace, in which he had his lodging.

In the ante-room he dismissed those of his servants who had been taken
from the ranks of the Duke's people, and bade his own Tuscan followers,
Zaccaria and Lanciotto, see to the packing of his effects, and make all
ready to set out within the hour.

He was no coward, but he had no wish to die just yet if it might be
honourably avoided. Life had some sweets to offer Francesco del
Falco, and this spurred him to hasten, for he well knew his cousin's
unscrupulous ways. He was aware that Gian Maria had been forced by
weight of argument to let him go, and he shrewdly feared that did he
linger, his cousin might veer round again, and without pausing to seek
advice a second time, have him disposed of out of hand and reckless of
consequences.

Whilst Lanciotto was left busy in the ante-room the Count passed into
his bedchamber attended by Zaccaria, to make in his raiment such changes
as were expedient. But scarce had he begun when he was interrupted by
the arrival of Fanfulla degli Arcipreti, whom Lanciotto ushered in.
Francesco's face lighted at sight of his friend, and he held out his
hand.

“What is it that has happened?” cried the young gallant, adding that
which showed his question to be unnecessary, for from Fabrizio da Lodi
he had had the whole story of what was befallen. He sat himself upon the
bed, and utterly disregarding the presence of Zaccaria--whom he knew
to be faithful--he attempted to persuade the Count where Fabrizio had
failed. But Paolo cut him short ere he had gone very far.

“Have done with that,” he said, and for all that he said it with
a laugh, determination sounded sturdy in his accents. “I am a
knight-errant, not a prince, and I'll not be converted from one to the
other. It were making a helot of a free man, and you do not love me,
Fanfulla, if you drive this argument further. Do you think me sad,
cast down, at the prospect of this banishment? Why, boy, the blood runs
swifter through my veins since I heard the sentence. It frees me from
Babbiano in an hour when perhaps my duty--the reciprocation of the
people's love--might otherwise have held me here, and it gives me
liberty to go forth, my good Fanfulla, in quest of such adventure as
I choose to follow.” He threw out his arms, and displayed his splendid
teeth in a hearty laugh.

Fanfulla eyed him, infected by the boisterous gladness of his mood.

“Why, true indeed, my lord,” he acknowledged, “you are too fine a bird
to sing in a cage. But to go knight-erranting----” He paused, and spread
his hands in protest. “There are no longer dragons holding princesses
captive.”

“Alas no. But the Venetians are on the eve of war, and they will find
work for these hands of mine. I want not for friends among them.”

Fanfulla sighed.

“And so we lose you. The stoutest arm in Babbiano leaves us in the hour
of need, driven out by that loutish Duke. By my soul, Ser Francesco, I
would I might go with you. Here is nothing to be done.”

Francesco paused in the act of drawing on a boot, and raised his eyes to
stare a moment at his friend.

“But if you wish it, Fanfulla, I shall rejoice to have your company.”

And now the idea of it entered Fanfulla's mind in earnest, for his
expression had been more or less an idle one. But since Francesco
invited him, why not indeed?

And thus it came to pass that at the third hour of that warm May night
a party of four men on horseback and two sumpter mules passed out of
Babbiano and took the road that leads to Vinamare, and thence into the
territory of Urbino. These riders were the Count of Aquila and Fanfulla
degli Arcipreti, followed by Lanciotto leading a mule that bore the arms
of those knights-errant, and Zaccaria leading another with their general
baggage.

All night they rode beneath the stars, and on until some three hours
after sunrise, when they made halt in a hollow of the hills not far from
Fabriano. They tethered their horses in a grove of peaceful laurel and
sheltering mulberry, at the foot of a slope that was set with olive
trees, grey, gnarled and bent as aged cripples, and beside the river
Esino at a spot where it was so narrow that an agile man might leap its
width. Here, then, they spread their cloaks, and Zaccaria unpacked
his victuals, and set before them a simple meal of bread and wine and
roasted fowl, which to their hunger made more appeal than a banquet at
another season. And when they had eaten they laid them down beside the
stream, and there beguiled in pleasant talk the time until they fell
asleep. They rested them through the heat of the day, and waking some
three hours after noon, the Count rose up and went some dozen paces down
the stream to a spot where it fell into a tiny lake--a pool deep and
blue as the cloudless heavens which it mirrored. Here he stripped off
his garments and plunged headlong in, to emerge again, some moments
later, refreshed and reinvigorated in body and in soul.

As Fanfulla awoke he beheld an apparition coming towards him, a figure
lithe and stalwart as a sylvian god, the water shining on the ivory
whiteness of his skin and glistening in his sable hair as the sunlight
caught it.

“Tell me now, Fanfulla, lives there a man of so depraved a mind that he
would prefer a ducal crown to this?”

And the courtier, seeing Francesco's radiant mien, understood perhaps,
at last, how sordid was the ambition that could lure a man from such a
god-like freedom, and from the holy all-consuming joys it brought him.
His thoughts being started upon that course, it was of this they talked
what time the Count resumed his garments--his hose of red, his knee-high
boots of untanned leather, and his quilted brigandine of plain brown
cloth, reputed dagger-proof. He rose at last to buckle on his belt
of hammered steel, from which there hung, behind his loins, a stout,
lengthy dagger, the only weapon that he carried.

At his command the horses were saddled and the sumpters laden once more.
Lanciotto held his stirrup, and Zaccaria did like service for Fanfulla,
and presently they were cantering out of that fragrant grove on to the
elastic sward of broad, green pasture-lands. They crossed the stream at
a spot where the widened sheet of water scarce went higher than their
horses' hocks; then veering to the east they rode away from the hills
for a half-league or so until they gained a road. Here they turned
northward again, and pushed on towards Cagli.

As the bells were ringing the Ave Maria the cavalcade drew up before
the Palazzo Valdicampo, where two nights ago Gian Maria had been
entertained. Its gates were now as readily thrown wide to welcome the
illustrious and glorious Count of Aquila, who was esteemed by Messer
Valdicampo no less than his more puissant cousin. Chambers were set at
his disposal, and at Fanfulla's; servants were bidden to wait upon them;
fresh raiment was laid out for them, and a noble supper was prepared to
do honour to Francesco. Nor did the generous Valdicampo's manner cool
when he learned that Francesco was in disgrace at the Court of Babbiano
and banished from the dominions of Duke Gian Maria. He expressed
sympathetic regret at so untoward a circumstance and discreetly
refrained from passing any opinion thereupon.

Yet later, as they supped, and when perhaps the choice wines had
somewhat relaxed his discretion, he permitted himself to speak of Gian
Maria's ways in terms that were very far from laudatory.

“Here, in my house,” he informed them, “he committed an outrage upon a
poor unfortunate, for which an account may yet be asked of me--since it
was under my roof that the thing befell, for all that I knew nothing of
it.”

Upon being pressed by Paolo to tell them more, he parted with the
information that the unfortunate in question was Urbino's jester Peppe.
At that, Paolo's glance became more intent. The memory of his meeting
with the fool and his mistress in the woods, a month ago, flashed now
across his mind, and it came to him that he could rightly guess the
source whence his cousin had drawn the information that had led to his
own arrest and banishment.

“Of what nature was the outrage?” he inquired.

“From what Peppe himself has told me it would seem that the fool was
possessed of some knowledge which Gian Maria sought, but on which Peppe
was bound by oath to silence. Gian Maria caused him to be secretly taken
and carried off from Urbino. His sbirri brought the fellow here, and to
make him speak the Duke improvised in his bedchamber a tratta di corde,
which had the desired result.”

The Count's face grew dark with anger. “The coward!” he muttered. “The
dastardly craven!”

“But bethink you, sir Count,” exclaimed Valdicampo, “that this poor
Peppe is a frail and deformed creature, lacking the strength of an
ordinary man, and do not judge him over-harshly.”

“It was not of him I spoke,” replied Francesco, “but of my cousin, that
cowardly tyrant, Gian Maria Sforza. Tell me, Messer Valdicampo--what has
become of Ser Peppe?”

“He is still here. I have had him tended, and his condition is already
much improved. It will not be long ere he is recovered, but for a few
days yet his arms will remain almost useless. They were all but torn
from his body.”

When the meal was done Francesco begged his host to conduct him to
Peppe's chamber. This Valdicampo did, and leaving Fanfulla in the
company of the ladies of his house, he escorted the Count to the room
where the poor, ill-used hunchback was abed tended by one of the women
of Valdicampo's household.

“Here is a visitor to see you, Ser Peppe,” the old gentleman announced,
setting down his candle on a table by the bed. The jester turned his
great head towards the newcomer's, and sought with melancoly eyes the
face of his visitor. At sight of him a look of terror spread itself upon
his countenance.

“My lord,” he cried, struggling into a sitting posture, “my noble,
gracious lord, have mercy on me. I could tear out this craven tongue of
mine. But did you know what agonies I suffered, and to what a torture
they submitted me to render me unfaithful, it may be that you, yourself,
would pity me.”

“Why, that I do,” answered Francesco gently. “Indeed, could I have seen
the consequences that oath would have for you, I had not bound you by
it.”

The fear in Peppe's face gave place to unbelief.

“And you forgive me, lord?” he cried. “I dreaded when you entered
that you were come to punish me for what wrong I may have done you in
speaking. But if you forgive me, it may be that Heaven will forgive me
also, and that I may not be damned. And that were a thousand pities, for
what, my lord, should I do in hell?”

“Deride the agonies of Gian Maria,” answered Francesco, with a laugh.

“It were almost worth burning for,” mused Peppe, putting forth a hand,
whose lacerated, swollen wrist bore evidence to the torture he had
suffered. At sight of it the Count made an exclamation of angry horror,
and hastened to inquire into the poor fool's condition.

“It is not so bad now,” Peppe answered him, “and it is only in
consequence of Messer Valdicampo's insistence that I have kept my bed. I
can scarce use my arms, it is true, but they are improving. To-morrow
I shall be up, and I hope to set out for Urbino, where my dear mistress
must be distressed with fears for my absence, for she is a very kind and
tenderhearted lady.”

This resolve of Peppe's prompted the Count to offer to conduct him
to Urbino on the morrow, since he, himself, would be journeying that
way--an offer which the fool accepted without hesitation and with lively
gratitude.

CHAPTER XII. THE FOOL'S INQUISITIVENESS

In the morning Francesco set out once more, accompanied by his servants,
Fanfulla, and the fool. The latter was now so far restored as to be able
to sit a mule, but lest the riding should over-tire him they proceeded
at little more than an ambling pace along the lovely valleys of the
Metauro. Thus it befell that when night descended it found them still
journeying, and some two leagues distant from Urbino. Another league
they travelled in the moonlight, and the fool was beguiling the time
for them with a droll story culled from the bright pages of Messer
Boccaccio, when of a sudden his sharp ears caught a sound that struck
him dumb in the middle of a sentence.

“Are you faint?” asked Francesco, turning quickly towards him, and
mindful of the fellow's sore condition.

“No, no,” answered the fool, with a readiness that dispelled the Count's
alarm on that score. “I thought I heard a sound of marching in the
distance.”

“The wind in the trees, Peppino,” explained Fanfulla.

“I do not think----” He stopped short and listened and now they all
heard it, for it came wafted to them on a gust of the fitful breeze that
smote their faces.

“You are right,” said Francesco. “It is the tramp of men. But what
of that, Peppe? Men will march in Italy. Let us hear the end of your
story.”

“But who should march in Urbino, and by night?” the fool persisted.

“Do I know or do I care?” quoth the Count. “Your story, man.”

For all that he was far from satisfied, the fool resumed his narrative.
But he no longer told it with his former irresistible humour. His mind
was occupied with that sound of marching, which came steadily nearer.
At length he could endure it no longer, and the apathy of his companions
fired him openly to rebel.

“My lord,” he cried, turning to the Count, and again leaving his story
interrupted, “they are all but upon us.”

“True!” agreed Francesco indifferently. “The next turn yonder should
bring us into them.”

“Then I beg you, Lord Count, to step aside. Let us pause here, under
the trees, until they have passed. I am full of fears. Perhaps I am a
coward, but I mislike these roving night-hands. It may be a company of
masnadieri.”

“What then?” returned the Count, without slackening speed. “What cause
have we to fear a party of robbers?”

But Fanfulla and the servants joined their advice to Peppe's, and
prevailed at last upon Francesco to take cover until this company should
have passed. He consented, to pacify them, and wheeling to the right
they entered the border of the forest, drawing rein well in the shadow,
whence they could survey the road and see who passed across the patch
of moonlight that illumined it. And presently the company came along
and swung into that revealing flood of light. To the astonishment of
the watchers they beheld no marauding party such as they had been led to
expect, but a very orderly company of some twenty men, soberly arrayed
in leather hacketons and salades of bright steel, marching sword
on thigh and pike on shoulder. At the head of this company rode a
powerfully-built man on a great sorrel horse, at sight of whom the
fool swore softly in astonishment. In the middle of the party came four
litters borne by mules, and at the side of one of them rode a slender,
graceful figure that provoked from Peppe a second oath. But the
profoundest objurgation of all was wrung from him at sight of a portly
bulk in the black habit of the Dominicans ambling in the rear, who just
then was in angry altercation with a fellow that was urging his mule
along with the butt of his partisan.

“May you be roasted on a gridiron like Saint Lawrence,” gasped the irate
priest. “Would you break my neck, brute beast that you are? Do you
but wait until we reach Roccaleone, and by St. Dominic, I'll get your
ruffianly commander to hang you for this ill-seasoned jest.”

But his tormentor laughed for answer, and smote the mule again, a blow
this time that almost caused it to rear up. The friar cried out in
angry alarm, and then, still storming and threatening his persecutor, he
passed on. After him came six heavily-laden carts, each drawn by a pair
of bullocks, and the rear of the procession was brought up by a flock of
a dozen bleating sheep, herded by a blasphemant man-at-arms. They passed
the astonished watchers, who remained concealed until that odd company
had melted away into the night.

“I could swear,” said Fanfulla, “that that friar and I have met before.”

“Nor would you do a perjury,” answered him the fool. “For it is that fat
hog Fra Domenico--he that went with you to the Convent of Acquasparta to
fetch unguents for his Excellency.”

“What does he in that company, and who are they?” asked the Count,
turning to the fool as they rode out of their ambush.

“Ask me where the devil keeps his lures,” quoth the fool, “and I'll
make some shift to answer you. But as for what does Fra Domenico in that
galley, it is more than I can hazard a guess on. He is not the only
one known to me,” Peppino added, “There was Ercole Fortemani, a great,
dirty, blustering ruffian whom I never saw in aught but rags, riding at
their heads in garments of most unwonted wholeness; and there was Romeo
Gonzaga, whom I never knew to stir by night save to an assignation.
Strange things must be happening in Urbino.”

“And the litters?” inquired Francesco, “Can you hazard no guess as to
their meaning?”

“None,” said he, “saving that they may account for the presence of
Messer Gonzaga. For litters argue women.”

“It seems, fool, that not even your wisdom shall avail us. But you heard
the friar say they were bound for Roccaleone?”

“Yes, I heard that. And by means of it we shall probably learn the rest
at the end of our journey.”

And being a man of extremely inquisitive mind, the fool set his
inquiries on foot the moment they entered the gates of Urbino in the
morning--for they had reached the city over-late to gain admittance that
same night, and were forced to seek shelter in one of the houses by the
river. It was of the Captain of the Gate that he sought information.

“Can you tell me, Ser Capitan,” he inquired, “what company was that that
travelled yesternight to Roccaleone?”

The captain looked at him a moment.

“There was none that I know of,” said he, “Certainly none from Urbino.”

“You keep a marvellous watch,” said the fool drily. “I tell you that a
company of men-at-arms some twenty strong went last night from Urbino to
Roccaleone.”

“To Roccaleone?” echoed the captain, with a musing air, more attentively
than before, as if the repetition of that name had suggested something
to his mind. “Why, it is the castle of Monna Valentina.”

“True, sapient sir. But what of the company, and why was it travelling
so, by night?”

“How know you it proceeded from Urbino?” quoth the captain earnestly.

“Because at its head I recognised the roaring warrior Ercole Fortemani,
in the middle rode Romeo Gonzaga, in the rear came Fra Domenico,
Madonna's confessor--men of Urbino all.”

The officer's face grew purple at the news.

“Were there any women in the party?” he cried.

“I saw none,” replied the fool, in whom this sudden eagerness of the
captain's awakened caution and reflection.

“But there were four litters,” put in Francesco, whose nature was less
suspicious and alert than the wise fool's.

Too late Peppe scowled caution at him. The captain swore a great oath.

“It is she,” he cried, with assurance. “And this company was travelling
to Roccaleone, you say. How know you that?”

“We heard it from the friar,” answered Francesco readily.

“Then, by the Virgin! we have them. Olá!” He turned from them, and ran
shouting into the gatehouse, to re-emerge a moment later with half-dozen
soldiers at his heels.

“To the Palace,” he commanded, and as his men surrounded Francesco's
party, “Come, sir,” he said to the Count. “You must go with us, and tell
your story to the Duke.”

“There is no need for all this force,” answered Francesco coldly.
“In any case, I could not pass through Urbino without seeing Duke
Guidobaldo. I am the Count of Aquila.”

At once the captain's bearing grew respectful. He made his apologies for
the violent measures of his zeal, and bade his men fall behind. Ordering
them to follow him, he mounted a horse that was brought him, and rode
briskly through the borgo at the Count's side. And as he rode he told
them what the jester's quick intuition had already whispered to him.
The lady Valentina was fled from Urbino in the night, and in her company
were gone three of her ladies, and--it was also supposed, since they had
disappeared--Fra Domenico and Romeo Gonzaga.

Aghast at what he heard, Francesco pressed his informer for more news;
but there was little more that the captain could tell him, beyond
the fact that it was believed she had been driven to it to escape her
impending marriage with the Duke of Babbiano. Guidobaldo was distraught
at what had happened, and anxious to bring the lady back before news of
her behaviour should reach the ears of Gian Maria. It was, therefore, a
matter of no little satisfaction to the captain that the task should be
his to bear Guidobaldo this news of her whereabouts which from Francesco
and the jester he had derived.

Peppe looked glum and sullen. Had he but bridled his cursed curiosity,
and had the Count but taken the alarm in time and held his peace, all
might have been well with his beloved patrona. As it was, he--the one
man ready to die that he might serve her--had been the very one to
betray her refuge. He heard the Count's laugh, and the sound of it was
fuel to his anger. But Francesco only thought of the splendid daring of
the lady's action.

“But these men-at-arms that she had with her?” he cried. “For what
purpose so numerous a bodyguard?”

The captain looked at him a moment.

“Can you not guess?” he inquired. “Perhaps you do not know the Castle of
Roccaleone.”

“It were odd if I did not know the most impregnable fortress in Italy.”

“Why, then, does it not become clear? She has taken this company for
a garrison, and in Roccaleone she clearly intends to resist in rebel
fashion the wishes of his Highness.”

At that the Count threw back his head, and scared the passers-by with as
hearty a peal of laughter as ever crossed his lips.

“By the Host!” he gasped, laughter still choking his utterance. “There
is a maid for you! Do you hear what the captain says, Fanfulla? She
means to resist this wedding by armed force if needs be. Now, on my
soul, if Guidobaldo insists upon the union after this, why, then, he has
no heart, no feeling. As I live, she is a kinswoman that such a warlike
prince might well be proud of. Small wonder that they do not fear the
Borgia in Urbino.” And he laughed again. But the captain scowled at him,
and Peppe frowned.

“She is a rebellious jade,” quoth the captain sourly.

“Nay, softly,” returned Francesco; for all that he still laughed. “If
you were of knightly rank I'd break a lance with you on that score. As
it is----” he paused, his laughter ceased, and his dark eyes took the
captain's measure in a curious way. “Best leave her uncensured, Ser
Capitano. She is of the house of Rovere, and closely allied to that of
Montefeltro.”

The officer felt the rebuke, and silence reigned between them after
that.

It was whilst Francesco, Fanfulla and Peppe waited in the ante-chamber
for admittance to the Duke that the jester vented some of the bitterness
he felt at their babbling. The splendid room was thronged with a courtly
crowd. There were magnificent nobles and envoys, dark ecclesiastics
and purple prelates, captains in steel and court officers in silk and
velvet. Yet, heedless of who might hear him, Peppe voiced his rebuke,
and the terms he employed were neither as measured nor as respectful as
the Count's rank dictated. Yet with that fairness of mind that made him
so universally beloved, Francesco offered no resentment to the fool's
reproof. He saw that it was deserved, for it threw upon the matter a
light that was new and more searching. But he presently saw further than
did the fool, and he smiled at the other's scowls.

“Not so loud Peppe,” said he. “You over-estimate the harm. At worst,
we have but anticipated by a little what the Duke must have learnt from
other sources.”

“But it is just that little--the few hours or days--that will do the
mischief,” snapped the jester testily, for all that he lowered his
voice. “In a few days Gian Maria will be back. If he were met with the
news that the Lady Valentina were missing, that she had run away with
Romeo Gonzaga--for that, you'll see, will presently be the tale--do you
think he would linger here, or further care to pursue his wooing? Not
he. These alliances that are for State purposes alone, in which the
heart plays no part, demand, at least, that on the lady's side there
shall be a record unblemished by the breath of scandal. His Highness
would have returned him home, and Madonna would have been rid of him.”

“But at a strange price, Peppe,” answered Franeesco gravely. “Still,” he
added, “I agree that I would have served her purpose better by keeping
silent. But that such an affair will cool the ardour of my cousin I do
not think. You are wrong in placing this among the alliances in which
the heart has no part. On my cousin's side--if all they say be true--the
heart plays a very considerable part indeed. But, for the rest--what
harm have we done?”

“Time will show,” said the hunchback.

“It will show, then, that I have done no hurt whatever to her
interests. By now she is safe in Roccaleone. What, then, can befall her?
Guidobaldo, no doubt, will repair to her, and across the moat he will
entreat her to be a dutiful niece and to return. She will offer to do
so on condition that he pass her his princely word not to further molest
her with the matter of this marriage. And then?”

“Well?” growled the fool, “And then? Who shall say what may befall then?
Let us say that his Highness reduces her by force.”

“A siege?” laughed the Count. “Pooh! Where is your wisdom, fool! Do you
think the splendid Guidobaldo is eager to become the sport of Italy,
and go down to posterity as the duke who besieged his niece because she
resisted his ordainings touching the matter of her wedding?”

“Guidobaldo da Montefeltro can be a violent man upon occasion,” the fool
was answering, when the officer who had left them reappeared with the
announcement that his Highness awaited them.

They found the Prince in a very gloomy mood, and after greeting
Francesco with cool ceremony, he questioned him on the matter of the
company they had met yesternight. These inquiries he conducted with
characteristic dignity, and no more show of concern than if it had been
an affair of a strayed falcon. He thanked Francesco for his information,
and gave orders that the seneschal should place apartments at his and
Fanfulla's disposal for as long as it should please them to grace
his court. With that he dismissed them, bidding the officer remain to
receive his orders.

“And that,” said Francesco to Peppe, as they crossed the ante-chamber
in the wake of a servant, “is the man who would lay siege to his niece's
castle? For once, sir fool, your wisdom is at fault.”

“You do not know the Duke, Excellency,” answered the fool. “Beneath that
frozen exterior burns a furnace, and there is no madness he would not
commit.”

But Francesco only laughed as, linking arms with Fanfulla, he passed
down the gallery on his way to the apartments to which the servant was
conducting them.

CHAPTER XIII. GIAN MARIA MAKES A VOW

In a measure the events that followed would almost tend to show that
the fool was right. For even if the notion of besieging Valentina and
reducing her by force of arms was not Guidobaldo's own in the first
place, yet he lent a very willing ear to the counsel that they should
thus proceed, when angrily urged two days thereafter by the Duke of
Babbiano.

Upon hearing the news Gian Maria had abandoned himself to such a licence
of rage as made those about him tremble from the highest to the meanest.
The disappointment of his passion was in itself justification enough for
this; but, in addition, Gian Maria beheld in the flight of Valentina the
frustration of those bold schemes of which had talked so loudly to his
councillors and his mother. It was his confidence in those same schemes
that had induced him to send that defiant answer to Caesar Borgia. As
a consequence of this there was haste--most desperate haste--that he
should wed, since wedding was to lend him the power to carry out his
brave promises of protecting his crown from the Duke of Valentinois,
not to speak of the utter routing of the Borgia which he had wildly
undertaken to accomplish.

That the destinies of States should be tossed to the winds of Heaven
by a slip of a girl was to him something as insufferable as it had been
unexpected.

“She must be brought back!” he had screeched, in his towering passion.
“She must be brought back at once.”

“True!” answered Guidobaldo, in his serene way; “she must be brought
back. So far, I agree with you entirely. Tell me, now, how the thing is
to be accomplished.” And there was sarcasm in his voice.

“What difficulties does it present?” inquired Gian Maria.

“No difficulties,” was the ironical reply. “She has shut herself up in
the stoutest castle in Italy, and tells me that she will not come
forth until I promise her freedom of choice in the matter of marriage.
Clearly, there are no difficulties attached to her being brought back.”

Gian Maria showed his teeth.

“Do you give me leave to go about it in my own way?” he asked.

“Not only do I give you leave, but I'll render you all the assistance in
my power, if you can devise a means for luring her from Roccaleone.”

“I hesitate no longer. Your niece, Lord Duke, is a rebel, and as a rebel
is she to be treated. She has garrisoned a castle, and hurled defiance
at the ruler of the land. It is a declaration of war, Highness, and war
we shall have.”

“You would resort to force?” asked Guidobaldo, disapproval lurking in
his voice.

“To the force of arms, your Highness,” answered Gian Maria, with prompt
fierceness. “I will lay siege to this castle of hers, and I shall tear
it stone from stone. Oh, I would have wooed her nicely had she let me,
with gentle words and mincing ways that maidens love. But since
she defies us, I'll woo her with arquebuse and cannon, and seek by
starvation to make her surrender to my suit. My love shall put on armour
to subject her, and I vow to God that I shall not shave my beard until I
am inside her castle.”

Guidobaldo looked grave.

“I should counsel gentler measures,” said he. “Besiege her if you will,
but do not resort to too much violence. Cut off their resources and let
hunger be your advocate. Even so, I fear me, you will be laughed at by
all Italy,” he added bluntly.

“A fig for that! Let the fools laugh if they be minded to. What forces
has she at Roccaleone?”

At the question Guidobaldo's brow grew dark. It was as if he had
recalled some circumstance that had lain forgotten.

“Some twenty knaves led by a notorious ruffian of the name of Fortemani.
The company was enrolled, they tell me, by a gentleman of my court, a
kinsman of my Duchess, Messer Romeo Gonzaga.”

“Is he with her now?” gasped Gian Maria.

“It would seem he is.”

“By the Virgin's Ring of Perugia!” spluttered Gian Maria in increased
dismay. “Do you suggest that they fled together?”

“My lord!” Guidobaldo's voice rang sharp and threatening. “It is of my
niece that you are speaking. She took this gentleman with her just as
she took three of her ladies and a page or two, to form such attendance
as befits her birth.”

Gian Maria took a turn in the apartment, a frown wrinkling his brow, and
his lips pressed tight. Guidobaldo's proud words by no means convinced
him. But the one preponderating desire in his heart just then was
to humble the girl who had dared to flout him, to make her bend her
stubborn neck. At last:

“I may indeed become the laughing-stock of Italy,” he muttered, in a
concentrated voice, “but I shall carry my resolve through, and my first
act upon entering Roccaleone will be to hang this knave Gonzaga from its
highest turret.”

That very day Gian Maria began his preparations for the expedition
against Roccaleone, and word of it was carried by Fanfulla to
Francesco--for the latter had left his quarters at the palace upon
hearing of Gian Maria's coming, and was now lodging at the sign of the
“Sun.”

Upon hearing the news he swore a mighty oath in which he consigned
his cousin to the devil, by whom, in that moment, he pronounced him
begotten.

“Do you think,” he asked, when he was calmer, “that this man Gonzaga is
her lover?”

“It is more than I can say,” answered Fanfulla. “There is the fact that
she fled with him. Though when I questioned Peppe on this same subject
he first laughed the notion to scorn, and then grew grave. 'She loves
him not, the popinjay,' he said; 'but he loves her, or I am blind else,
and he's a villain, I know.'”

Francesco stood up, his face mighty serious, and his dark eyes full of
uneasy thought.

“By the Host! It is a shameful thing,” he cried out at last. “This
poor lady so beset on every hand by a parcel of villains, each more
unscrupulous than the other. Fanfulla, send for Peppe. We must despatch
the fool to her with warning of Gian Maria's coming, and warning, too,
against this man of Mantua she has fled with.”

“Too late,” answered Fanfulla. “The fool departed this morning for
Roccaleone, to join his patrona.”

Francesco looked his dismay.

“She will be undone,” he groaned. “Thus between the upper and the nether
stone--between Gian Maria and Romeo Gonzaga. Gesù! she will be undone!
And she so brave and so high-spirited!”

He moved slowly to the casement, and stood staring at the windows across
the street, on which the setting sun fell in a ruddy glow. But it was
not the windows that he saw. It was a scene in the woods at Acquasparta
on that morning after the mountain fight; a man lying wounded in the
bracken, and over him a gentle lady bending with eyes of pity and
solicitude. Often since had his thoughts revisited that scene, sometimes
with a smile, sometimes with a sigh, and sometimes with both at once.

He turned suddenly upon Fanfulla. “I will go myself,” he announced.

“You?” echoed Fanfulla. “But the Venetians?”

By a gesture the Count signified how little the Venetians weighed with
him when compared with the fortunes of this lady.

“I am going to Roccaleone,” he insisted, “now--at once.” And striding to
the door he beat his hands together and called Lanciotto.

“You said, Fanfulla, that in these days there are no longer maidens held
in bondage to whom a knight-errant may lend aid. You were at fault, for
in Monna Valentina we have the captive maiden, in my cousin the dragon,
in Gonzaga another, and in me the errant knight who is destined--I
hope--to save her.”

“You will save her from Gian Maria?” questioned Fanfulla incredulously.

“I will attempt it.”

He turned to his servant, who entered as he spoke.

“We set out in a quarter of an hour, Lanciotto,” said he. “Saddle for me
and for yourself. You are to go with me. Zaccaria may remain with Messer
degli Arcipreti. You will care for him, Fanfulla, and he will serve you
well.”

“But what of me?” cried Fanfulla. “Do I not accompany you?”

“If you will, yes. But you might serve me better by returning to
Babbiano and watching the events there, sending me word of what
befalls--for great things will befall soon if my cousin returns not and
the Borgia advances. It is upon this that I am founding such hopes as I
have.”

“But whither shall I send you word? To Roccaleone?”

Francesco reflected a moment. “If you do not hear from me, then send
your news to Roccaleone, for if I should linger there and we are
besieged, it will perhaps be impossible to send a message to you. But
if--as I hope--I go to Aquila, I will send you word of it.”

“To Aquila?”

“Yes. It may be that I shall be at Aquila before the week is out. But
keep it secret, Fanfulla, and I'll fool these dukes to the very top of
their unhealthy bent.”

A half-hour later the Count of Aquila, mounted on a stout Calabrian
horse, and attended by Lanciotto on a mule, rode gently down towards the
valley. They went unnoticed, for what cared for them the peasants that
sang at their labours in the contado?

They met a merchant, whose servant was urging his laden sumpters up
the hilly road to the city on the heights, and they passed him with a
courteous greeting. Farther they came upon a mounted company of nobles
and ladies, returning from a hawking party, and followed by attendants
bearing their hooded falcons, and their gay laughter still rang in
Francesco's ears after he had passed from their sight and vanished in
the purple mists of eventide that came up to meet him from the river.

They turned westward towards the Apennines, and pushed on after night
had fallen, until the fourth hour, when at Francesco's suggestion they
drew rein before a sleepy, wayside locanda, and awoke the host to demand
shelter. There they slept no longer than until matins, so that the grey
light of dawn saw them once more upon their way, and by the time the sun
had struck with its first golden shaft the grey crest of the old hills,
they drew rein on the brink of the roaring torrent at the foot of the
mighty crag that was crowned by the Castle of Roccaleone.

Grim and gaunt it loomed above the fertile vale, with that torrent
circling it in a natural moat, like a giant sentinel of the Apennines
that were its background. And now the sunlight raced down the slopes of
the old mountains like a tide. It smote the square tower of the keep,
then flowed adown the wall, setting the old grey stone a-gleaming, and
flashing back from a mullioned window placed high up. Lower it came,
revealing grotesque gargoyles, flooding the crenellated battlements and
turning green the ivy and lichen that but a moment back had blackened
the stout, projecting buttresses. Thence it leapt to the ground, and
drove the shadow before it down the grassy slope, until it reached
the stream and sparkled on its foaming, tumbling waters, scattering a
hundred colours through the flying spray.

And all that time, until the sun had reached him and included him in the
picture it was awakening, the Count of Aquila sat in his saddle, with
thoughtful eyes uplifted to the fortress.

Then, Lanciotto following him, he walked his horse round the western
side, where the torrent was replaced by a smooth arm of water, for
which a cutting had been made to complete the isolation of the crag of
Roccaleone. But here, where the castle might more easily have become
vulnerable, a blank wall greeted him, broken by no more than a narrow
slit or two midway below the battlements. He rode on towards the
northern side, crossing a footbridge that spanned the river, and at
last coming to a halt before the entrance tower. Here again the moat was
formed by the torrential waters of the mountain stream.

He bade his servant rouse the inmates, and Lanciotto hallooed in a voice
that nature had made deep and powerful. The echo of it went booming up
to scare the birds on the hillside, but evoked no answer from the silent
castle.

“They keep a zealous watch,” laughed the Count. “Again, Lanciotto.”

The man obeyed him, and again and again his deep voice rang out like a
trumpet-call before sign was made from within that it had been heard.
At length, above the parapet of the tower appeared a stunted figure with
head unkempt, as grotesque almost as any of the gargoyles beneath, and
an owlish face peered at them from one of the crenels of the battlement,
and demanded, in surly, croaking tones their business. Instantly the
Count recognised Peppe.

“Good morrow, fool,” he bade him.

“You, my lord?” exclaimed the jester.

“You sleep soundly at Roccaleone,” quoth Francesco. “Bestir that knavish
garrison of yours, and bid the lazy dogs let down the bridge. I have
news for Monna Valentina.”

“At once, Excellency,” the fool replied, and would have gone upon the
instant but that Francesco recalled him.

“Say, Peppe, a knight--the knight she met at Acquasparta, if you will.
But leave my name unspoken.”

With the assurance that he would obey his wishes Peppe went his errand.
A slight delay ensued, and then upon the battlements appeared Gonzaga,
sleepy and contentious, attended by a couple of Fortemani's knaves, who
came to ask the nature of Francesco's business.

“It is with Monna Valentina,” answered him Francesco, raising head
and voice, so that Gonzaga recognised him for the wounded knight of
Acquasparta, remembered and scowled.

“I am Monna Valentina's captain here,” he announced, with arrogance.
“And you may deliver to me such messages as you bear.”

There followed a contention, conducted ill-humouredly on the part of
Gonzaga and scarcely less so on the Count's, Francesco stoutly refusing
to communicate his business to any but Valentina, and Gonzaga as stoutly
refusing to disturb the lady at that hour, or to lower the bridge. Words
flew between them across the waters of the moat, and grew hotter at each
fresh exchange, till in the end they were abruptly terminated by the
appearance of Valentina herself, attended by Peppino.

“What is this, Gonzaga?” she inquired, her manner excited, for the fool
had told her that it was the knight Francesco who sought admittance,
and at the very mention of the name she had flushed, then paled, then
started for the ramparts. “Why is this knight denied admittance since
he bears a message for me?” And from where she stood she sought
with admiring eyes the graceful shape of the Count of Aquila--the
knight-errant of her dreams. Francesco bared his head, and bent to
the withers of his horse in courteous greeting. She turned to Gonzaga
impatiently.

“For what do you wait?” she cried. “Have you not understood my wishes?
Let the bridge be lowered.”

“Bethink you, Madonna,” he remonstrated. “You do not know this man. He
may be a spy of Gian Maria's--a hireling paid to betray us.”

“You fool,” she answered sharply. “Do you not see that it is the wounded
knight we met that day you were escorting me to Urbino?”

“What shall that signify?” demanded he. “Is it proof of his honesty of
purpose or loyalty to you? Be advised, Madonna, and let him deliver his
message from where he is. He is safer there.”

She measured him with a determined eye.

“Messer Gonzaga, order them to lower the bridge,” she bade him.

“But, lady, bethink you of your peril.”

“Peril?” she echoed. “Peril from two men, and we a garrison of over
twenty? Surely the man is a coward who talks so readily of perils. Have
the drawbridge lowered.”

“But if----” he began, with a desperate vehemence, when again she cut
him short.

“Am I to be obeyed? Am I mistress, and will you bid them lower the
bridge, or must I, myself, go see to it?”

With a look of despairing anger and a shrug of the shoulders he turned
from her, and despatched one of his men with an order. A few moments
later, with a creaking of hinges and a clanking of chains, the great
bridge swung down and dropped with a thud to span the gulf. Instantly
the Count spurred his horse forward, and followed by Lanciotto rode
across the plank and under the archway of the entrance tower into the
first courtyard.

Now, scarcely had he drawn rein there when through a door at the far end
appeared the gigantic figure of Fortemani, half-clad and sword in hand.
At sight of Francesco the fellow leaped down a half-dozen steps, and
advanced towards him with a burst of oaths.

“To me!” he shouted, in a voice that might have waked the dead. “Olá!
Olá! What devil's work is this? How come you here? By whose orders was
the bridge let down?”

“By the orders of Monna Valentina's captain,” answered Francesco,
wondering what madman might be this.

“Captain?” cried the other, coming to a standstill and his face turning
purple. “Body of Satan! What captain? I am captain here.”

The Count looked him over in surprise.

“Why, then,” said he, “you are the very man I seek. I congratulate you
on the watch you keep, Messer Capitano. Your castle is so excellently
patrolled that had I been minded for a climb I had scaled your walls and
got within your gates without arousing any of your slumbering sentries.”

Fortemani eyed him with a lowering glance. The prosperity of the past
four days had increased the insolence inherent in the man.

“Is that your affair?” he growled menacingly. “You are over-bold, sir
stranger, to seek a quarrel with me, and over-pert to tell me how I
shall discharge my captaincy. By the Passion! You shall be punished.”

“Punished--I?” echoed Francesco, on whose brow there now descended a
scowl as black as Ercole's own.

“Aye, punished, young sir. Ercole Fortemani is my name.”

“I have heard of you,” answered the Count contemptuously, “and of how
you belie that name of yours, for they tell me that a more drunken,
cowardly, good-for-nothing rogue is not to be found in Italy--no, not
even in the Pope's dominions. And have a care how you cast the word
'punishment' at your betters, animal. The moat is none so distant, and
the immersion may profit you. For I'll swear you've not been washed
since they baptized you--if, indeed, you be a son of Mother Church at
all.”

“Sangue di Cristo!” spluttered the enraged bully, his face mottled.
“This to me? Come down from that horse.”

He laid hold of Francesco's leg to drag him to the ground, but the Count
wrenched it free by a quick motion that left a gash from his spur upon
the captain's hands. Simultaneously he raised his whip, and would have
laid the lash of it across the broad of Fortemani's back--for it had
angered him beyond words to have a ruffian of this fellow's quality
seeking to ruffle it with him--but at that moment a female voice, stern
and imperative, bade them hold in their quarrel.

Fortemani fell back nursing his lacerated hand and muttering curses,
whilst Francesco turned in the direction whence that voice had come.
Midway on the flight of stone steps he beheld Valentina, followed
by Gonzaga, Peppe, and a couple of men-at-arms, descending from the
battlements.

Calm and queenly she stood, dressed in a camorra of grey velvet with
black sleeves, which excellently set off her handsome height. Gonzaga
was leaning forward, speaking into her ear, and for all that his voice
was subdued, some of his words travelled down to Francesco on the still,
morning air.

“Was I not wise, Madonna, in that I hesitated to admit him? You see what
manner of man he is.”

The blood flamed in Francesco's cheeks, nor did it soften his chagrin to
note the look which Valentina flashed down at him.

Instantly he leapt to the ground, and flinging his reins to Lanciotto
he went forward to the foot of that stone staircase, his broad hat slung
back upon his shoulders, to meet that descending company.

“Is this seemly, sir?” she questioned angrily. “Does it become you to
brawl with my garrison the moment you are admitted?”

The blood rose higher in Francesco's face, and now suffused his temples
and reached his hair. Yet his voice was well restrained as he made
answer:

“Madonna, this knave was insolent.”

“An insolence that you no doubt provoked,” put in Gonzaga, a dimple
showing on his woman's cheek. But the sterner rebuke fell from the lips
of Valentina.

“Knave?” she questioned, with flushed countenance. “If you would not
have me regret your admittance, Messer Francesco, I pray you curb your
words. Here are no knaves. That, sir, is the captain of my soldiers.”

Francesco bowed submissively, as patient under her reproof as he had
been hasty under Fortemani's.

“It was on the matter of this captaincy that we fell to words,” he
answered, with more humility. “By his own announcement I understood this
nobleman”--and his eyes turned to Gonzaga--“to be your captain.”

“He is the captain of my castle,” she informed him.

“As you see, Ser Francesco,” put in Peppe, who had perched himself upon
the balustrade, “we suffer from no lack of captains here. We have also
Fra Domenico, who is captain of our souls and of the kitchen; myself am
captain of----”

“Devil take you, fool,” snapped Gonzaga, thrusting him roughly from his
perch. Then turning abruptly to the Count: “You bear a message for us,
sir?” he questioned loftily.

Swallowing the cavalier tone, and overlooking the pronoun Gonzaga
employed, Francesco inclined his head again to the lady.

“I should prefer to deliver it in more privacy than this.” And his
eye travelled round the court and up the steps behind, where was now
collected the entire company of Fortemani. Gonzaga sneered and tossed
his golden curls, but Valentina saw naught unreasonable in the request,
and bidding Romeo attend her and Francesco follow, she led the way.

They crossed the quadrangle, and, mounting the steps down which
Fortemani had dashed to meet the Count, they passed into the
banqueting-hall, which opened directly upon the south side of the
courtyard. The Count, following in her wake, ran the gauntlet of scowls
of the assembled mercenaries. He stalked past them unmoved, taking their
measure as he went, and estimating their true value with the unerring
eye of the practised condottiero who has had to do with the enrolling of
men and the handling of them. So little did he like their looks that on
the threshold of the hall he paused and stayed Gonzaga.

“I am loath to leave my servant at the mercy of those ruffians, sir. May
I beg that you will warn them against offering him violence?”

“Ruffians?” cried the lady angrily, before Gonzaga could offer a reply.
“They are my soldiers.”

Again he bowed, and there was a cold politeness in the tones in which he
answered her:

“I crave your pardon, and I will say no more--unless it be to deplore
that I may not felicitate you on your choice.”

It was Gonzaga's turn to wax angry, for the choice had been his.

“Your message will have need to be a weighty one, sir, to earn our
patience for your impertinence.”

Francesco returned the look of those blue eyes which vainly sought to
flash ferociously, and he made little attempt to keep his scorn from
showing in his glance. He permitted himself even to shrug his shoulders
a trifle impatiently.

“Indeed, indeed, I think that I had best begone,” he answered
regretfully, “for it is a place whose inmates seem all bent on
quarrelling with me. First your captain Fortemani greets me with an
insolence hard to leave unpunished. You, yourself, Madonna, resent that
I should crave protection for my man against those fellows whose looks
give rise for my solicitation. You are angry that I should dub them
ruffians, as if I had followed the calling of arms these ten years
without acquiring knowledge of the quality of a man however much you may
disguise him. And lastly, to crown all, this cicisbeo”--and he spread a
hand contemptuously towards Gonzaga--“speaks of my impertinences.”

“Madonna,” cried Gonzaga, “I beg that you will let me deal with him.”

Unwittingly, unwillingly, Gonzaga saved the situation by that prayer.
The anger that was fast rising in Madonna's heart, stirred by the proud
bearing of the Count, was scattered before the unconscious humour of her
captain's appeal, in such ludicrous contrast was his mincing speech and
slender figure with Francesco's firm tones and lean, active height.
She did not laugh, for that would have been to have spoilt all, but she
looked from one to the other with quiet relish, noting the glance
of surprise and raised eyebrows with which the Count received the
courtier's request to be let deal with him. And thus, being turned
from anger, the balance of her mind was quick to adjust itself, and
she bethought her that perhaps there was reason in what this knight
advanced, and that his reception had lacked the courtesy that was his
due. In a moment, with incomparable grace and skill, she had soothed
Gonzaga's ruffled vanity, and appeased the Count's more sturdy
resentment.

“And now, Messer Francesco,” she concluded, “let us be friends, and let
me hear your business. I beg that you will sit.”

They had passed into the banqueting-hall--a noble apartment, whose walls
were frescoed with hunting and pastoral scenes, one or two of which
were the work of Pisaniello. There were, too, some stray trophies of
the chase, and, here and there, a suit of costly armour that caught the
sunlight pouring through the tall, mullioned windows. At the far end
stood a richly carved screen of cedar, and above this appeared the
twisted railing of the minstrels' gallery. In a tall armchair of
untanned leather, at the head of the capacious board, Monna Valentina
sat herself, Gonzaga taking his stand at her elbow, and Francesco
fronting her, leaning lightly against the table.

“The news I bear you, lady, is soon told,” said the Count. “I would its
quality were better. Your suitor Gian Maria returning to Guidobaldo's
court, eager for the nuptials that were promised him, has learnt of your
flight to Roccaleone and is raising--indeed will have raised by now--an
army to invest and reduce your fortress.”

Gonzaga turned as pale as the vest of white silk that gleamed beneath
his doublet of pearl-coloured velvet at this realisation of the
prophecies he had uttered without believing. A sickly fear possessed
his soul. What fate would they mete out to him who had been the leading
spirit in Valentina's rebellion? He could have groaned aloud at this
miscarriage of all his fine plans. Where now would be the time to talk
of love, to press and carry his suit with Valentina and render himself
her husband? There would be war in the air, and bloody work that made
his skin creep and turn cold to ponder on. And the irony of it all
was keenly cruel. It was the very contingency that he had prophesied,
assured that neither Guidobaldo nor Gian Maria would be so mad as to
court ridicule by engaging upon it.

For a second Francesco's eyes rested on the courtier's face, and saw the
fear written there for all to read. The shadow of a smile quivered on
his lips as his glance moved on to meet the eyes of Valentina, sparkling
as sparkles frost beneath the sun.

“Why, let them come!” she exclaimed, almost in exultation. “This ducal
oaf shall find me very ready for him. We are armed at all points. We
have victuals to last us three months, if need be, and we have no lack
of weapons. Let Gian Maria come, and he will find Valentina della Rovere
none so easy to reduce. To you, sir,” she continued, with more calm, “to
you on whom I have no claim, I am more than grateful for your chivalrous
act in riding here to warn me.”

Francesco sighed; a look of regret crossed his face.

“Alas!” he said. “When I rode hither, Madonna, I had hoped to serve you
to a better purpose. I had advice to offer and assistance if you should
need it; but the sight of those men-at-arms of yours makes me fear that
it is not advice upon which it would be wise to act. For the plan I had
in mind, it would be of the first importance that your soldiers should
be trustworthy, and this, I fear me, they are not.”

“Nevertheless,” put in Gonzaga feverishly, clinging to a slender hope,
“let us hear it.”

“I beg that you will,” said Valentina.

Thus enjoined, Francesco pondered a moment.

“Are you acquainted with the politics of Babbiano?” he inquired.

“I know something of them.”

“I will make the position quite clear to you, Madonna,” he rejoined. And
with that he told her of the threatened descent of Caesar Borgia upon
Gian Maria's duchy, and hence, of the little time at her suitor's
disposal; so that if he could but be held in check before the walls of
Roccaleone for a little while, all might be well. “But seeing in
what haste he is,” he ended, “his methods are likely to be rough and
desperate, and I had thought that meanwhile you need not remain here,
Madonna.”

“Not remain?” she cried, scorn of the notion in her voice. “Not remain?”
 quoth Gonzaga timorously, hope sounding in his.

“Precisely, Madonna. I would have proposed that you leave Gian Maria
an empty nest, so that even if the castle should fall into his hands he
would gain nothing.”

“You would advise me to fly?” she demanded.

“I came prepared to do so, but the sight of your men restrains me. They
are not trustworthy, and to save their dirty skins they might throw
Roccaleone open to the besiegers, and thus your flight would be
discovered, while yet there might be time to render it futile.”

Before she could frame an answer there was Gonzaga feverishly urging her
to act upon so wise and timely a suggestion, and seek safety in flight
from a place that Gian Maria would tear stone from stone. His words
pattered quickly and piteously in entreaty, till in the end, facing him
squarely:

“Are you afraid, Gonzaga?” she asked him.

“I am--afraid for you, Madonna,” he answered readily.

“Then let your fears have peace. For whether I stay or whether I go, one
thing is certain: Gian Maria never shall set hands upon me.” She turned
again to Francesco. “I see a certain wisdom in the counsel of flight
you would have offered me, no less than in what I take to be your advice
that I should remain. Did I but consult my humour I should stay and
deliver battle when this tyrant shows himself. But prudence, too, must
be consulted, and I will give the matter thought.” And now she thanked
him with a generous charm for having come to her with this news and
proffered his assistance, asking what motives brought him.

“Such motives as must ever impel a knight to serve a lady in distress,”
 said he, “and perhaps, too, the memory of the charity with which you
tended my wounds that day at Acquasparta.”

For a second their glances met, quivered in the meeting, and fell apart
again, an odd confusion in the breast of each, all of which Gonzaga,
sunk in moody rumination, observed not. To lighten the awkward silence
that was fallen, she asked him how it had transpired so soon that it was
to Roccaleone she had fled.

“Do you not know?” he cried. “Has not Peppe told you?”

“I have had no speech with him. He but reached the castle, himself, late
last night, and I first saw him this morning when he came to announce
your presence.”

And then, before more could be said, there arose a din of shouting from
without. The door was pushed suddenly open, and Peppe darted into the
room.

“Your man, Ser Francesco,” he cried, his face white with excitement.
“Come quickly, or they will kill him.”

CHAPTER XIV. FORTEMANI DRINKS WATER

The thing had begun with the lowering glances that Francesco had
observed, and had grown to gibes and insults after he had disappeared.
But Lanciotto had preserved an unruffled front, being a man schooled in
the Count of Aquila's service to silence and a wondrous patience. This
insensibility those hinds translated into cowardice, and emboldened
by it--like the mongrels that they were--their offensiveness grew more
direct and gradually more threatening. Lanciotto's patience was slowly
oozing away, and indeed, it was no longer anything but the fear of
provoking his master's anger that restrained him. At length one burly
ruffian, who had bidden him remove his head-piece in the company of
gentlemen, and whose request had been by Lanciotto as disregarded as
the rest, advanced menacingly towards him and caught him by the leg, as
Ercole had caught his master. Exasperated at that, Lanciotto had swung
his leg free, and caught the rash fellow a vicious kick in the face that
had felled him, stunned and bleeding.

The roar from the man's companions told Lanciotto what to expect. In an
instant they were upon him, clamouring for his blood. He sought to draw
his master's sword, which together with the Count's other armour was
slung across his saddle-bow; but before he could extricate it, he was
seized by a dozen hands, and cropped, fighting, from the saddle. On the
ground they overpowered him, and a mailed hand was set upon his mouth,
crushing back into his throat the cry for help he would have raised.

On the west side of the courtyard a fountain issuing from the wall
had once poured its water through a lion's head into a vast tank of
moss-grown granite. But it had been disused for some time, and the pipe
in the lion's mouth was dry. The tank, however, was more than half full
of water, which, during the late untenanting of the castle, had turned
foul and stagnant. To drown Lanciotto in this was the amiable suggestion
that emanated from Fortemani himself--a suggestion uproariously received
by his knaves, who set themselves to act upon it. They roughly dragged
the bleeding and frantically struggling Lanciotto across the yard and
gained the border of the tank, intending fully to sink him into it and
hold him under, to drown there like a rat.

But in that instant a something burst upon him like a bolt from out of
Heaven. In one or two, and presently in more, the cruel laughter turned
to sudden howls of pain as a lash of bullock-hide caught them about head
and face and shoulders.

“Back there, you beasts, you animals, back!” roared a voice of thunder,
and back they went unquestioning before that pitiless lash, like the
pack of craven hounds they were.

It was Francesco, who, single-handed, and armed with no more than a
whip, was scattering them from about his maltreated servant, as the hawk
scatters a flight of noisy sparrows. And now between him and Lanciotto
there stood no more than the broad bulk of Ercole Fortemani, his back to
the Count; for, as yet, he had not realised the interruption.

Francesco dropped his whip, and setting one hand at the captain's
girdle, and the other at his dirty neck, he hoisted him up with a
strength incredible, and hurled him from his path and into the slimy
water of the tank.

There was a mighty roar drowned in a mightier splash as Fortemani,
spread-eagle, struck the surface and sank from sight, whilst with the
flying spray there came a fetid odour to tell of the unsavouriness of
that unexpected bath.

Without pausing to see the completion of his work, Francesco stooped
over his prostrate servant.

“Have the beasts hurt you, Lanciotto?” he questioned. But before the
fellow could reply, one of those hinds had sprung upon the stooping
Count, and struck him with a dagger between the shoulder-blades.

A woman's alarmed cry rang out, for Valentina was watching the affray
from the steps of the hall, with Gonzaga at her elbow.

But Francesco's quilted brigandine had stood the test of steel, and the
point of that assassin's dagger glanced harmlessly aside, doing no worse
hurt than a rent in the silk surface of the garment. A second later
the fellow found himself caught as in a bond of steel. The dagger was
wrenched from his grasp, and the point of it laid against his breast
even as the Count forced him down upon his knees.

In a flash was the thing done, yet to the wretched man who saw himself
upon the threshold of Eternity, and who--like a true son of the
Church--had a wholesome fear of hell, it seemed an hour whilst, with
livid cheeks and eyes starting from his head, he waited for that poniard
to sink into his heart, as it was aimed. But not in his heart did the
blow fall. With a sudden snort of angry amusement, the Count pitched the
dagger from him and brought down his clenched fist with a crushing force
into the ruffian's face. The fellow sank unconscious beneath that mighty
blow, and Francesco, regaining the whip that lay almost at his feet,
rose up to confront what others there might be.

From the tank, standing breast-deep in that stinking water, his head