THE SHAME OF MOTLEY

Being the Memoir of Certain Transactions in the Life of LazzaroBiancomonte, of Biancomonte, sometime Fool of the Court of Pesaro. 

By Rafael Sabatini

CONTENTS

 PART I

 FLOWER OF THE QUINCE

 CHAPTER

 I. THE CARDINAL OF VALENCIA

 II. THE LIVERIES OF SANTAFIOR

 III. MADONNA PAOLA

 IV. THE COZENING OF RAMIRO

 V. MADONNA'S INGRATITUDE

 VI. FOOL'S LUCK

 VII. THE SUMMONS FROM ROME

 VIII. "MENE, MENE, TEKEL, UPHARSIN"

 IX. THE FOOL-AT-ARMS

 X. THE FALL OF PESARO

 PART II

 THE OGRE OF CESENA

 XI. MADONNA'S SUMMONS

 XII. THE GOVERNOR OF CESENA

 XIII. POISON

 XIV. REQUIESCAT!

 XV. AN ILL ENCOUNTER

 XVI. IN THE CITADEL OF CESENA

 XVII. THE SENESCHAL

 XVIII. THE LETTER

 XIX. DOOMED

 XX. THE SUNSET

 XXI. AVE CAESAR!

PART I. FLOWER OF THE QUINCE

CHAPTER I. THE CARDINAL OF VALENCIA

For three days I had been cooling my heels about the Vatican, vexed bysuspense. It fretted me that I should have been so lightly dealt withafter I had discharged the mission that had brought me all the way fromPesaro, and I wondered how long it might be ere his Most IllustriousExcellency the Cardinal of Valencia might see fit to offer me thehonourable employment with which Madonna Lucrezia had promised me thathe would reward the service I had rendered the House of Borgia by myjourney. 

Three days were sped, yet nought had happened to signify that thingswould shape the course by me so ardently desired; that the means wouldbe afforded me of mending my miserable ways, and repairing the wreckmy life had suffered on the shoals of Fate. True, I had been housed andfed, and the comforts of indolence had been mine; but, for the rest, Iwas still clothed in the livery of folly which I had worn on my arrival, and, wherever I might roam, there followed ever at my heels a crowd ofunderlings, seeking to have their tedium lightened by jests and capers, and voting me--when their hopes proved barren--the sorriest Fool thathad ever worn the motley. 

On that third day I speak of, my patience tried to its last strand, Ihad beaten a lacquey with my hands, and fled from the cursed gibes hisfellows aimed at me, out into the misty gardens and the chill Januaryair, whose sting I could, perhaps, the better disregard by virtue ofthe heat of indignation that consumed me. Was it ever to be so with me?Could nothing lift the curse of folly from me, that I must ever be aFool, and worse, the sport of other fools?

It was there on one of the terraces crowning the splendid heights aboveimmortal Rome that Messer Gianluca found me. He greeted me courteously;I answered with a snarl, deeming him come to pursue the plaguing fromwhich I had fled. 

"His Most Illustrious Excellency the Cardinal of Valencia is asking foryou, Messer Boccadoro, " he announced. And so despairing had been my moodof ever hearing such a summons that, for a moment, I accounted it somefresh jest of theirs. But the gravity of his fat countenance reassuredme. 

"Let us go, then, " I answered with alacrity, and so confident was I thatthe interview to which he bade me was the first step along the road tobetter fortune, that I permitted myself a momentary return to the Fool'sestate from which I thought myself on the point of being for ever freed. 

"I shall use the interview to induce his Excellency to submit a tenthbeatitude to the approval of our Holy Father: Blessed are the bearers ofgood tidings. Come on, Messer the seneschal. "

I led the way, in my impatience forgetful of his great paunch and littlelegs, so that he was sorely tried to keep pace with me. Yet who wouldnot have been in haste, urged by such a spur as had I? Here, then, wasthe end of my shameful travesty. To-morrow a soldier's harness shouldreplace the motley of a jester; the name by which I should be knownagain to men would be that of Lazzaro Biancomonte, and no longerBoccadoro--the Fool of the golden mouth. 

Thus much had Madonna Lucrezia's promises led me to expect, and it waswith a soul full of joyous expectation that I entered the great man'scloset. 

He received me in a manner calculated to set me at my ease, and yetthere was about him a something that overawed me. Cesare Borgia, Cardinal of Valencia, was then in his twenty-third year, for allthat there hung about him the semblance of a greater age, just as hiscardinalitial robes lent him the appearance of a height far above themiddle stature that was his own. His face was pale and framed in a silkyauburn beard; his nose was aquiline and strong; his eyes the keenestthat I have ever seen; his forehead lofty and intelligent. He seemedpervaded by an air of feverish restlessness, something surpassing thevivida vis animi, something that marked him to discerning eyes for a manof incessant action of body and of mind. 

"My sister tells me, " he said in greeting, "that you are willing to takeservice under me, Messer Biancomonte. "

"Such was the hope that guided me to Rome, Most Excellent, " I answeredhim. 

Surprise flashed into his eyes, and was gone as quickly as it had come. His thin lips parted in a smile, whose meaning was inscrutable. 

"As some reward for the safe delivery of the letter you brought me fromher?" he questioned mildly. 

"Precisely, Illustrious, " I answered in all frankness. 

His open hand smote the table of wood-mosaics at which he sat. 

"Praised be Heaven!" he cried. "You seem to promise that I shall have inyou a follower who deals in truth. "

"Could your Excellency, to whom my real name is known, expect ought elseof one who bears it--however unworthily?"

There was amusement in his glance. 

"Can you still swagger it, after having worn that livery for threeyears?" he asked, and his lean forefinger pointed at my hideous motleyof red and black and yellow. 

I flushed and hung my head, and--as if to mock that very expressionof my shame--the bells on my cap gave forth a silvery tinkle at themovement. 

"Excellency, spare me, " I murmured. "Did you know all my miserable storyyou would be merciful. Did you know with what joy I turned my back onthe Court of Pesaro--"

"Aye, " he broke in mockingly, "when Giovanni Sforza threatened to haveyou hanged for the overboldness of your tongue. Not until then did itoccur to you to turn from the shameful life in which the best yearsof your manhood were being wasted. There! Just now I commended yourtruthfulness; but the truth that dwells in you is no more, it seems, than the truth we may look for in the mouth of Folly. At heart, I fear, you are a hypocrite, Messer Biancomonte; the worst form of hypocrite--ahypocrite to your own self. "

"Did your Excellency know all!" I cried. 

"I know enough, " he answered, with stern sorrow; "enough to make memarvel that the son of Ettore Biancomonte of Biancomonte should play theFool to Costanzo Sforza, Lord of Pesaro. Oh you will tell me that youwent there for revenge, to seek to right the wrong his father did yourfather. "

"It was, it was!" I cried, with heated vehemence. "Be flames everlastingthe dwelling of my soul if any other motive drove me to this shamefultrade. "

There was a pause. His beautiful eyes flamed with a sudden light as theyrested on me. Then the lids drooped demurely, and he drew a deep breath. But when he spoke there was scorn in his voice. 

"And, no doubt, it was that same motive kept you there, at peace forthree whole years, in slothful ease, the motleyed Fool, jesting andcapering for his enemy's delectation--you, a man with the knightlymemory of your foully-wronged parent to cry hourly shame upon you. Nodoubt you lacked the opportunity to bring the tyrant to account. Or wasit that you were content to let him make a mock of you so long as hehoused and fed you and clothed you in your garish livery of shame?

"Spare me, Excellency, " I cried again. "Of your charity let my past bedone with. When he drove me forth with threats of hanging, from whichyour gracious sister saved me, I turned my steps to Rome at her biddingto--"

"To find honourable employment at my hands, " he interrupted quietly. Then suddenly rising, and speaking in a voice of thunder--"And what, then, of your revenge?" he cried. 

"It has been frustrated, " I answered lamely. "Sufficient do I accountthe ruin that already I have wrought in my life by the pursuit of thatphantom. I was trained to arms, my lord. Let me discard for good thesetawdry rags, and strap a soldier's harness to my back. "

"How came you to journey hither thus?" he asked, suddenly turning thesubject. 

"It was Madonna Lucrezia's wish. She held that my errand would be saferso, for a Fool may travel unmolested. "

He nodded that he understood, and paced the chamber with bowed head. Fora spell there was silence, broken only by the soft fall of his slipperedfeet and the swish of his silken purple. At last he paused before me andlooked up into my face--for I was a good head taller than he was. Hisfingers combed his auburn beard, and his beautiful eyes were full onmine. 

"That was a wise precaution of my sister's, " he approved. "I will takea lesson from her in the matter. I have employment for you, MesserBiancomonte. "

I bowed my head in token of my gratitude. 

"You shall find me diligent and faithful, my lord, " I promised him. 

"I know it, " he sniffed, "else should I not employ you. "

He turned from me, and stepped back to his table. He took up a package, fingered it a moment, then dropped it again, and shot me one of hisquiet glances. 

"That is my answer to Madonna Lucrezia's letter, " he said slowly, hisvoice as smooth as silk, "and I desire that you shall carry it to Pesarofor me, and deliver it safely and secretly into her hands. "

I could do no more than stare at him. It seemed as if my mind werestricken numb. 

"Well?" he asked at last; and in his voice there was now a suggestion ofsteel beneath the silk. "Do you hesitate?"

"And if I do, " I answered, suddenly finding my voice, "I do no more thanmight a bolder man. How can I, who am banned by punishment of death, contrive to penetrate again into the Court of Pesaro and reach the LadyLucrezia?"

"That is a matter that I shall leave to the shrewd wit which all Italysays is the heritage of Boccadoro, the Prince of Fools. Does the taskdaunt you?" His glance and voice were alike harsh. 

In very truth it did, and I told him so, but in the terms which theshrewd wit he said was mine dictated. 

"I hesitate, my lord, indeed; but more because I fear the frustrationof your own ends--whatever they may be--than because I dread to earna broken neck by again adventuring into Pesaro. Would not some othermessenger--unknown at the Court of Giovanni Sforza--be in better case toacquit himself of such a task?

"Yes, if I had one I could trust, " he answered frankly. 

"I will be open with you, Biancomonte. There are such grave matters atissue, there are such secrets confided to that paper, that I would notfor a kingdom, not for our Holy Father's triple crown, that they shouldfall into alien hands. "

He approached me again, and his slender hand, upon which the sacredamethyst was glowing, fell lightly on my shoulder. He lowered his voice"You are the man, the one man in Italy, whose interests are bound upwith mine in this; therefore are you the one man to whom I can entrustthat package. "

"I?" I gasped in amazement--as well I might, for what interests hadBoccadoro, the Fool, in common with Cesare Borgia, Cardinal of Valencia?

"You, " he answered vehemently, "you, Lazzaro Biancomonte of Biancomonte, whose father Costanzo of Pesaro stripped of his domains. The matters inthose papers mean the ruin of the Lord of Pesaro. We are all but ripe tostrike at him from Rome and when we strike he shall be so disfiguredby the blow that all Italy shall hold its sides to laugh at the sorryfigure he will cut. I would not say so much to any other living man butyou and if I tell it you it is because I need your aid. "

"The lion and mouse, " I murmured. 

"Why yes, if you will. "

"And this man is the husband of your sister!" I exclaimed, almostinvoluntarily. 

"Does that imply a doubt of what I have said?" he flashed, his headthrown back, his brows drawn suddenly together. 

"No, no, " I hastened to assure him. He smiled softly. 

"Maddonna Lucrezia knows all--or nearly all. Of what else she may needto learn, that letter will inform her. It is the last thread, the lastknot needed, before we can complete the net in which we are to hold thattyrant? Now, will you bear the letter?"

Would I bear it? Dear God! To achieve the end in view I would havespent my remaining days in motley, making sport for grooms andkitchen wenches. Some such answer did I make him, and he smiled hissatisfaction. 

"You shall journey as you are, " he bade me. "I am guided by my sister, assured that the coat of a Fool is stouter protection than the besthauberk ever tempered. When you have done your errand come you back tome, and you shall have employment better suited to one who bears thename of Biancomonte. "

"You may depend upon me in this, my lord, " I promised gravely. "I shallnot fail you. "

"It is well" said he; and those wondrous eyes of his rested again uponmy face. "How soon can you set out?"

"At once, my lord. Does not the by-word say that a fool makes littlepreparation for a journey?"

He nodded, and moved to a coffer, a beautiful piece of Venetian work inultramarine and gold. From this he took a heavy bag. 

"There, " said he, "you will find the best of all travelling companions. "I thanked him, and set the bag on the crook of my left arm, and by itsweight I knew how true he was to the notorious splendour of his race. "And this, " said he, "is a talisman that may serve to help you out ofany evil plight, and open many a door that you may find locked. " And hehanded me a signet ring on which was graven the steer that is the emblemof the House of Borgia. 

He raised aloft the hand on which was glistening the sacredamethyst--two fingers crooked and two erect. Wondering what this shouldmean, I stared inquiry. 

"Kneel, " he bade me. And realising what he would be about, I sank onto my knees whilst he murmured the Apostolic benediction over my bowedhead. The rushes of the floor were the only witnesses of the smile thatcrept to my lips at this sudden assumption of his churchly office bythat most worldly prince. 

CHAPTER II. THE LIVERIES OF SANTAFIOR

Such preparations as I had to make were soon complete. 

Although it was agreed that I was to travel in the motley, yet, in mylately-born shame of that apparel, I decided that I would conceal it asbest might be, revealing it only should the need arise. Moreover, itwas incumbent that I should afford myself more protection against theinclement January night than that of my foliated cape, my crested capand silken hose. So, a black cloak, heavy and ample, a broad-brimmedhat, and a pair of riding boots of untanned leather were my furtherequipment. In the lining of one of those boots I concealed the LordCesare's package; his money--some twenty ducats--I carried in a beltabout my waist, and his ring I set boldly on my finger. 

Few moments did it need me to make ready, yet fewer, it seems, wouldthe Borgia impatience have had me employ; for scarce was I booted whensomeone knocked at my door. I opened, and there entered a very mountainof a man, whose corselet flashed back the yellow light of my tapers, asmight have done a mirror, and whose harsh voice barked out to ask if Iwas ready. 

I had had some former acquaintance with this fellow, having first methim during the previous year, on the occasion of the Court of Pesaro'ssojourn at Rome. His name was Ramiro del' Orca, and throughout the Papalarmy it stood synonymous for masterfulness and grim brutality. He was, as I have said, an enormous man, of prodigious bodily strength, heavy, yet of good proportions. Of his face one gathered the impression of ablazing furnace. His cheeks and nose were of a vivid red, and still morefiery was the hair, now hidden 'neath his morion, and the beard thattapered to a dagger's point. His very eyes kept tune with the redharmony of his ferocious countenance, for the whites were ever bloodshotas a drunkard's--which, with no want of truth, men said he was. 

"Come, " grunted that fiery, self-sufficient vassal, "be stirring, sirFool. I have orders to see you to the gates. There is a horse readysaddled for you. It is the Lord Cardinal's parting gift. Resolve me now, which will be the greater ass--the one that rides, or the one that isridden?"

"O monstrous riddle!" I exclaimed, as I took up my cloak and hat. "Whoam I that I should solve it?"

"It baffles you, sir Fool?" quoth he. 

"In very truth it does. " I ruefully wagged my head so that my bells setup a jangle. "For the rider is a man and the ridden a horse. But, " Ipursued, in that back-biting strain, which is the very essence of thejester's wit, "were you to make a trio of us, including Messer Ramirodel' Orca, Captain in the army of his Holiness, no doubt would thenafflict me. I should never hesitate which of the three to pronounce theass. "

"What shall that mean?" he asked, with darkening brows. 

"That its meaning proves obscure to you confirms the verdict Iwas hinting at, " I taunted him. "For asses are notoriously of dullperceptions. " Then stepping forward briskly: "Come, sir, " I sharplyurged him, "whilst we engage upon this pretty play of wit, hisExcellency's business waits, which is an ill thing. Where is this horseyou spoke of?"

He showed me his strong, white teeth in a very evil smile. 

"Were it not for that same business--" he began. 

"You would do fine things, I am assured, " I interrupted him. 

"Would I not?" he snarled. "By the Host! I should be wringing your pertneck, or laying bare your bones with a thong of bullock-hide, you illconditioned Fool!"

I looked at him with pleasant, smiling eyes. 

"You confirm the opinion that is popularly held of you, " said I. 

"What may that be?" quoth he, his eyes very evil. "In Rome, I'm told, they call you hangman. "

He growled in his throat like an angered cur, and his hands were jerkedto the level of his breast, the fingers bending talon-wise. 

"Body of God!" he muttered fiercely, "I'll teach one fool, at least--"

"Let us cease these pleasantries, I entreat you, " I laughed. "Saintsdefend me! If your mood incline to raillery you'll find your match insome lad of the stables. As for me, I have not the time, had I the will, to engage you further. Let me remind you that I would be gone. "

The reminder was well-timed. He bethought him of the journey I must go, on which he was charged to see me safely started. 

"Come on, then, " he growled, in a white heat of passion that was onlycurbed by the consideration of that slender, pale young cardinal, hismaster. 

Still, some of his rage he vented in roughly taking me by the collarof my doublet, and dragging the almost headlong from the room, and soa-down a flight of steps out into the courtyard. Meet treatment for aFool--a treatment to which time might have inured me; for had I notfor three years already been exposed to rough usage of this kind at thehands of every man above the rank of groom? And had I once rebelled inact as I did in soul, and used the strength wherewith God endowed meto punish my ill-users, a whip would have reminded me into what sorryslavery had I sold myself when I put on the motley. 

It had been snowing for the past hour, and the ground was white in thecourtyard when we descended. 

At our appearance there was a movement of serving-men and a fall ofhoofs, muffled by the snow. Some held torches that cast a ruddy glareupon the all-encompassing whiteness, and a groom was leading forward thehorse that was destined to bear me. I donned my broad-brimmed hat, andwrapped my cloak about me. Some murmurs of farewell caught my ears, from those minions with whom I had herded during my three days at theVatican. Then Messer del' Orca thrust me forward. 

"Mount, Fool, and be off, " he rasped. 

I mounted, and turned to him. He was a surly dog; if ever surly dogwore human shape, and the shape was the only human thing about CaptainRamiro. 

"Brother, farewell, " I simpered. 

"No brother of yours, Fool, " snarled he. 

"True--my cousin only. The fool of art is no brother to the fool ofnature. "

"A whip!" he roared to his grooms. "Fetch me a whip. "

I left him calling for it, as I urged my nag across the snow andover the narrow drawbridge. Beyond, I stayed a moment to look over myshoulder. They stood gazing after me, a group of some half-dozen men, looking black against the whiteness of the ground. Behind them rose thebrown walls of the rocca illumined by the flare of torches, from whichthe smell of rosin reached my nostrils as I paused. I waved my hat tothem in token of farewell, and digging my spurless heels into the flanksof my horse, I ambled down through the biting wind and drifting snow, into the town. 

The streets were deserted and dark, save for the ray that here fell froma window, and there stole through the chink of a door to glow upon thesnow in earnest of the snug warmth within. Silence reigned, broken onlyby the moan of the wind under the eaves, for although it was no morethan approaching the second hour of night, yet who but the wight whomnecessity compelled would be abroad in such weather?

All night I rode despite that weather's foulness--a foulness that mighthave given pause to one whose haste to bear a letter was less attuned tohis own supreme desires. 

Betimes next morning I paused at a small locanda on the road toMagliano, and there I broke my fast and took some rest. My horse hadsuffered by the journey more than had I, and I would have taken a freshone at Magliano, but there was none to be had--so they told me--thisside of Narni, wherefore I was forced to set out once more upon thatpoor jaded beast that had carried me all night. 

It was high noon when I came, at last, to Narni, the last league of thejourney accomplished at a walk, for my nag could go no faster. Here Ipaused to dine, but here, again, they told me that no horses might behad. And so, leading by the bridle the animal I dared no longer ride, lest I should kill it outright, I entered the territory of Urbino onfoot, and trudged wearily amain through the snow that was some inchesdeep by now. In this miserable fashion I covered the seven leagues, orso, to Spoleto, where I arrived exhausted as night was falling. 

There, at the Osteria del Sole, I supped and lay. I found a company ofgentlemen in the common-room, who upon espying my motley--when I hadthrown off my sodden cloak and hat--pressed me, willy-nilly, intoamusing them. And so I spent the night at my Fool's trade, giving themdrolleries from the works of Boccacci and Sacchetti--the horn-books ofall jesters. 

I obtained a fresh horse next morning, and I set out betimes, intendingto travel with a better speed. The snow was thick and soft at first, butas I approached the hills it grew more crisp. Overhead the sky was ofan unbroken blue, and for all that the air was sharp there was warmthin the sunshine. All day I rode hard, and never rested until towardsnightfall I found myself on the spurs of the Apennines in theneighborhood of Gualdo, the better half of my journey well-accomplished. The weather had changed again at sunset. It was snowing anew, and thenorth wind was howling like a choir of the damned. 

Before me gleamed the lights of a little wayside tavern, and since itmight suit me better to lie there than to journey on to Gualdo, Idrew rein before that humble door, and got down from my wearied horse. Despite the early hour the door was already barred, for the bedding oftravellers formed no part of the traffic of so lowly a house as thisnameless, wayside wine-shop. Theirs was a trade that ended with thedaylight. Nevertheless I was assured they could be made to find me a ragof straw to lie on, and so I knocked boldly with my whip. 

The taverner who opened for me, and stood a moment surveying me by thelight of the torch he held aloft, was a slim, mild-mannered man, notover-clean. Behind him surged the figure of his wife; just such a womanas you might look to find the mate of such a man: broad and tall offrame and most scurvily cross-grained of face. It may well be that hadhe bidden me welcome, she had driven me back into the night; but sincehe made some demur when I asked for lodging, and protested that in hishouse was but accommodation too rude to offer my magnificence, the womanthrust him aside, and loudly bade me enter. 

I obeyed her readily, hat on head and cloak about me, lest my interestsshould suffer were my trade disclosed. I bade the man see to my horse, and then escorted by the woman, I made my way to the single roomabove, which, in obedience to my demand, she made haste to set at myconvenience. 

It was an evil-smelling, squalid hole; a bed of wattles in a corner, andin the centre a greasy table with a three-legged stool and a crazy chairbeside it. The floor was black with age and filth, and broken everywhereby rat-holes. She set her noisome, smoking oil lamp on the table, andwith some apology for the rudeness of the chamber she asked in tonesalmost defiant if my excellency would be content. 

"Perforce, " said I ungraciously, perceiving surliness to be the key tothe respect of such a creature; "a king might thank Heaven for a kennelon such a night as this. "

She bent her back in a clumsy bow, and with a growing humility wonderedhad I supped. I had not, but sooner would I have starved than havebeen poisoned by such foulnesses as they might have set before me. So Ianswered her that all I needed was a cup of wine. 

When she had brought me that, and, at last, I was alone, I closed thedoor. It had no lock, nor any sort of fastening, so I set the threelegged stool against it that it might give me warning of intrusion. NextI threw off my cloak and hat and boots, and all dressed as I was I flungmyself upon my miserable couch. But jaded though I might be, it wasnot yet my intent to sleep. Now that the half of my journey wasaccomplished, I found myself beset by doubts which had not beforeassailed me, touching the manner in which this mission of mine was to beaccomplished. It would prove no easy thing for me to penetrate unnoticedinto the town of Pesaro, much less into the Sforza Court, where forthree years I had pursued my Fool's trade. There was scarce a man, a woman or a child in the entire domains of Giovanni Sforza to whomBoccadoro, the Fool, was not known; and many a villano, who had nevernoticed the features of the Lord of Pesaro, could have told you thevery colour of his jester's eyes; which, after all, is no strange thing, for--sad reflection!--in a world in which Wisdom may be overlooked, Folly goes never disregarded. 

The garments I wore might be well enough to journey in; but if I wouldgain the presence of Lucrezia Borgia I must see that I arrived inothers. And then my thoughts wandered into speculation. What mightbe this momentous letter that I carried? What was this secret traffic'twixt Cesare Borgia and his sister? Since Cesare had said that itmeant the ruin of Giovanni Sforza--a ruin so utter, so complete andhumiliating that it must provoke the scornful mirth of all Italy--theknowledge of it must soon be mine. Meanwhile I was an agent of thatruin. Dear God! how that reflection warmed me! What joy I took inthe thought that, though he knew it not, nor could come to know it, I Lazzaro Biancomonte, whom he had abused and whose spirit he hadbroken--was become a tool to expedite the work of abasement anddestruction that was ripening for him. And realizing all this, thatletter I vowed to Heaven I would carry, suffering no obstacle to dauntme, suffering nothing to turn me from my path. 

And then another voice seemed to arise within me, to cry outimpatiently: "Yes, yes; but how?"

I rose, and approaching the table, I took up the jug of wine and pouredmyself a draught. I drank it off, and cast the dregs at an inquisitiverat that had thrust its head above the boards. Then I quenched thelight, and flung myself once more upon my bed, in the hope that darknesswould prove a stimulant to thought and bring me to the solution I wasseeking. It brought me sleep instead. Unconsciously I sank to it, myriddle all unsolved. 

I did not wake until the pale sun of that January morning was drawingthe pattern of my lattice on the ceiling. The stormy night had beensucceeded by a calm and sunlit day. And by its light the place wore amore loathsome look than it had done last night, so that at the verysight of it I leapt from my couch and grew eager to be gone. I seta ducat on the table, and going to the door I called my hostess. Thestairs creaked presently 'neath her portentous weight, and, pantingslightly, she stood before me. 

At sight of me, for I was without my cloak, and my motley was revealedin the cold, morning light, she cried out in amazement first, and thenin rage--deeming me one of those parasites who tramp the world in thegarb of folly, seeking here a dinner, there a bed, in exchange for somescurvy tumbling or some witless jests. 

"Ossa di Cristo!" was her cry. "Have I housed a Fool?"

"If I am the first you have housed, your tumbling ruin of a tavern hasbeen a singularly choice resort. Woman--"

"Would you 'woman' me?" she stormed. 

"Why, no, " said I politely. "I was at fault. I'll keep the title foryour husband--God help him!"

She smiled grimly. 

"And are these, " she asked, with a ferocious sarcasm, "the jests withwhich you pay the score?"

"Jests?" quoth I. "Score? Pish! More eyes, less tongue would more befita hostess who has never housed a fool. " And with a splendid gesture Ipointed to the ducat gleaming on the table. At sight of the gold hereyes grew big with greed. 

"My master--" she began, and coming forward took the piece in her hand, to assure herself that she was not the dupe of magic. "A fool withgold!" she marvelled. 

"Is a shame to his calling, " I acknowledged. Then--"Get me a needle anda length of thread, " said I. She scuttled off to do my bidding, likenothing so much as one of the rats that tenanted her unclean sty. Shewas back in a moment, all servility, and wondering whether there was arent about me she might make bold to stitch. What a key to courtesy isgold, my masters! I drove her out, and eager to conciliate me, she wentat once. 

With my own hands I effected in my doublet the slight repair of which itstood in need. Then I donned my hat, and, cloak on shoulder, made my waybelow, calling for my horse as I descended. 

I scorned the wine they proffered me ere I departed. That last night'sdraught had quenched my thirst for ever of such grape-juice as it wastheirs to tender. I urged the taverner to hasten with my horse, andstood waiting in the squalid common-room, my mind divided 'twixtimpatience to resume the road to Pesaro and fresh speculations upon themeans I was to adopt to enter it and yet save my neck--for this was nowbecome an obsessing problem. 

As I stood waiting, there broke upon my ears the sound of an approachingcavalcade: the noise of voices and the soft fall of hoofs upon the thicksnow carpet. The company halted at the door, and a loud, gruff voice wasraised to cry:

"Locandiere! Afoot, sluggard!"

I stepped to the door, with very natural curiosity, a company of fourmounted men escorting a mule-litter, the curtains of which were drawn sothat nothing might be seen of him or her that rode within. Grooms werethose four, as all the world might see at the first glance, and thelivery they wore was that of the noble House of Santafior--the holywhite flower of the quince being embroidered on the breast of theirgabardines. 

They bore upon them such signs of hard and hasty travelling that it wassoon guessed they had spent the night in the saddle. Their horses werein a foam of sweat; and the men themselves were splashed with mud fromfoot to cap. 

Even as I was going forward to regard them the taverner appeared, leading my horse by the bridle. Now at an inn the traveller that arrivesis ever of more importance than he that departs. At sight of thosehorsemen, the taverner forgot my impatience, for he paused to bow inwelcome to the one that seemed the leader. 

"Most Magnificent, " said he to that liveried hind, "command me. "

"We need a guide, " the fellow answered with an ill grace. 

"A guide, Illustrious?" quoth the host. "A guide?"

"I said a guide, fool, " answered him the groom. "Heard you never of suchanimals? We need a man who knows the hills, to lead us by the shortestroad to Cagli. "

The taverner shook his grey head stupidly. He bowed again until Ifancied I could hear the creak of his old joints. 

"Here be no guides, Magnificent, " he deplored. "Perhaps at Gualdo--"

"Animal, " was the retort--for true courtesy commend me to alacquey!--"it is not our wish to pursue the road as far as Gualdo, elsehad we not stopped at this kennel of yours. "

I scarce know what it can have been that moved me to act as I thendid, for, in the truth, the manner of that rascal of a groom was littleprepossessing, and his master, I doubted, could be little better that heleft the fellow to hector it thus over that wretched tavern oaf. But Istepped forward. 

"Did you say that you were journeying to Cagli?" questioned I. 

He eyed me sourly, suspicion writ athwart his round, ill-favoured face, But my motley was hidden from his sight. My cloak, my hat and bootsallowed naught of my true condition to appear, and might as well havecovered a lordling as a jester. Yet his inveterate surliness the rascalcould not wholly conquer. 

"What may be the purpose of your question?" he growled. 

"To serve your master, whoever he may be, " I answered him serenely, "although it is a service I do not press upon him. I, too, am journeyingto Cagli, and like yourselves, I am in haste and go the shorter wayacross the hills, with which I am well acquainted. If it so please youto follow me your need of a guide may thus be satisfied. "

It was the tone to take if I would be respected. Had I proposed that weshould journey in company I should not have earned me the half of thedeference which was accorded to my haughtily granted leave that theymight follow me if they so chose. 

With marked submission did he give me thanks in his master's name. 

I mounted and set out, and at my heels came now the litter and itsescort. Thus did we quit the plain and breast the slopes, where the snowgrew deeper and firmer underfoot as we advanced. And as I went, stillplaguing my mind to devise a means by which I might penetrate to theCourt of Pesaro, little did I dream that the matter was being solved forme--the solution having begun with my offer to guide that company acrossthe hills. 

CHAPTER III. MADONNA PAOLA

We gained the heights in the forenoon, and there we dismounted andpaused awhile to breathe our horses ere we took the path that was tolead us down to Cagli. The air was sharp and cold, for all that overheadwas spread a cloudless, cobalt dome of sky, and the sun poured downits light upon the wide expanse of snow-clad earth, of a whiteness sodazzling as to be hurtful to the sight. 

Hitherto I had ridden stolidly ahead, as unheeding of that followingcompany as if I had been unconscious of its existence. But now thatwe paused, their fat, white-faced leader, whose name was Giacopo, approached me and sought to draw me into conversation. I yielded readilyenough, for I scented a mystery about that closely-curtained litter, and mysteries are ever provoking to such a mind as mine. For all thatit might profit me naught to learn who rode there, and why with allthis haste, yet these were matters, I confess, on which my curiosity wasaroused. 

"Are you journeying beyond Cagli?" I asked him presently, in an idletone. 

He cocked his head, and eyed me aslant, the suspicion in his eyesconfirming the existence of the mystery I scented. 

"Yes, " he answered, after a pause. "We hope to reach Urbino beforenight. And you? Are you journeying far?"

"That far, at least, " I answered him, emulating the caution he hadshown. 

And then, ere more might pass between us, the leather curtains of thelitter were sharply drawn aside. At the sound I turned my head, and sofar was the vision different from that which--for no reason that I cangive--I had expected, that I was stricken with surprise and wonder. Alady--a very child, indeed--had leapt nimbly to the ground ere any ofthose grooms could offer her assistance. 

She was, I thought, the most beautiful woman that I had ever seen, andto one who had read the famous work of Messer Firenzuola on femininebeauty it might seem, at first, that here stood the incarnation of thatwriter's catalogue of womanly perfections. She was of a good shapeand stature, despite her tender years; her face was oval, delicatelyfeatured and of an ivory pallor. Her eyes--blue as the heavensoverhead--were not of the colour most approved by Firenzuola, nor washer hair of the golden brown which that arbiter commends. Had Firenzuolaseen her, it may well be that he had altered or modified his views. Shewas sumptuously arrayed in a loose-sleeved camorra of grey velvet thatwas heavy with costly furs; above the lenza of fine linen on her headgleamed the gold thread of a jewelled net, and at her waist a girdle ofsurpassing richness, all set with gems, glowed like a thing of fire inthe bright sunshine. 

She took a deep breath of the sharp, invigorating air, then lookedabout her, and espying me in conversation with Giacopo she approached usacross the gleaming snow. 

"Is this, " she inquired, and her sweet, melodious voice was a perfectmatch to the graceful charm of her whole presence, "the traveller who sokindly consented to fill for us the office of a guide?"

Giacopo answered briefly that I was that man. 

"I am in your debt, sir, " she protested, with an odd earnestness. "Youdo not know how great a service you have rendered me. But if at any timePaola Sforza di Santafior may be able to discharge this obligation, youshall find me very willing. "

White-faced, black-browed Giacopo scowled at this proclamation of heridentity. 

I made her a low bow, and answered coldly, brusquely almost, for I hatedthe very name of Sforza, and every living thing that bore it. 

"Madonna, you overrate my service. It so chanced that I was travellingthis way. "

She looked more closely at me, as if she would have sought the reasonof my churlish tone, and I was strangely thankful that she could not seethe motley worn by the muffled stranger who confronted her. No doubtshe accounted me a clown, whose nature inclined to surliness, and so sheturned away, telling Giacopo that as soon as the horses were breathedthey might push on. 

"We must rest them yet awhile, Madonna, " answered he, "if they are tocarry us as far as Cagli. Heaven send that we may obtain fresh cattlethere, else is all lost. "

Her frown proclaimed how much his words displeased her. 

"You forget that if there are no horses for us, neither are there anyfor those others. " And she waved her hand towards the valley belowand the road by which we had come. From this and from what was saidI gathered that they were a party of fugitives with pursuers at theirheels. 

"They have a warrant which we have not, " was Giacopo's answer, gloomilydelivered, "and they will seize cattle where they can find it. "

With a little gesture of impatience, more at his fears than at the perilthat aroused them, she moved away towards her litter. 

"Your horse would be better for the loan of your cloak, sir stranger, "said Giacopo to me. 

I knew him to be right, but shrugged my shoulders. 

"Better the horse should die of cold than I, " I answered gruffly, andturning from him I set myself to pace the snow and stir the blood thatwas chilling in my veins. 

There was a beauty in the white, sunlit landscape spread before me thatcompelled my glance. To some it might compare but ill with the luxuriantsplendour that is of the vernal season; but to me there was a wondrouslyimpressive charm about that solemn, silent, virginal expanse of snow, expressionless as the Sphinx, and imposing and majestic by virtue ofthat very lack of expression. From Fabriano, at our feet, was spread tothe east, the broad plain that lies twixt the Esino and the Masone, asfar as Mount Comero, which, in the distance, lifted its round shoulderfrom the haze of sea. To the west the country lay under the samewinding-sheet of snow as far as eye might range, to the towers ofdistant Perugia, to the Lake Trasimeno--a silver sheen that brokethe white monotony--to Etruscan Cortona, perched like an eyrie on itsmountain top, and to the line of Tuscan hills, like heavy, low-lyingclouds upon the blue horizon. 

Lost was I in the contemplation of that scene when a cry, succeeded bya volley of horrid blasphemy, drew my attention of a sudden to mycompanions. They stood grouped together, and their eyes were on the roadby which we had scaled those heights. Their first expression of loudastonishment had been succeeded by an utter silence. I stepped forwardto command a better view of what they contemplated, and in the plainbelow, midway between Narni and the slopes, a mile or so behind us, Icaught a glitter as of a hundred mirrors in the sunshine. A company ofsome dozen men-at-arms it was, riding briskly along the tracks we hadleft behind us in the snow. Could these be the pursuers?

Even as I formed the question in my mind, the lady's silvery voice, behind me, put it into words. She had drawn aside the curtains of herlitter and she was leaning out, her eyes upon those dancing points ofbrilliance. 

"Madonna, " cried one of her grooms, in a quaver of alarm, "they areBorgia soldiers. "

"Your fear is father to that opinion, " she answered scornfully. "How canyou descry it at this distance?"

Now, either God had given that knave an eagle's sight, or else, as shesuggested, fear spurred his imagination and begot his certainty of whathe thought he saw. 

"The leader's bannerol bears the device of a red bull, " he answeredpromptly. 

I thought she paled a little, and her brows contracted. 

"In God's name, let us get forward, then!" cried Giacopo. "Orsu! Tohorse, knaves!"

No second bidding did they need. In the twinkling of an eye they were inthe saddle, and one of them had caught the bridle of the leading mule ofthe litter. Giacopo called to me to lead the way with him, with no moreceremony than if I had been one of themselves. But I made no ado. Achase is an interesting business, whatever your point of view, and if agreater safety lies with the hunter, there is a keener excitement withthe hunted. 

Down that steep and slippery hillside we blundered, making for Cagli ata pace in which there lay a myriad-fold more danger than could menaceus from any party of pursuers. But fear was spur and whip to theunreasoning minds of those poltroons, and so from the danger behind uswe fled, and courted a more deadly and certain peril in the fleeing. At first I sought to remonstrate with Giacopo; but he was deaf to thewisdom that I spoke. He turned upon me a face which terror had renderedwhiter than its natural habit, white as the egg of a duck, with a hintof blue or green behind it. I had, besides, an ugly impression of teethand eyeballs. 

"Death is behind us, sir, " he snarled. "Let us get on. "

"Death is more assuredly before you, " I answered grimly. "If you willcourt it, go your way. As for me, I am over-young to break my neckand be left on the mountain-side to fatten crows. I shall follow at myleisure. "

"Gesu!" he cried, through chattering teeth. "Are you a coward, then?"

The taunt would have angered me had his condition been other than itwas; but coming from one so possessed of the devil of terror, it did nomore than provoke my mirth. 

"Come on, then, valiant runagate, " I laughed at him. 

And on we went, our horses now plunging, now sliding down yard upon yardof moving snow, snorting and trembling, more reasoning far than theserational animals that bestrode them. Twice did it chance that a man wasflung from his saddle, yet I know not what prayers Madonna may have beenuttering in her litter, to obtain for us the miracle of reaching theplain with never so much as a broken bone. 

Thus far had we come, but no farther, it seemed, was it possible to go. The horses, which by dint of slipping and sliding had encompassed thedescent at a good pace, were so winded that we could get no more than anamble out of them, saving mine, which was tolerably fresh. 

At this a new terror assailed the timorous Giacopo. His head was everturned to look behind--unfailing index of a frightened spirit; his eyeswere ever on the crest of the hills, expecting at every moment to beholdthe flash of the pursuers' steel. The end soon followed. He drew reinand called a halt, sullenly sitting his horse like a man deprived ofwit--which is to pay him the compliment of supposing that he ever hadwit to be deprived of. 

Instantly the curtain-rings rasped, and Madonna Paola's head appeared, her voice inquiring the reason of this fresh delay. 

Sullenly Giacopo moved his horse nearer, and sullenly he answered her. 

"Madonna, our horses are done. It is useless to go farther. "

"Useless?" she cried, and I had an instance of how sharply could ringthe voice that I had heard so gentle. "Of what do you talk, you knave?Ride on at once. "

"It is vain to ride on, " he answered obdurately, insolence rising in hisvoice. "Another half-league--another league at most, and we are taken. "

"Cagli is less than a league distant, " she reminded him. "Once there, wecan obtain fresh horses. You will not fail me now, Giacopo!"

"There will be delays, perforce, at Cagli, " he reminded her, "and, meanwhile, there are these to guide the Borgia sbirri. " And he pointedto the tracks we were leaving in the snow. 

She turned from him, and addressed herself to the other three. 

"You will stand by me, my friends, " she cried. "Giacopo, here, is acoward; but you are better men. " They stirred, and one of them wasmomentarily moved into a faint semblance of valour. 

"We will go with you, Madonna, " he exclaimed. "Let Giacopo remainbehind, if so he will. "

But Giacopo was a very ill-conditioned rogue; neither true himself, nortolerant, it seemed, of truth in others. 

"You will be hanged for your pains when you are caught!" he exclaimed, "as caught you will be, and within the hour. If you would save yournecks, stay here and make surrender. "

His speech was not without effect upon them, beholding which, Madonnaleapt from the litter, the better to confront them. The corners ofher sensitive little mouth were quivering now with the emotion thatpossessed her, and on her eyes there was a film of tears. 

"You cowards!" she blazed at them, "you hinds, that lack the spirit evento run! Were I asking you to stand and fight in defence of me, you couldnot show yourselves more palsied. I was a fool, " she sobbed, stampingher foot so that the snow squelched under it. "I was a fool to entrustmyself to you. "

"Madonna, " answered one of them, "if flight could still avail us, youshould not find us stubborn. But it were useless. I tell you again, Madonna, that when I espied them from the hill-top yonder, they were buta half-league behind. Soon we shall have them over the mountain, and weshall be seen. "

"Fool!" she cried, "a half-league behind, you say; and you forget thatwe were on the summit, and they had yet to scale it. If you but presson we shall treble that distance, at least, ere they begin the descent. Besides, Giacopo, " she added, turning again to the leader, "you may beat fault; you may be scared by a shadow; you may be wrong in accountingthem our pursuers. "

The man shrugged his shoulders, shook his head, and grunted. 

"Arnaldo, there, made no mistake. He told us what he saw. "

"Now Heaven help a poor, deserted maid, who set her trust in curs!" sheexclaimed, between grief and anger. 

I had been no better than those hinds of hers had I remained unmoved. Ihave said that I hated the very name of Sforza; but what had this tenderchild to do with my wrongs that she should be brought within the compassof that hatred? I had inferred that her pursuers were of the House ofBorgia, and in a flash it came to me that were I so inclined I mightprove, by virtue of the ring I carried, the one man in Italy to serveher in this extremity. And to be of service to her, her winsome beautyhad already inflamed me. For there was I know not what about this childthat seemed to take me in its toils, and so wrought upon me that thereand then I would have risked my life in her good service. Oh, you maylaugh who read. Indeed, deep down in my heart I laughed myself, Ithink, at the heroics to which I was yielding--I, the Fool, most base oflacqueys--over a damsel of the noble House of Santafior. It was shame ofmy motley, maybe, that caused me to draw my cloak more tightly about meas I urged forward my horse, until I had come into their midst. 

"Lady, " said I bluntly and without preamble, "can I assist you? I haveinferred your case from what I have overheard. "

All eyes were on me, gaping with surprise--hers no less than hergrooms'. 

"What can you do alone, sir?" she asked, her gentle glance upraised tomine. 

"If, as I gather, your pursuers are servants of the House of Borgia, Imay do something. "

"They are, " she answered, without hesitation, some eagerness, even, investing her tones. 

It may seem an odd thing that this lady should so readily have taken astranger into her confidence. Yet reflect upon the parlous condition inwhich she found herself. Deserted by her dispirited grooms, her enemieshot upon her heels, she was in no case to trifle with assistance, orto despise an offer of services, however frail it might seem. With bothhands she clutched at the slender hope I brought her in the hour of herdespair. 

"Sir, " she cried, "if indeed it lies in your power to help me, you couldnot find it in your heart to be sparing of that power did you but knowthe details of my sorry circumstance. "

"That power, Madonna, it may be that I have, " said I, and at those wordsof mine her servants seemed to honour me with a greater interest. Theyleaned forward on their horses and eyed me with eyes grown of a suddenhopeful. "And, " I continued, "if you will have utter faith in me, I seea way to render doubly certain your escape. "

She looked up into my face, and what she saw there may have reassuredher that I promised no more than I could accomplish. For the rest shehad to choose between trusting me and suffering capture. 

"Sir, " said she, "I do not know you, nor why you should interestyourself in the concerns of a desolated woman. But, Heaven knows, I amin no case to stand pondering the aid you offer, nor, indeed, do I doubtthe good faith that moves you. Let me hear, sir, how you would proposeto serve me. "

"Whence are you?" I inquired. 

"From Rome, " she informed me without hesitation, "to seek at my cousin'sCourt of Pesaro shelter from a persecution to which the Borgia family issubmitting me. "

At her cousin's Court of Pesaro! An odd coincidence, this--and while Iwas pondering it, it flashed into my mind that by helping her I mightassist myself. Had aught been needed o strengthen my purpose to serveher, I had it now. 

"Yet, " said I, surprise investing my voice, "at Pesaro there is MadonnaLucrezia of that same House of Borgia. "

She smiled away the doubt my words implied. 

"Madonna Lucrezia is my friend, " said she; "as sweet and gentle afriend as ever woman had, and she will stand by me even against her ownfamily. "

Since she was satisfied of that, I waived the point, and returned towhat was of more immediate interest. 

"And you fled, " said I, "with these?" And I indicated her attendants. "Not content to leave the clearest of tracks behind you in the snow, youhave had yourself attended by four grooms in the livery of Santafior. So that by asking a few questions any that were so inclined might followyou with ease. "

She opened wide her eyes at that. Oftentimes have I observed that itneeds a fool to teach some elementary wisdom to the wise ones of thisworld. I leapt from my saddle and stood in the road beside her, thebridle on my arm. 

"Listen now, Madonna. If you would make good your escape it firstimports that you should rid yourself of this valiant escort. Separatefrom it for a little while. Take you my horse--it is a very gentlebeast, and it wilt carry you with safety--and ride on, alone, to Cagli. "

"Alone?" quoth she, in some surprise. 

"Why, yes, " I answered gruffly. "What of that? At the Inn of 'The FullMoon' ask for the hostess, and tell her that you are to await an escortthere, begging her, meanwhile, to place you under her protection. Sheis a worthy soul, or else I do not know one, and she will befriend youreadily. But see to it that you tell her nothing of your affairs. "

"And then?" she inquired eagerly. 

"Then, wait you there until to-night, or even until to-morrow morning, for these knaves to rejoin you to the end that you may resume yourjourney. "

"But we--" began Giacopo. Scenting his protest, I cut him short. 

"You four, " said I, "shall escort me--for I shall replace Madonna inthe litter--you shall escort me towards Fabriano. Thus shall we draw thepursuit upon ourselves, and assure your lady a clear road of escape. "

They swore most roundly and with great circumstance of oaths that theywould lend themselves to no such madness, and it took me some moments topersuade them that I was possessed of a talisman that should keep us allfrom harm. 

"Were it otherwise, dolts, do you think I should be eager to go withyou? Would any chance wayfarer so wantonly imperil his neck for the sakeof a lady with whom he can scarce be called acquainted?"

It was an argument that had weight with them, as indeed, it must havehad with the dullest. I flashed my ring before their eyes. 

"This escutcheon, " said I, "is the shield that shall stand between usand danger from any of the house that bears these arms. "

Thus I convinced and wrought upon them until they were ready to obeyme--the more ready since any alternative was really to be preferred totheir present situation. In danger they already stood from those thatfollowed as they well knew; and now it seemed to them that by obeyingone who was armed with such credentials, it might be theirs to escapethat danger. But even as I was convincing them, by the same argumentswas I sowing doubts in the lady's subtler mind. 

"You are attached to that house?" quoth she, in accents of mistrust. She wanted to say more. I saw it in her eyes that she was wondering wasthere treachery underlying an action so singularly disinterested as tojustify suspicion. 

"Madonna, " said I, "if you would save yourself I implore that you willtrust me. Very soon your pursuers will be appearing on those heights, and then your chance of flight will be lost to you. I will ask you butthis: Did I propose to betray you into their hands, could I have donebetter than to have left you with your grooms?"

Her face lighted. A sunny smile broke on me from her heavenly eyes. 

"I should have thought of that, " said she. And what more she would haveadded I put off by urging her to mount. 

Sitting the man's saddle as best she might--well enough, indeed, tofill us all with surprise and admiration--she took her leave of me withpretty words of thanks, which again I interrupted. 

"You have but to follow the road, " said I, "and it will bring youstraight to Cagli. The distance is a short league, and you should comethere safely. Farewell, Madonna!"

"May I not know, " she asked at parting, "the name of him that has sogenerously befriended me?"

I hesitated a second. Then--"They call me Boccadoro, " answered I. 

"If your mouth be as truly golden as your heart, then are youwell-named, " said she. Then, gathering her mantle about her, and wavingme farewell, she rode off without so much as a glance at the cowardlyhinds who had failed her in the hour of her need. 

A moment I stood watching her as she cantered away in the sunshine; thenstepping to the litter, I vaulted in. 

"Now, rogues, " said I to the escort, "strike me that road to Fabriano. "

"I know you not, sir, " protested Giacopo. "But this I know--that ifyou intend us treachery you shall have my knife in your gullet for yourpains. "

"Fool!" I scorned him, "since when has it been worth the while of anyman to betray such creatures as are you? Plague me no more! Be moving, else I leave you to your coward's fate. "

It was the tone best understood by hinds of their lily-livered quality. It quelled their faint spark of mutiny, and a moment later one of thoseknaves had caught the bridle of the leading mule and the litter movedforward, whilst Giacopo and the others came on behind at as brisk a paceas their weary horses would yield. In this guise we took the road south, in the direction opposite to that travelled by the lady. As we rode, Isummoned Giacopo to my side. 

"Take your daggers, " I bade him, "and rip me that blazon from yourcoats. See that you leave no sign about you to proclaim you of the Houseof Santafior, or all is lost. It is a precaution you would have takenearlier if God had given you the wit of a grasshopper. "

He nodded that he understood my order, and scowled his disapproval of mycomment on his wit. For the rest, they did my bidding there and then. 

Having satisfied myself that no betraying sign remained about them, Idrew the curtains of my litter, and reclining there I gave myself up topondering the manner in which I should greet the Borgia sbirri when theyovertook me. From that I passed on to the contemplation of the positionin which I found myself, and the thing that I had done. And theproportions of the jest that I was perpetrating afforded me no littleamusement. It was a burla not unworthy the peerless gifts of Boccadoro, and a fitting one on which to close his wild career of folly. For had Inot vowed that Boccadoro I would be no more once the errand on which Itravelled was accomplished? By Cesare Borgia's grace I looked to--

A sudden jolt brought me back to the immediate present, and therealisation that in the last few moments we had increased our pace. Iput out my head. 

"Giacopo!" I shouted. He was at my side in an instant. "Why are wegalloping?"

"They are behind, " he answered, and fear was again overspreading his fatface. "We caught a glimpse of them as we mounted the last hill. "

"You caught a glimpse of whom?" quoth I. 

"Why, of the Borgia soldiers. "

"Animal, " I answered him, "what have we to do with them? They may havemistaken us for some party of which they are in pursuit. But since weare not that party, let your jaded beasts travel at a more reasonablespeed. We do not wish to have the air of fugitives. "

He understood me, and I was obeyed. For a half-hour we rode at a moregentle pace. That was about the time they took to come up with us, stilla league or so from Fabriano. We heard their cantering hoofs crushingthe snow, and then a loud imperious voice shouting to us a commandto stay. Instantly we brought up in unconcerned obedience, and theythundered alongside with cries of triumph at having run their prey toearth. 

I cast aside my hat, and thrust my motleyed head through the curtainswith a jangle of bells, to inquire into the reason of this halt. Whom myappearance astounded the more--whether the lacqueys of Santafior, orthe Borgia men-at-arms that now encircled us--I cannot guess. But in thecrowd of faces that confronted me there was not one but wore a look ofdeep amazement. 

CHAPTER IV. THE COZENING OF RAMIRO

The cavalcade that had overtaken us proved to number some twentymen-at-arms, whose leader was no less a person than Ramiro del'Orca--that same mountain of a man who had attended my departure fromthe Vatican three nights ago. From the circumstance that so importanta personage should have been charged with the pursuit of the Lady ofSantafior, I inferred that great issues were at stake. 

He was clad in mail and leather, and from his lance fluttered thebannerol bearing the Borgia arms, which had announced his quality toMadonna's servants. 

At sight of me his bloodshot eyes grew round with wonder, and for alittle season a deathly calm preceded the thunder of his voice. 

"Sainted Host!" he roared at last. "What trickery may this be?" Andsidling his horse nearer he tore aside the curtains of my litter. 

Out of faces pale as death the craven grooms looked on, to behold mereclining there, my cloak flung down across my legs to hide my boots, and my motley garb of red and black and yellow all revealed. I believetheir astonishment by far surpassed the Captain's own. 

"You are choicely met, Ser Ramiro, " I greeted him. Then, seeing thathe only stared, and made no shift to speak: "Maybe, " quoth I, "you'llexplain why you detain me. I am in haste. "

"Explain?" he thundered. "Sangue di Cristo! The burden of explaininglies with you. What make you here?"

"Why, " answered I, in tones of deep astonishment, "I am about thebusiness of the Lord Cardinal of Valencia, our master. "

"Davvero?" he jeered. He stretched out a mighty paw, and took me by thecollar of my doublet. "Now, bethink you how you answer me, or there willbe a fool the less in the world. "

"Indeed, the world might spare more. "

He scowled at my pleasantry. To him, apparently, the situation affordedno scope for philosophical reflections. 

"Where is the girl?" he asked abruptly. 

"Girl?" quoth I. "What girl? Am I a mother-abbess, that you should setme such a question?"

Two dark lines showed between his brows. His voice quivered withpassion. 

"I ask you again--where is the girl?"

I laughed like one who is a little wearied by the entertainment providedfor him. 

"Here be no girls, Messer del' Orca, " I answered him in the same tone. "Nor can I think what this babble of girls portends. "

My seeming innocence, and the assurance with which I maintained theexpression of it, whispered a doubt into his mind. He released me, andturned upon his men, a baffled look in his eyes. 

"Was not this the party?" he inquired ferociously. "Have you misled me, beasts?

"It seemed the party, Illustrious, " answered one of them. 

"Do you dare tell me that 'it seemed'?" he roared, seeking to fatherupon them the blunder he was beginning to fear that he had made. "But--What is the livery of these knaves?

"They wear none, " someone answered him, and at that answer he seemed toturn limp and lose his fierce assurance. 

Then he bridled afresh. 

"Yet the party, I'll swear, is this!" he insisted; and turning once moreto me: "Explain, animal!" he bade me in terrifying tones. "Explain, or, by the Host! be you ignorant or not, I'll have you hanged. "

I accounted it high time to take another tone with him. Hanging was adiscomfort I was never less minded to suffer. 

"Draw nearer, fool, " said I contemptuously, and at the epithet, sogreatly did my audacity amaze him, he mildly did my bidding. 

"I know not what doubts are battling in your thick head, sir captain, "I pursued. "But this I know--that if you persist in hindering me, orcommit the egregious folly of offering me violence, you will answer forit, hereafter, to the Lord Cardinal of Valencia. 

"I am going upon a secret mission"--and here I sank my voice to awhisper for his ears alone--"in the service of the house that hires you, as for yourself you might easily have inferred. Behold. " And I revealedmy ring. "Detain me longer at your peril. "

He must have had some notion of the fact that I was journeying in CesareBorgia's service, and this coupled with the sight of that talismaneffected in his manner a swift and wholesome change. Had I, arrayed inthe panoply of Mother Church, defied the devil, my victory could nothave been more complete. 

He looked about him like a man whose wits have been scattered suddenlyto the four winds of Heaven. 

"But this litter, " he mumbled, riveting his dazed eyes upon me, "andthese four knaves--?"

"Tell me, " I questioned, with sudden earnestness, "are you in quest ofjust such a party?"

"Aye that I am, " he answered sharply, intelligence returning to hisglance, inquiry burning in it. 

"And would the men, peradventure, be wearing the livery of the House ofSantafior?"

His quick assent came almost choked in a company of oaths. 

"Why then, if that be your quarry, you are but wasting time. Such aparty passed us at the gallop about an hour ago. It would be an hour, would it not, Giacopo?"

"I should say an hour, " answered the lacquey dully. 

"In what direction?" came Ramiro's frenzied question. He doubted me nolonger. 

"In the direction of Fabriano I should say, " I answered. "Although itmay well be that they were making for Sinigaglia. The road branchesfarther on. "

He waited for no more. Without word of thanks for the pricelessinformation I had given him, he wheeled his horse, and shouted a hoarsecommand to his followers. A moment later and they were cantering pastus, the snow flying beneath their hoofs; within five minutes the last ofthem had vanished round an angle of the road, and the only indicationof the halt they had made was the broad path of dirty brown where theirhorses had crushed the snow. 

I have been an actor in few more entertaining comedies than the cozeningof Ser Ramiro, and a witness of nothing that afforded me at once so muchrelief and relish as his abrupt departure. I sank back on the cushionsof my litter, and gave myself over to a burst of full-souled laughterwhich was interrupted ere it was half done by Giacopo, who haddismounted and approached me. 

"You have fooled us finely, " said he, with venom. 

I quenched my laughter to regard him. Of what did he babble? Was he, andwere his fellows, too, so ungrateful as to bear a grudge against the manwho had saved them?

"You have fooled us finely, " he insisted in a louder voice. 

"That, knave, is my trade, " said I. "But it rather seems to me that itwas Messer Ramiro del' Orca whom I fooled. "

"Aye, " he answered querulously. "But what when he discerns how you haveplayed upon him? What when he discovers the trick by which you havethrown him off the scent? What when he returns?"

"Spare me, " I begged, "I am but indifferently skilful at conjecture. "

"Nay, but you shall answer me, " he cried, livid with a passion that mybantering tone had quickened. 

"Can it be that you are indeed curious to know what will befall when hereturns?" I questioned meekly. 

"I am, " he snorted, with an angry twist of the lips. 

"It should be easy to gratify the morbid spirit of curiosity thatactuates you. Remain here, and await his return. Thus shall you learn. "

"That will not I, " he vowed. 

"Nor I, nor I, nor I!" chorused his followers. 

"Then, why plague me with unprofitable questions? What concern is it ofours how Messer del' Orca shall vent his wrath when he is disillusioned. Your duty now is to rejoin your mistress. Ride hard for Cagli. Seek herat the sign of 'The Full Moon, ' and then away for Pesaro. If you arebrisk you will gain the shelter of the Lord Giovanni Sforza's fortresslong before Messer del' Orca again picks up the scent, if, indeed, heever does so. "

Giacopo laughed derisively till his fat body shook with the scornfulmirth of him. 

"By my faith, I'm done with the business, " he cried, and the other threeexpressed a very hearty agreement with that attitude. 

"How done with it?" I asked. 

"I shall make my way back across the hills and so retrace my steps toRome. I'll risk my head no more for any lady or any Fool. "

"If you should ever chance to risk it for yourself, " said I, withunmeasured scorn, "you'll risk it for the greatest fool and thecowardliest rogue that ever shamed the name of man. And your mistress?Is she to wait at Cagli until doomsday? If anywhere within the bulk ofthat elephant's body there lurks the heart of a rabbit, you'll get youto horse and ride to the help of that poor lady. "

They resented my tone, and showed their resentment plainly. MesserGiacopo went the length of raising his hand to me. But I am a man ofamazing strength--amazing inasmuch as being slender of shape I do nothave the air of it. Leaping suddenly from the litter, I caught thatmiserable vassal by the breast of his doublet, shook him once or twice, then tossed him headlong into a drift of snow by the roadside. 

At that they bared their knives and made shift to attack me. But I flungmyself on to one of the mules of the litter, and showing them the stoutPistoja dagger that I carried, I presented with it a bold and truculentfront, no whit intimidated by their numbers. Four to one though theywere, they thought better of it. A moment they stood off, consultingamong themselves; then Giacopo mounted, and with some mocking counsel asto how I should dispose of the litter and the mules, they made off, nodoubt, to find their way back to Rome. Giacopo, as I was afterwards todiscover, was Madonna Paola's purse-bearer, so that they would not lackfor means. 

Awhile I stayed there, cursing them for the white-livered cravens thatthey were, and thinking of that poor child who had ridden on to Cagli, and who would await them in vain. There, on the mule, I sat in thenoontide sunlight, and pondered this, so absorbed in her affairs as tohave grown forgetful of my own. At last I resolved to ride on to Caglialone, and inform her that her men were fled. 

There was no time to lose, for as that rogue Giacopo had said, Ramirodel' Orca might discover at any moment how he had been tricked, andreturn hot-foot to find me and extort the truth from me by such means asI had no stomach for enduring. 

First, then, it was of moment thoroughly to efface our tracks, leavingno sign that might guide Meser Ramiro to repair the error into which Ihad tricked him. Slowly, says the proverb, one journeys far and safely. Slowly, then, did I consider! The escort was, no doubt, on its way backto Rome, and if I could but rid myself of that cumbrous litter, SerRamiro would find himself mightily hard put to it to again pick up thetrail. I remembered a ravine a little way behind, and I rode my muleback to that as fast as it would travel with the litter and the othermule attached to it. Arrived there, I unharnessed the beasts on thevery edge of that shallow precipice. Then exerting all my strength, Icontrived to roll the litter over. Down that steep incline it went, overand over, gathering more snow to itself at every revolution, and sinkingat last into the drift at the bottom. There were signs enough to showits presence, but those signs would hardly be read by any but thesharpest eyes, or by such as might be looking for it in precisely sucha position. I must trust to luck that it escaped the notice of MesserRamiro. But even if he did discover it, I did not think that it wouldtell him overmuch. 

That done I resumed my hat and cloak--which I had retained--mounted oncemore, and urging the other mule along, I proceeded thus as fast as mightbe for a half-league or so in the direction of Cagli. That distancecovered, again I halted. There was not a soul in sight. I stripped oneof the mules of all its harness, which I buried in the snow, behind ahedge, then I drove the beast loose into a field. The peasant-owner ofthat land might conclude upon the morrow that it had rained asses in thenight. 

And now I was able to travel at a brisker pace, and in an hour or so Ihad passed the point where the road diverged, and I caught a glimpse ofthe four grooms, already high up in the hills which they were crossing. Whether they saw me or not I do not know, but with a last curse attheir cowardice I put them from my mind, and cantered briskly on towardsCagli. It was a short league farther, and in little more than half anhour, my mule half-dead, I halted at the door of "The Full Moon. "

Flinging my reins to the ostler, I strode into the inn, swaddled in mycloak, and called for the hostess. The place was empty, as indeed allCagli had seemed when I rode up. She came forward--a woman with a brown, full face, and large kindly eyes--and I asked her whether a lady hadarrived there in safety that morning. At first she seemed mistrustful, but when I had assured her that I was in that lady's service, shefrankly owned that Madonna was safe in her own room. Thither I allowedher to lead me, at once eager and reluctant. Eager with my own eyes toassure myself of her perfect safety; reluctant that, since a man may notpenetrate to a lady's chamber hat on head, by uncovering I must disclosemy shameful trade. Yet there was nothing for it but a bold face, andas I mounted the stairs in the woman's wake, I told myself that I wasdoubly a fool to be tormented by qualms of such a nature. 

Hat in hand I followed the hostess into Madonna's room. The lady rosefrom the window-seat to greet me, her face pale and her gentle eyeswearing an anxious look. At sight of my head crowned with the crested, horned hood of folly, a frown of bewilderment drew her brows together, and she looked more closely to see whether I was indeed the man who hadbefriended her that morning in her extremity. In the eyes of the hostessI caught a gleam of recognition. She knew me for the merry loon who hadentertained her guests one night a fortnight since, when on my way fromPesaro to Rome. But before she could give expression to this discoveryof hers, the lady spoke. 

"Leave us awhile, my woman, " she commanded. But I stayed the hostess asshe was withdrawing. 

"This lady, " said I, "will need an escort of three or four stout knavesupon a journey that she is going. She will be setting out as soon as maybe. "

"But what of my grooms?" cried the lady. 

"Madonna, " I informed her, "they have deserted you. That is thereason of my presence here. You shall hear the story of it presently. Meanwhile, we must arrange to replace them. " And I turned again to thehostess. 

She was standing in thought, a doubtful expression on her face. But as Ilooked at her she shook her head. 

"There is no such escort to be found to-day in Cagli, " she made answer. "The town is all but empty, and every lusty man is either gone on thepilgrimage to the Holy House of Loretto, or else is at Pesaro for theFeast of the Epiphany. "

It was in vain that I protested that a couple of knaves might surelybe found. She answered me that such as were in Cagli were there becausethey would not be elsewhere. 

The lady's face grew clouded as she listened, for from my insistence sheshrewdly inferred that it imported to be gone. 

"There is your ostler, " quoth I at last. "He will do for one. "

"He is the only man I have. My husband and my sons are gone to Pesaro. "

"Yet spare us this one, and you shall be well paid his services. "

But no bribe could tempt her to give way, and no doubt she waswell-advised, for she contended that there was work to be done such aswas beyond her years and strength, and that if she sent her ostler off, as well might she close her inn--a thing that was impossible. 

Here, then, was an obstacle with which I had not reckoned. It wasimpossible to send the lady off alone, to travel a distance of someten leagues, and the most of it by night--for if she would make sure ofescaping, she must journey now without pause until she came to Pesaro. 

And then, in a flash, it occurred to me that here lay the means, readyto my hand, by avail of which I might boldly re-enter Pesaro despitemy banishment, and discharge my errand to Lucrezia Borgia. For, surely, considering the mission on which ostensibly I should be returning--asthe saviour and protector of his kinswoman--Giovanni Sforza could notenforce that ban against me. Next I bethought me of the other aspectthat the business wore. In fooling Ramiro I had thwarted the Borgiaends; in rescuing Madonna Paola I had perhaps set at naught the Cardinalof Valencia's aims. If so, what then? It would seem that because thelady's eyes were mild and sweet, and because her beauty had so deeplywrought upon me, I had indeed fooled away my chance of salvation fromthe life and trade that were grown hateful to me. For back to Rome andCesare Borgia I should dare go no more. Clearly I had burned my boats, and I had done it almost unthinkingly, acting upon the good impulse tobefriend this lady, and never reckoning the cost down to its total. Forall that the thing I had done, and what I might yet do, should offer methe means I needed to enter Pesaro without danger to my neck, I did notsee that I was to derive great profit in the end--unless my profit layin knowing that I had advanced the ruin of Giovanni Sforza by deliveringmy letter to Lucrezia. That at any rate was enough incentive clearly todefine for me the line that I should take through this tangle into whichthe ever-jesting Fates had thrust me. 

I was still at my thoughts, still pondering this most perplexingsituation, the hostess standing silent by the door, when suddenlyMadonna Paola spoke. 

"Sir, " said she, in faltering accents, "I--I have not the right to askyou, and I stand already so deeply in your debt. Not a doubt of it, butit will have inconvenienced you to have journeyed thus far to informme of the flight of my grooms. Yet if you could--" She paused, timid ofproceeding, and her glance fell. 

The hostess was all ears, struck by the respectful manner in which thisvery evidently noble lady addressed a Fool. I opened the door for her. 

"You may leave us now, " said I. "I will come to you presently. "

When she was gone I turned once more to the lady, my course resolvedupon. My hate had conquered my last doubt. What first imported was thatI should get to Pesaro and to Madonna Lucrezia. 

"You were about to ask me, " said I, "that I should accompany you toPesaro. "

"I hesitated, sir, " she murmured. I bowed respectfully. 

"There was not the need, Madonna, " I assured her. "I am at yourservice. "

"But, Messer Boccadoro, I have no claim upon you. "

"Surely, " said I, "the claim that every distressed lady has upon a manof heart. Let us say no more. It were best not to delay in setting out, although I can scarcely think that there is any imminent danger fromRamiro del' Orca now. "

"Who is he?" she inquired. 

"I told her, whereupon--"

"Did they come up with you?" she asked. "What passed between you?"

Succinctly I related what had chanced, and how I had sent Ramiro on afool's errand, adding the particulars of the flight of her grooms, andof how I had rid myself of the litter and the second mule. She heard me, her eyes sparkling, and at times she clapped her hands with a glee thatwas almost childish, vowing that this was splendid, that was brave. Iallayed what little fears remained her by pointing out how effectivelywe had effaced our tracks, and how vainly now Messer del' Orca mightbeat the country in quest of a lady in a litter, escorted by fourgrooms. 

And now she beset me with fresh thanks and fresh expressions of wonderat my generous readiness to befriend her--a wonder all devoid ofsuspicion touching the single-mindedness of my purpose. But I remindedher that we had little leisure to stand talking, and left her to makeher preparations for the journey, whilst I went below to see that mymule and her horse were saddled. I made bold to pay the reckoning, andwhen presently she spoke of it, with flaming cheeks, and would havepledged me a jewel, I bade her look upon it as a loan which anon shemight repay me when I had brought her safely to her kinsman's Court atPesaro. 

Thus, at last, we left Cagli, and took the road north, riding side byside and talking pleasantly the while, ever concerning the matter of herflight and of her hopes of shelter at Pesaro, which, being nearest toher heart, found readiest expression. I went wrapped in my cloak oncemore, my head-dress hidden 'neath my broad-brimmed hat, so that the fewwayfarers we chanced on need not marvel to see a lady in such friendlyintercourse with a Fool. And so dull was I that day as not to marvel, myself, at such a state of things. 

The sun was declining, a red ball of fire, towards the mountains on ourleft, casting a blood-red glow upon the snow that everywhere encompassedus, as we cantered briskly on towards Fossombrone. 

In that hour I fell to pondering, and I even caught myself hoping thatMesser Ramiro del' Orca might not chance upon the discovery of howegregiously I had fooled him. He was dull-witted and slow at inference, and upon that I built the hope that he might fail to associate me withMadonna Paola's elusion of his pursuit. Thus the chance might yet bemine of returning to Rome and the honourable employment Cesare Borgiahad promised me. If only that were so to fall out, I might yet contriveto mend the wreckage of my life. I was returned, it seems, to theways of early youth, when we build our hopes of future greatness uponuntenable foundations!

Great hopes and great ambitions rose within my breast that Januaryevening, fired by the gentle child that rode beside me. Fate had sentme to her aid that day, and I seemed to have acquired, by virtue of thatcircumstance, a certain right in her. Had Fate no other favours for mein her lap! I bethought me of the very House of Sforza, to which I hadbeen so shamefully attached, and of its humble source in that peasant, Giacomuzzo Attendolo, surnamed Sforza for his abnormal strength of body, who rose to great and princely heights. 

Assuredly I had the advantage of such an one, and were the chance butgiven me--

I went no further. Down in my heart I laughed to scorn my own wildmusings. Cesare Borgia would come to know--he must, whether Ramiro toldhim, or whether he inferred it for himself from the account Ramiro mustgive him of our meeting--how I had thwarted him in one thing, whilst Ihad served him in another. Fate was against me. I had fallen too low toever rise again, and no dreams indulged in a sunset hour, and inspired, perhaps, by a child who was beautiful as one of the saints of God, wouldever come to be realised by poor Boccadoro. 

Night was falling as we clattered through the slippery streets ofFossombrone. 

CHAPTER V. MADONNA'S INGRATITUDE

We stayed in Fossombrone little more than a half-hour, and having made ahasty supper we resumed our way, giving out that we wished to reach Fanoere we slept. And so by the first hour of night Fossombrone was a leagueor so behind us, and we were advancing briskly towards the sea. Overheada moon rode at the full in a clear sky, and its light was reflected bythe snow, so that we were not discomforted by any darkness. We fell, presently, into a gentler pace, for, after all, there could be noadvantage in reaching Pesaro before morning, and as we rode we talked, and I made bold to ask her the cause of her flight from Rome. 

She told me then that she was Madonna Paola Sforza di Santafior, andthat Pope Alexander, in his nepotism and his desire to make rich andpowerful alliances for his family, had settled upon her as the wife forhis nephew, Ignacio Borgia. He had been emboldened to this step by thefact that her only protector was her brother, Filippo di Santafior, whomthey had sought to coerce. It was her brother, who, seeing himself in adangerous and unenviable position, had secretly suggested flight toher, urging her to repair to her kinsman Giovanni Sforza at Pesaro. Herflight, however, must have been speedily discovered and the Borgias, whosaw in that act a defiance of their supreme authority, had ordered herpursuit. 

But for me, she concluded, that pursuits must have resulted in hercapture, and once they had her back in Rome, willing or unwilling, theywould have driven her into the alliance by means of which they soughtto bring her fortune into their own house. This drew her into freshprotestations of the undying gratitude she entertained towards me, protestations which I would have stemmed, but that she persisted inthem. 

"It is a good and noble thing that you have done, " said she, "and Ithink that Heaven must have directed you to my aid, for it is scarcelikely that in all Italy I should have found another man who would havedone so much. "

"Why, what, after all, is this much that I have done?" I cried. "It isno less than my manhood bade me do; no less than any other would havedone seeing you so beset. "

"Nay, that is more than I can ever think, " she answered. "Who for thesake of an unknown would have suffered such inconveniences as haveyou? Who would have returned as you have returned to advise me of thedefection of my grooms? Who, when other escort failed, would have gonethe length of journeying all this way to render a service that is beyondrepayment? And, above all, who for the sake of an unknown maid wouldhave submitted to this travesty of yours?"

"Travesty?" quoth I, so struck by that as to interrupt her at last. "What travesty, Madonna?"

"Why, this garb of motley that you donned the better to fool my pursuersand that you still wear in my poor service. "

I turned in the saddle to stare at her, and in the moonlight I clearlysaw her eyes meet mine. So! that was the reason of her kindness andof the easy familiarity of her speech with me! She deemed me someknight-errant who caracoled through Italy in quest of imperilled maidensneeding aid. Of a certainty she had gathered her knowledge of the worldfrom the works of Messer Bojardo, or perhaps from the "Amadis of Gaul"of Messer Bernardo Tasso. And, no doubt, she thought that suits ofmotley grew on bushes by the roadside, whence those who had a fancy fordisguise might cull them. 

Well, well, it were better she should know the truth at once, and choosesuch a demeanour as she considered fitting towards a Fool. I had nostomach for the courtesies that were meant for such a man as I was not. 

"Madonna, you are in error, " I informed her, speaking slowly. "This garbis no travesty. It is my usual raiment. "

There was a pause and I saw the slackening of her reins. No doubt, hadwe been afoot she would have halted, the better to confront me. 

"How?" she asked, and a new note, imperious and chill, was soundingalready in her voice. "You would not have me understand that you are bytrade a Fool?

"Allowing that I am not a fool by birth, under what other circumstances, think you, I should be likely to wear the garments of a Fool?"

"But this morning, " she protested, after a brief pause, "when first Imet you, you were not so arrayed. "

"I was arrayed even as I am now, in a cloak and hat and boots thathid my motley from such undiscerning eyes as were yours and yourgrooms'--all taken up with your own fears as you then were. "

There was in the tail of that a sting, as I meant there should be, for the sudden haughtiness of her tone was cutting into me. Was I lessworthy of thanks because I was a Fool? Had I on that account done lessto serve and save her? Or was it that the action which, in a spurred andarmoured knight, had been accounted noble was deemed unworthy ofthanks in a crested, motleyed jester? It seemed, indeed, that some suchreasoning she followed, for after that we spoke no more until we wereapproaching Fano. 

A many times before had I felt the shame of my ignoble trade, but neverso acutely as at that moment. It had seared my soul when Giovanni Sforzahad told my story to his Court, ere he had driven me from Pesaro withthreats of hanging, and it had burned even deeper when later, MadonnaLucrezia, upon entrusting me with her letter to her brother, hadupbraided me with the supineness that so long had held me in that vilebondage. But deepest of all went now the burning iron of that disgrace. For my companion's silence seemed to argue that had she known my qualityshe would have scorned the aid of which she had availed herself to suchgood purpose. If any doubt of this had mercifully remained me, her nextwords would have served to have resolved it. It was when the lights ofFano gleamed ahead; we were coming to a cross-roads, and I urged theturning to the left. 

"But Fano is in front, " she remonstrated coldly. 

"This way we can avoid the town and gain the Pesaro road beyond it, "answered I, my tone as cool as hers. 

"Yet may it not be that at Fano I might find an escort?"

I could have cried out at her cruelty, for in her words I could but readmy dismissal from her service. There had been no more talk of an escortother than that which I afforded, and with which at first she had beenwell content. 

I sat my mule in silence for a moment. She had been very justly servedhad I been the vassal that she deemed me, and had I borne myself in thatcharacter without consideration of her sex, her station or her years. She had been very justly served had I wheeled about and left her thereto make her way to Fano, and thence to Pesaro, as best she might. Shewas without money, as I knew, and she would have found in Fano such areception as would have brought the bitter tears of late repentance toher pretty eyes. 

But I was soft-hearted, and, so, I reasoned with her; yet in a mannerthat was to leave her no doubt of the true nature of her situation, andthe need to use me with a little courtesy for the sake of what I mightyet do, if she lacked the grace to treat me with gratitude for the sakeof that which I had done already. 

"Madonna, " said I. "It were wiser to choose the by-road and forego theescort, since we have dispensed with it so far. There are many reasonswhy a lady should not seek to enter Fano at this hour of night. "

"I know of none, " she interrupted me. 

"That may well be. Nevertheless they exist. "

"This night-riding in so lonely a fashion is little to my taste, " shetold me sullenly. "I am for Fano. "

She had the mercy to spare me the actual words, yet her tone told me asplainly as if she had uttered them that I could go with her or not, asI should choose. In silence, very sore at heart, I turned my mule's headonce more towards the lights of the town. 

"Since you are resolved, so be it, " was all my answer; and we proceeded. 

No word did we exchange until we had entered the main street, when shecurtly asked me which was the best inn. 

"'The Golden Fish, '" said I, as curtly, and to "The Golden Fish" wewent. 

Arrived there, Madonna Paola took affairs into her own hands. Shedismounted, leaving the reins with a groom, and entering the common-roomshe proclaimed her needs to those that occupied it by loudly callingupon the landlord to find her an escort of three or four knaves toaccompany her at once to Pesaro, where they should be well rewarded bythe Lord Giovanni, her cousin. 

I had followed her in, and I ground my teeth at such an egregious pieceof folly. Her hood was thrown back, displaying the lenza of fine linenon her sable hair, and over this a net of purest gold all set withjewels. Her camorra, too, was open, and in her girdle there were gemsfor all to see. There were but a half-dozen men in the room. Two ofthese had a venerable air--they may have been traders journeying toMilan--whilst a third, who sat apart, was a slender, effeminate-lookingyouth. The remaining three were fellows of rough aspect, and when one ofthem--a black-browed ruffian--raised his eyes and fastened them upon theriches that Madonna Paola with such indifference displayed, I knew whatwas to follow. 

He rose upon the instant, and stepping forward, he made her a low bow. 

"Illustrious lady, " said he, "if these two friends of mine and I findfavour with you, here is an escort ready found. We are stout fellows, and very faithful. "

Faithful to their cut-throat trade, I made no doubt he meant. 

His fellows now rose also, and she looked them over, giving herself theairs of having spent her virgin life in judging men by their appearance. It was in vain I tugged her cloak, in vain I murmured the word "wait"under cover of my hand. She there and then engaged them, and bade themmake ready to set out at once. One more attempt I made to induce her toalter her resolve. 

"Madonna, " said I, "it is an unwise thing to go a-journeying by nightwith three unknown men, and of such villainous appearance. To me theyseem no better than bandits. "

We were standing apart from the others, and she was sipping a cup ofspiced wine that the host had mulled for her. She looked at me with atolerant smile. 

"They are poor men, " said she. "Would you have them robed in velvet?"

"My quarrel is with their looks, Madonna, not their garments, " Ianswered patiently. She laughed lightly, carelessly; even, I thought, atrifle scornfully. 

"You are very fanciful, " said she, then added--"but if so be that youare afraid to trust yourself in their company, why then, sir, I needbring you no farther out of the road that you were following when firstwe met. "

Did the child think that some jealousy actuated me, and prompted me toinspire her with mistrust of my supplanters? She angered me. Yet now, more than ever was I resolved to journey with her. Leave her at themercy of those ruffians, whom in her ignorance she was mad enough totrust, I could not--not even had she whipped me. She was so young, sofrail and slight, that none but a craven could have found it in hisheart to have deserted her just then. 

"If it please you Madonna, " I answered smoothly, "I will make bold totravel on with you. "

It may be that my even accents stung her; perhaps she read in them somemeasure of reproof of the ingratitude that lay in her altered bearingtowards me. Her eyes met mine across the table, and seemed to harden asshe looked. Her answer came in a vastly altered tone. 

"Why, if you are bent that way, I shall be glad to have you availyourself of my escort, Boccadoro. "

I had suffered the scorn now of her speech, now of her silence, forsome hours, but never was I so near to turning on her as at that moment;never so near to consigning her to the fate to which her headstrongfolly was compelling her. That she should take that tone with me!

The violence of the sudden choler I suppressed turned me pale under hersteady glance. So that, seeing it, her own cheeks flamed crimson, andher eyes fell, as if in token that she realised the meanness of herbearing. To some natures there can be nothing more odious than such arealisation, and of those, I think, was she; for she stamped her footin a sudden pet, and curtly asked the host why there was such delay withthe horses. 

"They are at the door, Madonna, " he protested, bowing as he spoke. "Andyour escort is already waiting in the saddle. "

She turned and strode abruptly towards the threshold. Over her shouldershe called to me:

"If you come with us, Boccadoro, you had best be brisk. "

"I follow, Madonna, " said I, with a grim relish, "so soon as I have paidthe reckoning. "

She halted and half turned, and I thought I saw a slight droop at thecorners of her mouth. 

"You are keeping count of what I owe you?" she muttered. 

"Aye, Madonna, " I answered, more grimly still, "I am keeping count. " AndI thought that my wits were vastly at fault if that account were not tobe greatly swelled ere Pesaro was reached. Haply, indeed, my own lifemight go to swell it. I almost took a relish in that thought. Perhapsthen, when I was stiff and cold--done to death in her service--thishandsome, ungrateful child would come to see how much discomfort I hadsuffered for her sake. 

My thoughts still ran in that channel as we rode out of Pesaro, for Imisliked the way in which those knaves disposed themselves about us. In front went Madonna Paola; and immediately behind her, so that theirhorses' heads were on a level with her saddle-bow, one on each side, went two of those ruffians. The third, whom I had heard them callStefano, and who was the one who had made her the offer of theirservices, ambled at my side, a few paces in the rear, and sought to drawme into conversation, haply by way of throwing me off my guard. 

Mistrust is a fine thing at times. "Forewarned is forearmed, " says theproverb, and of all forewarnings there is none we are more likelyto heed than our own mistrust; for whereas we may leave unheeded thewarnings of a friend, we seldom leave unheeded the warnings of ourspirit. 

And so, while my amiable and garrulous Ser Stefano engaged me inpleasant conversation--addressing me ever as Messer the Fool, since heknew me not by name--I wrapped my cloak about me, and under cover of itkept my fingers on the hilt of my stout Pistoja dagger, ready to drawand use it at the first sign of mischief. For that sign I was alleyes, and had I been Argus himself I could have kept no better watch. Meanwhile I plied my tongue and maintained as merry a conversation withSer Stefano as you could wish to hear, for he seemed a ready-wittedknave of a most humorous turn of fancy--God rest his rascally soul! Andso it came to pass that I did by him the very thing he sought to do byme; I lulled him into a careless confidence. 

At last the sign I had been waiting for was given. I saw it as plainlyas if it had been meant for me; I believe I saw it before the man forwhom it was intended, and but for my fears concerning Madonna Paola, Icould have laughed outright at their clumsy assurance. The man who rodeon Madonna's right turned in his saddle and put up his hand as if tobeckon Stefano. I was regaling him with one of the choicest of MesserSacchetti's paradoxes, gurgling, myself, at the humour of the thing Itold. I paid no heed to the sign. I continued to expound my quip, asthough we had the night before us in which to make its elusive humourclear. But out of the tail of my eye I watched my good friend Stefano, and I saw his right hand steal round to the region of his back whereI knew his dagger to be slung. Yet was I patient. There should be noblundering through an excessive precipitancy. I talked on until I sawthat my suspicions were amply realised. I caught the cold gleam of steelin the hand that he brought back as stealthily as he had carried it tohis poniard. Sant' Iddio! What a coward he was for all his bulk, to goso slyly about the business of stabbing a poor, helpless, defencelessFool. 

"But Sacchetti makes his point clear, " I babbled on, most blandly;"almost as clear, as comprehensive and as penetrating as should be toyou the point of this. " And with a swift movement I swung half-round inmy saddle, and sank my dagger to the hilt in his side even as he was inthe act of raising his. 

He made no sound beyond the faintest gurgle--the first vowel of asuddenly choked word of wonder and surprise. He rocked a second in hissaddle, then crashed over, and lay with arms flung wide, like a hugeblack crucifix, upon the white ground. At the same moment a piercingscream broke from Madonna Paola. 

I tremble still to think what might have been her fate had not thoseruffians who had laid hands on her fallen into the sorry error ofholding their single adversary too lightly. They heard the thud of thegallant Stefano's fall, and they never doubted that mine was the bodythat had gone down. They heard the rapid hoof-beats of my approach, yet, they never turned their heads to ascertain whether they might not bemistaken in their firm conviction that it was Messer Stefano who wasjoining them. 

I kissed my blade for luck, and drove it straight and full into the backof the fellow on Madonna Paola's right. He cried out, essayed to turnin his saddle that he might deal with this unlooked-for assailant, then, overcome, he lurched forward on to the withers of his horse and thencerolled over, and was dragged away at the gallop, his foot caught in astirrup, by the suddenly startled brute he rode. 

So far things had gone with an amazing and delightful ease. If only thelast of them had had the amiability to be intimidated by my prowess andto have taken to his heels, I might have issued from that contest withthe unscathed glory of a very Mars. But from his throat there came, inanswer to his comrade's cry, a roar of rage. He fell back from Madonna, and wheeled his horse to come at me, drawing his sword as he advanced. 

"Ride on, Madonna, " I shouted. "I will rejoin you presently. "

The fellow laughed, a mighty ugly and discomposing laugh, which may ormay not have shaken her faith in my promise to rejoin her. It certainlywent near to shaking mine. However, she displayed a presence of mindfull worthy of the haughtiness and ingratitude of which she had showedherself capable. She urged her mule forward, and, so, left him a clearroad to attack me. I made a mistake then that went mighty near tocosting me my life. I paused to twist my cloak about my left armintending to use it as a buckler. Had I but risked the arm itself, allunprotected, in that task, it may well be that it had served me better. As it was, my preparations were far from complete when already he wasupon me, with the result that the waving slack of my cloak was in my wayto hamper and retard the movements of my arm. 

His sword leapt at me, a murderous blue-white flash of moonlit steel. I put up my half-swaddled arm to divert the thrust, holding my daggerready in my right, and gripping my mule with all the strength of mytwo knees. I caught the blade, it is true, and turned aside the strokeintended for my heart. But the slack of the cloak clung to the neck ofmy mule, so that I could not carry my arm far enough to send his pointclear of my body. It took me in the shoulder, stinging me, first icycold then burning hot, as it went tearing its way through. For just asecond was I daunted, more at knowing myself touched than by the actualpain. Then I flung my whole body forward to reach him at the closequarters to which he had come, and I buried my dagger in his breast, high up at the base of his dirty throat. 

The force of the blow carried me forward, even as it bore him backward;and so, with his sword-blade in my shoulder, and my dagger where I hadplanted it, we hurtled over together and lay a second amidst what seemeda forest of equine legs. Then something smote me across the head, and Iwas knocked senseless. 

Conceive me, if you can, a sorrier, or more useless thing. A senselessFool!

CHAPTER VI. FOOL'S LUCK

My return to consciousness seemed to afford me such sensations as adiver may experience as he rises up and up through the depth of waterhe has plumbed--or as a disembodied soul may know in its gentle ascenttowards Heaven. Indeed the latter parallel may be more apt. For throughthe mist that suffused my senses there penetrated from overhead a voicethat seemed to invoke every saint in the calendar on the behalf of somepoor mortal. A very litany of intercession was it, not quite, it wouldappear, devoid of self-seeking. 

"Sainted Virgin, restore him! Good St. Paul, who wert done to death witha sword, let him not perish, else am I lost indeed!" came the voice. 

I took a deep breath, and opened my eyes, whereat the voice cried outgladly that its intercessions had been heard, and I knew that it was onmy behalf that the saints of Heaven had been disturbed in their beatificpeace. My head was pillowed in a woman's lap, and it took me a moment ortwo to realise that that lap was Madonna Paula's, as was hers the voicethat had reached my awakening senses, the voice that now welcomed meback to life in terms that were very different from the last that Icould remember her having used towards me. 

"Thank God, Messer Boccadoro!" she exclaimed, as she bent over me. 

Her face was black with shadow, but in her voice I caught a hint oftears, and I wondered whether they were shed on my behalf or on her own. 

"I do!" I answered fervently. "Have you any notion of what hour it is?"

"None, " she sighed. "You have been so long unconscious that I was losinghope of ever hearing your voice again. "

I became aware of a dull ache on the right side of my head. I put up myhand, and withdrew it moist. She saw the action. 

"One of the horses must have struck you with its hoof after you fell, "she explained. "But I was more concerned for your other wound. Iwithdrew the sword with my own hands. "

That other wound she spoke of was now making itself felt as well. It wasa gnawing, stinging pain in the region of my left shoulder, whichseemed to turn me numb to the waist on that side of my body, and renderpowerless my arm. I questioned her touching my three adversaries, andshe silently pointed to three black masses that lay some little distancefrom us in the snow. 

"Not all dead?" I cried. 

"I do not know, " she answered, with a sob. "I have not dared go nearthem. They frighten me. Mother of Heaven, what a night of horror ithas been! Oh, that I had taken your advice, Messer Boccacloro!" sheexclaimed in a passion of self-reproach. 

I laughed, seeking to soften her distress. 

"To me it seems, that whether you would or not, you have been compelledto take it, after all. Those fellows lie there harmless enough, and I amstill--as I urged that I should be--your only escort. "

"A nobler protector never woman had, " she assured me, and I felt a hotpearl of moisture fail upon my brow. 

"You were wise, at least, to journey with a Fool, " I answered her. "Forfools are proverbially lucky folk, and to-night has proven me of allfools the luckiest. But, Madonna, " I suggested, in a different tone, "should we not be better advised to attempt to resume, this interestingjourney of ours? We do not seem to lack horses?"

A couple of nags were standing by the road-side, together with ourmules, and I was afterwards to learn that she, herself, it was hadtethered them. 

"It must be yet some three leagues to Pesaro, " I added, "and if wejourney slowly, as I fear me that we must, we should arrive there soonafter daybreak. "

"Do you think that you can stand?" she asked, a hopeful ring in hervoice. 

"I might essay it, " answered I, and I would have done so, there andthen, but that she detained me. 

"First let me see to this hurt in your head, " said she. "I have beenbathing it with snow while you were unconscious. "

She gathered a fresh handful as she spoke, and, very tenderly she wipedaway the blood. Then from her own head she took the fine linen lanzathat she wore, and made a bandage--a bandage sweet with the faintfragrance of marsh-mallow--and bound it about my battered skull. Whenthat was done she turned her attention to my shoulder. This was a moredifficult matter, and all that we could do was to attempt to stanch theblood, which already had drenched my doublet on that side. To this endshe passed a long scarf under my arm, and wound it several times aboutmy shoulder. 

At last her gentle ministrations ended, I sought to rise. A dizzinessassailed me scarce was I on my feet, and it is odds I had fallen back, but that she caught and steadied me. 

"Mother in Heaven! You are too weak to ride, " she exclaimed. "You mustnot attempt it. "

"Nay, but I will, " I answered, with more stoutness of tone than I feltof body, and notwithstanding that my knees were loosening under myweight. "It is a faintness that will pass. "

If ever man willed himself to conquer weakness, that did I then, andwith some measure of success--or else it was that my faintness passedof itself. I drew away from her support, and straightening myself, Icrossed to where the animals were tethered, staggering at first, butpresently with a surer foot. She followed me, watching my steps withas much apprehension as a mother may feel when her first-born makes hisearliest attempts at walking, and as ready to spring to my aid did Ishow signs of stumbling. But I kept up, and presently my senses seemedto clear, and I stepped out more surely. 

Awhile we stood discussing which of the animals we should take. It wasmy suggestion that we should ride the horses but she wisely contendedthat the mules would prove the more convenient if the slower. I agreedwith her, and then, ere we set out, I went to see to my late opponents. One of them--Ser Stefano--was cold and stiff; the other two still lived, and from the nature of their wounds seemed likely to survive, if onlythey were not frozen to death before some good Samaritan came upon them. 

I knelt a moment to offer up a prayer for the repose of the soul of himthat was dead, and I bound up the wounds of the living as best I could, to save them greater loss of blood. Indeed, had it lain in my power, Iwould have done more for them. But in what case was I to render furtheraid? After all, they had brought their fate upon themselves, and I doubtnot they were paying a score that they had heaped up heavily in thepast. 

I went back to the mules, and, despite my remonstrances, Madonna Paolainsisted upon aiding me to mount, urging me to have a care of my wound, and to make no violent movement that should set it bleeding again. Thenshe mounted too, nimble as any boy that ever robbed an orchard, and weset out once more. And now it was a very contrite and humbled lady thatrode with me, and one that was at no pains to dissemble her contrition, but, rather, could speak of nothing else. 

It moved me strangely to have her suing pardon from me, as though I hadbeen her equal instead of the sometime jester of the Court of Pesaro, dismissed for an excessive pertness towards one with whom his mastercurried favour. 

And presently, as was perhaps but natural after all that she hadwitnessed, she fell to questioning me as to how it came to pass thatone of such wit, resource and courage should follow the mean callingto which I had owned. In answer I told her without reservation the fullstory of my shame. It was a thing that I had ever most zealously kepthidden, as already I have shown. 

To be a Fool was evil enough in all truth; but to let men know thatunder my motley was buried the identity of a man patrician-born wassomething infinitely worse. For, however vile the trade of a Fool maybe, it is not half so vile for a low-born clod who is too indolent ortoo sickly to do honest work as for one who has accepted it out of ahalf-cowardice and persevered in it through very sloth. 

Yet on that night and after all that had chanced, no matter how mycheeks might burn in the gloom as I rode beside her, I was glad for onceto tell that ignominious story, glad that she should know what weight ofcircumstance had driven me to wear my hideous livery. 

But since my story dealt oddly with that Lord of Pesaro, the kinsmanwhose shelter she was now upon her way to seek, I must first assuremyself that the candour to which I was disposed would not offend. 

"Does it happen, Madonna, " I inquired, "that you are well acquaintedwith the Lord of Pesaro?"

"Nay; I have never seen him, " answered she. "When he was at Rome, a yearago in the service of the Pope, I was at my studies in the convent. Hisfather was my father's cousin, so that my kinship is none so near. Whydo you ask?"

"Because my story deals with him, Madonna, and it is no pretty tale. Notsuch a narrative as I should choose wherewith to entertain you. Still, since you have asked for it, you shall hear it. 

"It was in the year that Giovanni Sforza, Lord of Pesaro, celebrated hisnuptials with the Lady Lucrezia Borgia--three years ago, therefore--thatone morning there rode into the courtyard of his castle of Pesazo atall and lean young man on a tall and lean old horse. He was garbed andharnessed after a fashion that proclaimed him half-knight, half-peasant, and caused the castle lacqueys to eye him with amusement and greet himwith derision. Lacqueys are great arbiters of fashion. 

"In a loud, imperious voice this cockerel called for Giovanni, Lordof Pesaro, whereupon, resenting the insolence of his manner, themen-at-arms would have driven him out without more ado. But it chancedthat from one of the windows of his stronghold the tyrant espied hisodd visitor. He was in a mood that craved amusement, and marvelling whatmadman might be this, he made his way below and bade them stand back andlet me speak--for I, Madonna, was that lean young man. 

"'Are you, ' quoth I, 'the Lord of Pesaro?'

"He answered me courteously that he was, whereupon I did my errand tohim. I flung my gauntlet of buffalo-hide at his feet in gage of battle. 

"'Your father, ' said I, 'Costanzo of Pesaro, was a foul brigand, whorobbed my father of his castle and lands of Biancomonte, leaving himto a needy and poverty-stricken old age. I am here to avenge upon yourfather's son my father's wrongs; I am here to redeem my castle andmy lands. If so be that you are a true knight, you will take up thechallenge that I fling you, and you will do battle with me, on horse orfoot, and with whatsoever arms you shall decree, God defending him thathas justice on his side. '

"Knowing the world as I know it now, Madonna, " I interpolated, "Irealise the folly of that act of mine. But in those days my viewsbelonged to a long departed age of chivalry, of which I had learnt fromsuch books as came my way at Biancomonte, and which I believed was thelife of to-day in the world of men. It was a thing which some tyrantswould have had me broken on the wheel. But Giovanni Sforza never so muchas manifested anger. There was a complacent smile on his white face andhis fingers toyed carelessly with his beard. 

"I waited patiently, very haughty of mien and very fierce at heart, andwhen the amusement began to fade from his eyes, I begged that he woulddeliver me his answer. 

"'My answer, ' quoth he, 'is that you get you back to the place fromwhence you came, and render thanks to God on your knees every morning ofthe life I am sparing you that Giovanni Sforza is more entertained thanaffronted by your frenzy. '

"At his words I went crimson from chin to brow. 

"'Do you disdain me?' I questioned, choking with rage. He turned, witha shrug and a laugh, and bade one of his men to give this cavalier hisglove, and conduct him from the castle. Several that had stood at handmade shift to obey him, whereat I fell into such a blind, unreasoningfury that incontinently I drew my sword, and laid about me. They weremany, I was but one; and they were not long in overpowering me anddragging me from my horse. 

"They bound me fast, and Giovanni bade them let me have a priest, thenget me hanged without delay. Had he done that, the world being as it is, perhaps none could blame him. But he elected to spare my life, yeton such terms as I could never have accepted had it not been for theconsideration of my poor widowed mother, whom I had left in the hills ofBiancomonte whilst I went forth to seek my fortune--such was the taleI had told her. I was her sole support, her only hope in life; and mydeath must have been her own, if not from grief, why, then from verywant. The thought of that poor old woman crushed my spirit as I sat indurance waiting for my end, and when the priest came, whom they had sentto shrive me, he found me weeping, which he took to argue a contriteheart. He bore the tale of it to Giovanni, and the Lord of Pesaro cameto visit me in consequence, and found me sorely changed from my furiousmood of some hours earlier. 

"I was a very coward, I own; but it was for my mother's sake. If Ifeared death, it was because I bethought me of what it must mean toher. "

"At sight of Giovanni I cast myself at his feet, and with tears in myeyes and in heartrending tones, bespeaking a humility as great as hadbeen my erstwhile arrogance, I begged my life of him. I told him thetruth--that for myself I was not afraid to die, but that I had a motherin the hills who was dependent on me, and who must starve if I were thuscut off. 

"He watched me with his moody eyes, a saturnine smile about his lips. Then of a sudden he shook with a silent mirth, whose evil, maliciousdepth I was far indeed from suspecting. He asked me would I take solemnoath that if he spared my life I would never again raise my hand againsthim. That oath I took with a greediness born of my fear of the deaththat was impending. 

"'You have been wise, ' said he, ' and you shall have your life on onecondition--that you devote it to my service. '

"'Even that will I do, ' I answered readily. He turned to an attendant, and ordered him to go fetch a suit of motley. No word passed between usuntil that man returned with those garish garments. Then Giovanni smiledon me in his mocking, infernal way. 

"'Not that, ' I cried, guessing his purpose. 

"'Aye, that, ' he answered me; 'that or the hangman's noose. A man whocould devise so monstrous a jest as was your challenge to the Tyrant ofPesaro should be a merry fellow if he would. I need such a one. Thereare two Fools at my Court, but they are mere tumblers, deformed verminthat excite as much disgust as mirth. I need a sprightlier man, a man ofsome learning and more drollery; such a man, in short, as you would seemto be. '

"I recoiled in horror and disgust. Was this his clemency--this sparingof my life that he might submit it to an eternal shame? For a moment mymother was forgotten. I thought only of myself, and I grew resolved tohang. 

"'When you spoke of service, ' said I 'I thought of service of anhonourable sort. '

"'The service that I offer you is honourable, ' he said, with coldamusement. 'Indeed, remembering that your life was forfeit, you shouldaccount yourself most fortunate. You shall be well housed and well fed, you shall wear silk and lie in fine linen, on condition that you aremerry. If you prove dull our castellan shall have you whipped--for sucha one as you could not be dull save out of sullenness, of which we shallseek to cure you if you show signs of it. '

"'I will not do it, ' I cried, 'it were too base. '

"'My friend, ' he answered me, 'the choice is yours. You shall have anhour in which to resolve what you will do. When they open this door foryou at sunset, come forth clad as you are, and you shall hang. Ifyou prefer to live, then don me that robe and cap of motley, and, oncondition that you are merry, life is yours. '"

I paused a moment. Our horses were moving slowly, for the tale engrossedus both, me in the telling, her in the hearing. Presently--

"I need not harass you with the reflections that were mine during thathour, Madonna. Rather let me ask you: how should a man so placed makechoice to be full worthy of the office proffered him?"

There was a moment's silence while she pondered. 

"Why, " she answered me, at last, "a fool I take it would have chosendeath: the wise man life, since it must hold the hope of better days. "

"And since it asked a man of wit to play the fool to such a tune as theLord Giovanni piped, that wise young man chose life and folly. But wasthat choice indeed so wise? The story ends not there. That young menwhose early life had been one of hardships found himself, indeed, well-housed and fed as the Lord Giovanni had promised him, and so hefell into a slothful spirit, and was content to play the Fool for bedand board. 

"There were times when conscience knocked loudly at my heart, and I wastortured with shame to see myself in the garb of Fools, the sport ofall, from prince to scullion. But in the three years that I had dwelt atPesaro my identity had been forgotten by the few who had ever been awareof it. Moreover, a court is a place of changes, and in three years therehad been such comings and goings at the Court of Giovanni Sforza, thatnot more than one or two remained of those that had inhabited it whenfirst I entered on my existence there. Thus had my position grownsteadily more bearable. I was just a jester and no more, and so, ina measure--though I blush to say it--I grew content. I gatheredconsolation from the fact that there were not any who now remembered thestory of my coming to Pesaro, or who knew of the cowardliness I had beenguilty of when I consented to mask myself in the motley and assume thename of Boccadoro. I counted on the Lord Giovanni's generosity to letthings continue thus, and, meanwhile, I provided for my mother out ofthe vails that were earned me by my shame. But there came a day whenGiovanni in evil wantonness of spirit chose to make merry at the Fool'sexpense. 

"To be held up to scorn and ridicule is a part of the trade of suchas I, and had it been just Boccadoro whom Giovanni had exposed to thederision of his Court, haply I had been his jester still. But such sportas that would have satisfied but ill the deep-seated malice of his soul. The man whom his cruel mockery crucified for their entertainment wasLazzaro Biancomonte, whom he revealed to them, relating in his ownfashion the tale I have told you. 

"At that I rebelled, and I said such things to him in that hour, beforeall his Court, as a man may not say to a prince and live. Passion surgedup in him, and he ordered his castellan to flog me to the bone--inshort, to slay me with a whip. 

"From that punishment I was saved by the intercessions of MadonnaLucrezia. But I was driven out of Pesaro that very night, and so ithappens that I am a wanderer now. "

At that I left it. I had no mind to tell her what motives had impelledLucrezia Borgia to rescue me, nor on what errand I had gone to Rome andwas from Rome returning. 

She had heard me in silence, and now that I had done, she heaved a sigh, for which gentle expression of pity out of my heart I thanked her. Wewere silent, thereafter, for a little while. At length she turned herhead to regard me in the light of the now declining moon. 

"Messer Biancomonte, " said she, and the sound of the old name, fallingfrom her lips, thrilled me with a joy unspeakable, and seemed already toreinvest me in my old estate, "Messer Biancomonte, you have done me inthese four-and-twenty hours such service as never did knight of old forany lady--and you did it, too, out of the most disinterested and nobleof motives, proving thereby how truly knightly is that heart of yours, which, for my sake, has all but beat its last to-night. You must journeyon to Pesaro with me despite this banishment of which you have told me. I will be surety that no harm shall come to you. I could not do less, and I shall hope to do far more. Such influence as I may prove to havewith my cousin of Pesaro shall be exerted all on your behalf, myfriend; and if in the nature of Giovanni Sforza there be a tithe of thegratitude with which you have inspired me, you shall, at least, havejustice, and Biancomonte shall be yours again. "

I was silent for a spell, so touched was I by the kindness shemanifested me--so touched, indeed, and so unused to it that I forgot howamply I had earned it, and how rudely she had used me ere that was done. 

"Alas!" I sighed. "God knows I am no longer fit to sit in the house ofthe Biancomonte. I am come too low, Madonna. "

"That Lazzaro, after whom you are named, " she answered, "had come yetlower. But he lived again, and resumed his former station. Take yourcourage from that. "

"He lived not at the mercy of Giovanni of Pesaro, " said I. 

There was a fresh pause at that. Then--"At least, " she urged me, "you'llcome to Pesaro with me?"

"Why yes, " said I. "I could not let you go alone. " And in my heart Ifelt a pang of shame, and called myself a cur for making use of her as Iwas doing to reach the Court of Giovanni Sforza. 

"You need fear no consequences, " she promised me. "I can be surety forthat at least. "

In the east a brighter, yellower light than the moon's began to show. It was the dawn, from which I gathered that it must be approachingthe thirteenth hour. Pesaro could not be more than a couple of leaguesfarther, and, presently, when we had gained the summit of the slighthill we were ascending, we beheld in the distance a blurred mass loomingon the edge of the glittering sea. A silver ribbon that uncoiled itselffrom the western hills disappeared behind it. That silvery streak wasthe River Foglia; that heap of buildings against the landscape's virginwhite, the town of Pesaro. 

Madonna pointed to it with a sudden cry of gladness. "See MesserBiancomonte, how near we are. Courage, my friend; a little farther, andyonder we have rest and comfort for you. "

She had need, in truth, to cry me "Courage!" for I was weakening fastonce more. It may have been the much that I had talked, or the infernaljolting of my mule, but I was losing blood again, and as we were on thepoint of riding forward my senses swam, so that I cried out; and but forher prompt assistance I might have rolled headlong from my saddle. 

As it was, she caught me about the waist as any mother might havedone her son. "What ails you?" she inquired, her newly-aroused anxietycontrasting sharply with her joyous cry of a moment earlier. "Are youfaint, my friend?" It needed no confession on my part. My condition wasall too plain as I leaned against her frail body for support. 

"It is my wound, " I gasped. Then I set my teeth in anguish. So near thehaven, and to fail now! It could not be; it must not be. I summoned allmy resolution, all my fortitude; but in vain. Nature demanded paymentfor the abuses she had suffered. 

"If we proceed thus, " she ventured fearfully, "you leaning against me, and going at a slow pace--no faster than a walk--think you, you can bearit? Try, good Messer 'Biancomonte. "

"I will try, Madonna, " I replied. "Perhaps thus, and if I am silent, wemay yet reach Pesaro together. If not--if my strength gives out--thetown is yonder and the day is coming. You will find your way withoutme. "

"I will not leave you, sir, " she vowed; and it was good to hear her. 

"Indeed, I hope you may not know the need, " I answered wearily. And thuswe started on once more. 

Sant' Iddio! What agonies I suffered ere the sun rose up out of the seato flood us with his winter glory! What agonies were mine during thosetwo hours or so of that last stage of our eventful journey! "I must bearup until we are at the gates of Pesaro, " I kept murmuring to myself, and, as if my spirit were inclined to become the servant of my will andhold my battered flesh alive until we got that far, Pesaro's gates I hadthe joy of entering ere I was constrained to give way. 

Dimly I remember--for very dim were my perceptions growing--that as wecrossed the bridge and passed beneath the archway of the Porta Romana, the officer turned out to see who came. At sight of me be gaped a momentin astonishment. 

"Boccadoro?" he exclaimed, at last. "So soon returned?"

"Like Perseus from the rescue of Andromeda, " answered I, in a feeblevoice, "saving that Perseus was less bloody than am I. Behold theMadonna Paola Sforza di Santafior, the noble cousin of our High andMighty Lord. "

And then as if my task being done, I were free to set my weary brainto rest, my senses grew confused, the officer's voice became a hum thatgradually waxed fainter as I sank into what seemed the most luxuriousand delicious sleep that ever mortal knew. 

Two days later, when I was conscious once more, I learned whatexcitement those words of mine had sown, with what honours Madonna Paolawas escorted to the Castle, and how the citizens of Pesaro turned outupon hearing the news which ran like fire before us. And Madonna, itseems, had loudly proclaimed how gallantly I had served her, for as theybore me along in a cloak carried by four men-at-arms, the cry that washeard in the streets of Pesaro that morning was "Boccadoro!" Theyhad loved me, had those good citizens of Pesaro, and the news of mydeparture had cast a gloom upon the town. To have their hero return ina manner so truly heroic provoked that brave display of their affection, and I deeply doubt if ever in the days of greatest loyalty the name ofSforza was as loudly cried in Pesaro as, they tell me, was the name ofSforza's Fool that day. 

CHAPTER VII. THE SUMMONS FROM ROME

If Madonna Paola did not achieve quite all that she had promised me soreadily, yet she achieved more than from my acquaintance with the natureof Giovanni Sforza--and my knowledge of the deep malice he entertainedfor me--I should have dared to hope. 

The Tyrant of Pesaro, as I was soon to learn, was greatly taken withthis fair cousin of his, whom that morning he had beheld for the firsttime. And being taken with her, it may be that Giovanni listened themore readily to her intercessions on my poor behalf. Since it was shewho begged this thing, he could not wholly refuse. But since he wasGiovanni Sforza, he could not wholly grant. He promised her that mylife, at least, should be secure, and that not only would he pardon me, but that he would have his own physician see to it that I was made soundagain. For the time, that was enough, he thought. First let them bringme back to life. When that was achieved, it would be early enough toconsider what course this life should take thereafter. 

And she, knowing him not and finding him so kind and gracious, trustedthat he would perform that which he tricked her into believing that hepromised. 

For some ten days I lay abed, feverish at first and later very weak fromthe great loss of blood I had sustained. But after the second day, whenmy fever had abated, I had some visitors, among whom was Madonna Paola, who bore me the news that her intercessions for me with the Lordof Pesaro were likely to bear fruit, and that I might look for myreinstatement. Yet, if I permitted myself to hope as she bade me; I didso none too fully. 

My situation, bearing in mind how at once I had served and thwarted theends of Cesare Borgia, was perplexing. 

Another visitor I had was Messer Magistri--the pompous seneschal ofPesaro--who, after his own fashion, seemed to have a liking for me, anda certain pity. Here was my chance of discharging the true errand onwhich I was returned. 

"I owe thanks, " said I, "to many circumstances for the sparing ofmy life; but above all people and all things do I owe thanks to ourgracious Lady Lucrezia. Do you think, Messer Magistri, that she wouldconsent to see me and permit me again to express the gratitude thatfills my heart?"

Mosser Magistri thought that he could promise this, and consentedto bear my message to her. Within the hour she was at my bedside anddivining that, haply, I had news to give her of the letter I had bornher brother, she dismissed Magistri who was in attendance. 

Once we were alone her first words were of kindly concern for mycondition, delivered in that sweet, musical voice that was by no meansthe least charm of a princess to whom Nature had been prodigal of gifts. For without going to that length of exaggerated praise which some havebestowed--for her own ear, and with an eye to profit--upon MadonnaLucrezia, yet were I less than truthful if I sought to belittle herample claims to beauty. Some six years later than the time of which Iwrite she was met on the occasion of her entry into Ferrara by a certainclown dressed in the scanty guise of the shepherd Paris, who profferedher the apple of beauty with the mean-souled flattery that sincebeholding her he had been forced to alter his old-time judgment infavour of Venus. 

He lied, like the brazen, self-seeking adulator that he was, and forwhich he should have been soundly whipped. Her nose was a shade toolong, her chin a shade too short to admit, even remotely, of suchcomparisons. Still, that she had a certain gracious beauty, as I havesaid, it is not mine to deny. There was an almost childish freshness inher face, an almost childish innocence in her fine gray eyes, and, aboveall, a golden and resplendent hair as brought to mind the tresses ofGod's angels. 

That fair child--for no more than a child was she--drew a chair to mybedside. 

There she sate herself, whilst I thanked her for her concern on mybehalf, and answered that I was doing well enough, and should be abroadagain in a day or two. 

"Brave lad, " she murmured, patting my hand, which lay upon the coverlet, as though she had been my sister and I anything but a Fool, "count meever your friend hereafter, for what you have done for Madonna Paola. For although it was my own family you thwarted, yet you did so to serveone who is more to me than any family, more than any sister could be. "

"What I did, Madonna, " I answered, "I did with the better heart since itopened out a way that was barred me, solved me a riddle which my Lord, your Illustrious brother, set me--one that otherwise might well haveovertaxed my wits. "

"Ah?" Her gray eyes fell on me in a swift and searching glance, a glancethat revealed to the full their matchless beauty. Care seemed ofa sudden to have aged her face. The question of her eyes needed notranslation into words. 

"The Lord Cardinal of Valencia entrusted me with a letter for you, inanswer to your own, " I informed her, and from underneath my pillow Idrew the package, which during Magistri's absence I had abstracted frommy boot that I might have it in readiness when she came. 

She sighed as she took it, and a wistful smile invested the corners ofher mouth. 

"I had hoped he would have found better employment for you, " she said. 

"His Excellency promised that he would more fitly employ me in thefuture did I discharge this errand with secrecy and despatch. But byaiding Madonna Paola I have burned my boats against returning to claimthe redemption of that promise; though had it not been for Madonna Paolaand what I did, I scarce know how I should have penetrated here to you. "

She broke the seal, and rising crossed to the window, where she stoodreading the letter, her back toward me. Presently I heard a stifledsob. The letter was crushed in her hand. Then moments passed ere sheconfronted me once more. But her manner as all changed; she was agitatedand preoccupied, and for all that she forced herself to talk of me andmy affairs, her mind was clearly elsewhere. At last she left me, nor didI see her again during the time I was confined to my bed. 

On the eleventh day I rose, and the weather being mild and spring-like, I was permitted by my grave-faced doctor to take the air a little on theterrace that overlooks the sea. I found no garments but some suits ofmotley, and so, in despite of my repugnance now to reassume that garb, Ihad no choice but to array myself in one of these. I selected the leastgarish one--a suit of black and yellow stripes, with hose that was halfblack, half yellow, too; and so, leaning upon the crutch they had leftme, I crept forth into the sunlight, the very ghost of the man that Ihad been a fortnight ago. 

I found a stone seat in a sheltered corner looking southward towardsAncona, and there I rested me and breathed the strong invigorating airof the Adriatic. The snows were gone, and between me and the wall sometwenty paces off--there was a stretch of soft, green turf. 

I had brought with me a book that Madonna Lucrezia had sent me while Iwas yet abed. It was a manuscript collection of Spanish odes, withthe proverbs of one Domenico Lopez--all very proper nourishment fora jester's mind. The odes seemed to possess a certain quaintness, andamong the proverbs there were many that were new to me in framing andin substance. Moreover, I was glad of this means of improving myacquaintance with the tongue of Spain, and I was soon absorbed. Soabsorbed, indeed, as never to hear the footsteps of the Lord Giovanni, when presently he approached me unattended, nor to guess at his presenceuntil his shadow fell athwart my page. I raised my eyes, and seeing whoit was I made shift to get on my feet; but he commanded me to remainseated, commenting sympathetically upon my weak condition. 

He asked me what I read, and when I had told him, a thin smile flutteredacross his white face. 

"You choose your reading with rare judgment, " said he. "Read on, andprime your mind with fresh humour, prepare yourself with new conceitsfor our amusement against the time when health shall be more fullyrestored you. "

It was in such words as these that he intimated to me that I waspardoned, and reinstated--as the Fool of the Court of Pesaro. That wasto be the sum of his clemency. We were precisely where we had been. Oncebefore had he granted me my life on condition that I should amuse him;he did no more than repeat that mercy now. I stared at him in wonder, open-mouthed, whereit he laughed. 

"You are agreeably surprised, my Boccadoro?" said he, his fingersstraying to his beard as was his custom. "My clemency is no more thanyou deserve in return for the service you have rendered to the House ofSforza. " And he patted my head as though I had been one of his dogs thathad borne itself bravely in the chase. 

I answered nothing. I sat there as if I had been a part of the stonefrom which my seat was hewn, for I lacked the strength to rise andstrangle him as he deserved--moreover, I was bound by an oath, which itwould have damned my soul to break, never to raise my hand against him. 

And then, before he could say more, two ladies issued from the doorwayon my right. They were Madonna Lucrezia and Madonna Paola. Upon espyingme they hastened forward with expressions of pleased surprise at seeingme risen and out, and when I would have got to my feet they stayed meas Giovanni had done. Madonna Paola's words seemed addressed to heavenrather than to me, for they were words of thanksgiving for this recoveryof my strength. 

"I have no thanks, " she ended warmly, "that can match the deeds by whichyou earned them, Messer Biancomonte. "

My eyes drifting to Giovanni's face surprised its sudden darkening. 

"Madonna Paola, " said he, in an icy voice, "you have uttered a name thatmust not be heard within my walls of Pesaro, if you would prove yourselfthe friend of Boccadoro. To remind me of his true identity is to remindme of that which counts not in his favour. "

She turned to regard him, a mild surprise in her blue eyes. 

"But, my lord, you promised--" she began. 

"I promised, " he interposed, with an easy smile and manner never sodeprecatory, "that I would pardon him, grant him his life and restorehim to my favour. "

"But did you not say that if he survived and was restored to strengthyou would then determine the course his life should take?"

Still smiling, he produced his comfit-box, and raised the lid. 

"That is a thing he seems to have determined for himself, " he answeredsmoothly--he could be smooth as a cat upon occasion, could this bastardof Costanzo Sforza. "I came upon him here, arrayed as you beholdhim, and reading a book of Spanish quips. Is it not clear that he haschosen?"

Between thumb and forefinger he balanced a sugar-crusted comfit ofcoriander seed steeped in marjoram vinegar, and having put his questionhe bore the sweet-meat to his mouth. The ladies looked at him, and fromhim to me. Then Madonna Paola spoke, and there seemed a reproachfulwonder in her voice. 

"Is this indeed your choice?" she asked me. 

"It is the choice that was forced on me, " said I, in heat. "They left meno garment save these of folly. That I was reading this book it pleasesmy lord to interpret into a further sign of my intentions. "

She turned to him again, and to the appeal she made was joined that ofMadonna Lucrezia. He grew serious and put up his hand in a gesture ofrare loftiness. 

"I am more clement than you think, " said he, "in having done so much. For the rest, the restoration that you ask for him is one involvingpolitical issues you little dream of. What is this?"

He had turned abruptly. A servant was approaching, leading amud-splashed courier, whom he announced as having just arrived. 

"Whence are you?" Giovanni questioned him. 

"From the Holy See, " answered the courier, bowing, "with letters for theHigh and Mighty Lord Giovanni Sforza, Tyrant of Pesaro, and his noblespouse, Madonna Lucrezia Borgia. "

He proffered his letters as he spoke, and Giovanni, whose brow had grownovercast, took them with a hand that seemed reluctant. Then bidding theservant see to the courier's refreshment, he dismissed them both. 

A moment he stood, balancing the parchments a if from their weight hewould infer the gravity of their contents; and the affairs of Boccadorowere, there and then, forgotten by us all. For the thought that roseuppermost in our minds--saving always that of Madonna Lucrezia--was thatthese communications concerned the sheltering of Madonna Paola, and werea command for her immediate return to Rome. At last Giovanni handed hiswife the letter intended for her, and, in silence, broke the seal of hisown. 

He unfolded it with a grim smile, but scarce had he begun to read whenhis expression softened into one of terror, and his face grew ashen. Next it flared crimson, the veins on his brow stood out like ropes, andhis eyes flashed furiously upon Madonna Lucrezia. She was reading, herbosom rising and falling in token of the excitement that possessed her. 

"Madonna, " he cried in an awful voice, "I have here a command from theHoly See to repair at once to Rome, to answer certain charges that arepreferred against me relating to my marriage. Madonna, know you aught ofthis?"

"I know, sir, " she answered steadily, "that I, too, have here a lettercalling me to Rome. But there is no reason given for the summons. "

Intuitively it flashed across my mind that whatever the matter mightbe, Madonna Lucrezia had full knowledge of it through the letter I hadbrought her from her brother. 

"Can you conjecture, Madonna, what are these charges to which my lettervaguely alludes?" Giovanni was inquiring. 

"Your pardon, but the subject is scarcely of a nature to permitdiscussion in the castle courtyard. Its character is intimate. "

He looked at her very searchingly, but for all that he was a man ofalmost twice her years, her wits were more than a match for his, andhis scrutiny can have told him nothing. She preserved a calm, unruffledfront. 

"In five minutes, Madonna, " said he, very sternly, "I shall be honouredif you will receive me in your closet. "

She inclined her head, murmuring an unhesitating assent. Satisfied, hebowed to her and to Madonna Paola--who had been looking on with eyesthat wonder had set wide open--and turning on his heel he strode brisklyaway. As he passed into the castle, Madonna Lucrezia heaved a sigh androse. 

"My poor Boccadoro, " she cried, "I fear me your affairs must wait awhile. But think of me always as your friend, and believe that if I canprevail upon my brother to overlook the ill-turn you did him when youentered the service of this child"--and she pointed to Madonna Paola--"Ishall send for you from Rome, for in Pesaro I fear you have little tohope for. But let this be a secret between us. "

From those words of hers I inferred, as perhaps she meant I should, thatonce she left Pesaro to obey her father's summons, our little northernstate was to know her no more. Once again, only, did I see her, on theoccasion of her departure, some four days later, and then but for amoment. Back to Pesaro she came no more, as you shall learn anon; butbehind her she left a sweet and fragrant memory, which still enduresthough many years are sped and much calumny has been heaped upon hername. 

I might pause here to make some attempt at refuting the base falsehoodsthat had been bruited by that time-serving vassal Guicciardini, and others of his kidney, whom the upstart Cardinal Giuliano dellaRovere--sometime pedlar--in his jealous fury at seeing the covetedpontificate pass into the family of Borgia, bought and hired to do hisloathsome work of calumny and besmirch the fame of as sweet a lady asItaly has known. But this poor chronicle of mine is rather concernedwith the history of Madonna Paola di Santafior, and it were a divergencewell-nigh unpardonable to set my pen at present to that other task. Moreover, there is scarce the need. If any there be who doubt me, or iffuture generations should fall into the error of lending credence to thelies of that villain Guicciardini, of that arch-villain Giuliano dellaRovere, or of other smaller fry who have lent their helot's pens toweave mendacious records of her life, dubbing her murderess, adulteress, and Heaven knows what besides--I will but refer them to the archivesof Ferrara, whose Duchess she became at the age of one-and-twenty, andwhere she reigned for eighteen years. There shall it be found recordedthat she was an exemplary, God-fearing woman; a faithful and honouredwife; a wise, devoted mother; and a princess, beloved and esteemed byher people for her piety, her charity and her wisdom. If such records asare there to be read by earnest seekers after truth be not sufficient toconvince, and to reveal those others whom I have named in the light oftheir true baseness, then were it idle for me to set up in these pages apassing refutation of the falsehoods which it has grieved me so often tohear repeated. 

It was two days later that the Lord Giovanni set out for Rome, obedientto the command he had received. But before his departure--on the eve ofit, to be precise--there arrived at Pesaro a very wonderful and handsomegentleman. This was the brother of Madonna Paola, the High and MightyLord Filippo di Santafior. He had had a hint in Rome that his connivanceat his sister's defiant escape was suspected at the Vatican, and hehad wisely determined that his health would thrive better in a northernclimate for a while. 

A very splendid creature was this Lord Filippo, all shimmeringvelvet, gleaming jewels, costly furs and glittering gold. His facewas effeminate, though finely featured, and resembled, in much, hissister's. He rode a cream-coloured horse, which seemed to have beensteeped in musk, so strongly was it scented. But of all his affectationsthe one with which I as taken most was to see one of his grooms approachhim when he dismounted, to dust his wondrous clothes down to his shoes, which he wore in the splayed fashion set by the late King of France whowas blessed with twelve toes on each of his deformed feet. 

The Lord Giovanni, himself not lacking in effeminacy, was greatly takenby the wondrous raiment, the studied lisp and the hundred affectationsof this peerless gallant. Had he not been overburdened at the time bythe Papal business that impended, he might there and then have cementedthe intimacy which was later to spring up between them. As it was, hemade him very welcome, and placed at his and his sister's disposalthe beautiful palace that his father had begun, and he, himself, hadcompleted, which was known as the Palazza Sforza. On the morrow Giovannileft Pesaro with but a small retinue, in which I was thankful not to beincluded. 

Two days later Madonna Lucrezia followed her husband, the fact that theyjourneyed not together, seeming to wear an ominous significance. Hereyes had a swollen look, such as attends much weeping, which afterwardsI took as proof that she knew for what purpose she was going, and wasmoved to bitter grief at the act to which her ambitious family wasconstraining her. 

After their departure things moved sluggishly at Pesaro. The noblesof the Lord Giovanni's Court repaired to their several houses in theneighboring country, and save for the officers of the household theplace became deserted. 

Madonna Paola remained at the Sforza Palace, and I saw her only onceduring the two mouths that followed, and then it was about the streets, and she had little more than a greeting for me as she passed. At herside rode her brother, a splendid blaze of finery, falcon on wrist. 

My days were spent in reading and reflection, for there was naught elseto do. I might have gone my ways, had I so wished it, but something keptme there at Pesaro, curious to see the events with which the time wasgrowing big. 

We grew sadly stagnant during Lent, and what with the uneventful courseof things, and the lean fare proscribed by Mother Church, it was a verydispirited Boccadoro that wandered aimlessly whither his dulling fancytook him. But in Holy Week, at last, we received an abrupt stir whichset a whirlpool of excitement in the Dead Sea of our lives. It was thesudden reappearance of the Lord Giovanni. 

He came alone, dust-stained and haggard, on a horse that dropped deadfrom exhaustion the moment Pesaro was reached, and in his pallid cheekand hollow eye we read the tale of some great fear and some disaster. 

That night we heard the story of how he had performed the feat of ridingall the way from Rome in four-and-twenty hours, fleeing for his lifefrom the peril of assassination, of which Madonna Lucrezia had warnedhim. 

He went off to his Castle of Gradara, where he shut himself up with thetrouble we could but guess at, and so in Pesaro, that brief excitementspent, we stagnated once again. 

I seemed an anomaly in so gloomy a place, and more than once did I thinkof departing and seeking out my poor old mother in her mountain home, contenting myself hereafter with labouring like any honest villano bornto the soil. But there ever seemed to be a voice that bade me stayand wait, and the voice bore a suggestion of Madonna Paola. But whydissemble here? Why cast out hints of voices heard, supernatural intheir flavour? The voice, I doubt not, was just my own inclination, which bade me hope that once again it might be mine to serve that lady. 

An eventful year in the history of the families of Sforza and Borgia wasthat year of grace 1497. 

Spring came, and ere it had quite grown to summer we had news of theassassination of the Duke of Gandia, and the tale that he was done todeath by his elder brother, Cesare Borgia; a tale which seemed to lackfor reasonable substantiation, and which, despite the many voices thatmake bold to noise it broadcast, may or may not be true. 

In that same month of June messages passed between Rome and Pesaro, andgradually the burden of the messages leaked out in rumours that PopeAlexander and his family were pressing the Lord Giovanni to consent to adivorce. At last he left Pesaro again; this time to journey to Milan andseek counsel with his powerful cousin, Lodovico, whom they called "TheMoor. " When he returned he was more sulky and downcast than ever, and atGradara he lived in an isolation that had been worthy of a hermit. 

And thus that miserable year wore itself out, and, at last, in December, we heard that the divorce was announced, and that Lucrezia Borgia wasthe Tyrant of Pesaro's wife no more. The news of it and the reasonsthat were put forward as having led to it were roared across Italy ina great, derisive burst of laughter, of which the Lord Giovanni was theunfortunate and contemptible butt. 

CHAPTER VIII. "MENE, MENE, TEKEL, UPHARSIN"

And now, lest I grow tedious and weary you with this narrative of mine, it may be well that I but touch with a fugitive pen upon the events ofthe next three years of the history of Pesaro. 

Early in 1498 the Lord Giovanni showed himself once more abroad, and heseemed again the same weak, cruel, pleasure-loving tyrant he had beenbefore shame overtook him and drove him for a season into hiding. Madonna Paola and her brother, Filippo di Santafior, remained in Pesaro, where they now appeared to have taken up their permanent abode. MadonnaPaola--following her inclinations--withdrew to the Convent of SantaCaterina, there to pursue in peace the studies for which she had ataste, whilst her splendid, profligate brother became the ornament--thearbiter elegantiarum--of our court. 

Thus were they left undisturbed; for in the cauldron of Borgia politicsa stew was simmering that demanded all that family's attention, and ofwhose import we guessed something when we heard that Cesare Borgia hadflung aside his cardinalitial robes to put on armour and give freer reinto the boundless ambition that consumed him. 

With me life moved as if that winter excursion and adventure had neverbeen. Even the memory of it must have faded into a haze that scarce leftdiscernible any semblance of reality, for I was once again Boccadoro, the golden-mouthed Fool, whose sayings were echoed by every jesterthroughout Italy. My shame that for a brief season had risen up in armsseemed to be laid to rest once more, and I was content with the burdenthat was mine. Money I had in plenty, for when I pleased him the LordGiovanni's vails were often handsome, and much of my earnings went tomy poor mother, who would sooner have died starving than have boughtherself bread with those ducats could she have guessed at what manner oftrade Lazzaro Biancomonte had earned them. 

The Lord Giovanni was a frequent visitor at the Convent of SantaCaterina, whither he went, ever attended by Filippo di Santafior, to payhis duty to his fair cousin. In the summer of 1500, she being then cometo the age of eighteen, and as divinely beautiful a lady as you couldfind in Italy, she allowed herself to be persuaded by her brother--who, I make no doubt had been, in his turn, persuaded by the Lord ofPesaro--to leave her convent and her studies, and to take up her lifeat the Sforza Palace, where Filippo held by now a sort of petty court ofhis own. 

And now it fell out that the Lord Giovanni was oftener at the Palacethan at the Castle, and during that summer Pesaro was given over tosuch merrymaking as it had never known before. There was endlesslute-thrumming and recitation of verses by a score of parasite poetswhom the Lord Giovanni encouraged, posing now as a patron of letters;there were balls and masques and comedies beyond number, and we were asgay as though Italy held no Cesare Borgia, Duke of Valentinois, who wassweeping northward with his all-conquering flood of mercenaries. 

But one there was who, though the very centre of all these merry doings, the very one in whose honour and for whose delectation they were setafoot, seemed listless and dispirited in that boisterous crowd. Thiswas Madonna Paola, to whom, rumour had it, that her kinsman, the LordGiovanni, was paying a most ardent suit. 

I saw her daily now, and often would she choose me for her solecompanion; often, sitting apart with me, would she unburden her heartand tell me much that I am assured she would have told no other. Astrange thing may it have seemed, this confidence between the Fool andthe noble Lady of Santafior--my Holy Flower of the Quince, as in mythoughts I grew to name her. Perhaps it may have been because she foundme ever ready to be sober at her bidding, when she needed sober companyas those other fools--the greater fools since they accounted themselveswise--could not afford her. 

That winter adventure betwixt Cagli and Pesaro was a link that bound ustogether, and caused her to see under my motley and my masking smilethe true Lazzaro Biancomonte whom for a little season she had known. Andwhen we were alone it had become her wont to call me Lazzaro, leavingthat other name that they had given me for use when others were at hand. Yet never did she refer to my condition, or wound me by seeking to spurme to the ambition to become myself again. Haply she was content that Ishould be as I sas, since had I sought to become different it must haveentailed my quitting Pesaro, and this poor lady was so bereft of friendsthat she could not afford to lose even the sympathy of the despisedjester. 

It was in those days that I first came to love her with as pure a flameas ever burned within the heart of man, for the very hopelessness of itpreserved its holy whiteness. What could I do, if I would love her, but love her as the dog may love his mistress? More was surely not forme--and to seek more were surely a madness that must earn me less. Andso, I was content to let things be, and keep my heart in check, thanking God for the mercy of her company at times, and for the preciousconfidences she made me, and praying Heaven--for of my love was I growndevout--that her life might run a smooth and happy course, and ready, in the furtherance of such an object, to lay down my own should the needarise. Indeed there were times when it seemed to me that it was a goodthing to be a Fool to know a love of so rare a purity as that--such alove as I might never have known had I been of her station, and in suchcase as to have hoped to win her some day for my own. 

One evening of late August, when the vines were heavy with ripe fruit, and the scent of roses was permeating the tepid air, she drew me fromthe throng of courtiers that made merry in the Palace, and led me outinto the noble gardens to seek counsel with me, she said, upon a matterof gravest moment. There, under the sky of deepest blue, crimsoning tosaffron where the sun had set, we paced awhile in silence, my own sensesheld in thrall by the beauty of the eventide, the ambient perfumesof the air and the strains of music that faintly reached us from thePalace. Madonna's head was bent, and her eyes were set upon the groundand burdened, so my furtive glance assured me, with a gentle sorrow. At length she spoke, and at the words she uttered my heart seemed for amoment to stand still. 

"Lazzaro, " said she, "they would have me marry. "

For a little spell there was a silence, my wits seeming to have growntoo numbed to attempt to seek an answer. I might be content, indeed, tolove her from a distance, as the cloistered monk may love and worshipsome particular saint in Heaven; yet it seems that I was not proofagainst jealousy for all the abstract quality of my worship. 

"Lazzaro, " she repeated presently, "did you hear me? They would have memarry. "

"I have heard some such talk, " I answered, rousing myself at last; "andthey say that it is the Lord Giovanni who would prove worthy of yourhand. "

"They say rightly, then, " she acknowledged. "The Lord Giovanni it is. "

Again there was a silence, and again it was she who broke it. 

"Well, Lazzaro?" she asked. "Have you naught to say?"

"What would you have me say, Madonna? If this wedding accords with yourown wishes, then am I glad. "

"Lazzaro, Lazzaro! you know that it does not. "

"How should I know it, Madonna?"

"Because your wits are shrewd, and because you know me. Think you thispetty tyrant is such a man as I should find it in my heart to conceiveaffection for? Grateful to him am I for the shelter he has afforded ushere; but my love--that is a thing I keep, or fain would keep, for somevery different man. When I love, I think it will be a valorous knight, agentleman of lofty mind, of noble virtues and ready address. "

"An excellent principle on which to go in quest of a husband, Madonnamia. But where in this degenerate world do you look to find him?"

"Are there, then, no such men?"

"In the pages of Bojardo and those other poets whom you have read tooearnestly there may be. "

"Nay, there speaks your cynicism, " she chided me. "But even if myideals be too lofty, would you have me descend from the height of sucha pinnacle to the level of the Lord Giovanni--a weak-spirited craven, aswitnesses the manner in which he permitted the Borgias to mishandle him;a cruel and unjust tyrant, as witnesses his dealing with you, to seek nofurther instances; a weak, ignorant, pleasure-loving fool, devoid of witand barren of ambition? Such is the man they would have me wed. Donot tell me, Lazzaro, that it were difficult to find a better one thanthis. "

"I do not mean to tell you that. After all, though it be my trade tojest, it is not my way to deal in falsehood. I think, Madonna, that ifwe were to have you write for us such an appreciation of the High andMighty Giovanni Sforza, you would leave a very faithful portrait for theenlightenment of posterity. "

"Lazzaro, do not jest!" she cried. "It is your help I need. That is thereason why I am come to you with the tale of what they seek to force meinto doing. "

"To force you?" I cried. "Would they dare so much?"

"Aye, if I resist them further. "

"Why, then, " I answered, with a ready laugh, "do not resist themfurther. "

"Lazzaro!" she cried, her accents telling of a spirit wounded by whatshe accounted a flippancy. 

"Mistake me not, " I hastened to elucidate. "It is lest they shouldemploy force and compel you at once to enter into this union that Icounsel you to offer no resistance. Beg for a little time, vaguelysuggesting that you are not indisposed to the Lord Giovanni's suit. "

"That were deceit, " she protested. 

"A trusty weapon with which to combat tyranny, " said I. 

"Well? And then?" she questioned. "Such a state of things cannot endurefor ever. It must end some day. "

I shook my head, and I smiled down upon her a smile that was very fullof confidence. 

"That day will never dawn, unless the Lord Giovanni's impatiencetranscends all bounds. "

She looked at me, a puzzled glance in her eyes, a bewildered expressionknitting her fine brows. 

"I do not take your meaning, my friend, " she complained. 

"Then mark the enucleation. I will expound this meaning of mine throughthe medium of a parable. In Babylon of old, there dwelt a king whosename was Belshazzar, who, having fallen into habits of voluptuousnessand luxury, was so enslaved by them as to feast and make merry whilsta certain Darius, King of the Medes, was marching in arms against hiscapital. At a feast one night the fingers of a man's hand were seen towrite upon the wall, and the words they wrote were a belated warning:'Mene, mene, tekel, upharsin. '"

She looked at me, her eyes round with inquiry, and a faint smile ofuncertainty on her lips. 

"Let me confess that your elucidation helps me but little. "

"Ponder it, Madonna, " I urged her. "Substitute Giovanni Sforza forBelshazzar, Cesare Borgia for King Darius, and you have the key to myparable. "

"But is it indeed so? Does danger threaten Pesaro from that quarter?"

"Aye, does it, " I answered, almost impatiently. "The tide of war issurging up, and presently will whelm us utterly. Yet here sits the LordGiovanni making merry with balls and masques and burle and banquets, wholly unprepared, wholly unconscious of his peril. There may be no handto write a warning on his walls--or else, as in the case of Babylon, thehand will write when it is too late to avert the evil--yet there are notwanting other signs for those that have the wit to read them; nor is awondrous penetration needed. "

"And you think then--" she began. 

"I think that if you are obdurate with him, he and your brothermay hurry you by force into this union. But if you temporise withhalf-promises, with suggestions that before Christmas you may growreconciled to his wishes, he will be patient. "

"But what if Christmas comes and finds us still in this position?"

"It will need a miracle for that; or, at least, the death of CesareBorgia--an unlikely event, for they say he uses great precautions. Saving the miracle, and providing Cesare lives, I will give the LordGiovanni's reign in Pesaro at most two months. "

We had halted now, and were confronting each other in the descendinggloom. 

"Lazzaro, dear friend, " she cried, almost with gaiety, "I was wise totake counsel with you. You have planted in my heart a very vigorousgrowth of hope. "

We turned soon after, and started to retrace our steps, for she might beill-advised to remain absent overlong. 

I left her on the terrace in a very different spirit from that in whichshe had come to me, bearing with me her promise that she would act as Ihad advised her. No doubt I had taken a load from her gentle soul, andoddly enough I had taken, too, a load from mine. 

Things fell out as I said they would in far as Giovanni Sforza andFilippo were concerned. Madonna's seeming amenability to their wishesstayed their insistence, and they could but respect her wishes to letthe betrothal be delayed yet a little while. And during the weeks thatfollowed, it was I scarce know whether more pitiable or more amusingto see the efforts that Giovanni made to win her ardently desiredaffection. 

Love has sharp eyes at times, and a dullard under the influence of thebaby god will turn shrewd and exert rare wiles in the conduct of hiswooing. Giovanni, by some intuition usually foreign to his dull nature, seemed to divine what manner of man would be Madonna Paola's ideal, andstrove to pass himself off as possessed of the attributes of that ideal, with an ardour that was pitiably comical. He became an actor by the sideof whom those comedians that played impromptus for his delectation werethe merest bunglers with the art. He gathered that Madonna Paola lovedthe poets and their stately diction, and so, to please her better, hebecame a poet for the season. 

"Poeta nascitur" the proverb runs, and that proverb's truth wasdoubtless forced home upon the Lord Giovanni at an early stage of hisexcursions into the flowery meads of prosody. Fortunately he lacked thesupreme vanity that is the attribute of most poetasters, and he was ableto see that such things as after hours of midnight-labour he contrivedto pen, would evoke nothing but her amusement--unless, indeed, it wereher scorn--and render him the laughing-stock of all his Court. 

So, in the wisdom of despair, he came to me, and with a gentleness thatin the past he had rarely manifested for me, he asked me was I skilledin writing verse. There were not wanting others to whom he might havegone, for there was no lack of rhymsters about his Court; but perhaps hethought he could be more certain of my silence than of theirs. 

I answered him that were the subject to my taste, I might succeed inthrowing off some passable lines upon it. He pressed gold upon me, andbade me there and then set about fashioning an ode to Madonna Paola, andto forget, when they were done, under pain of a whipping to the bone, that I had written them. 

I obeyed him with a right good-will. For what subject of all subjectspossible was there that made so powerful an appeal to my inclinations?Within an hour he had the ode--not perhaps such a poem as might standcomparison with the verses of Messer Petrarca, yet a very passableeffusion, chaste of conceit and palpitating with sincerity andadoration. It was in that that I addressed her as the "Holy Flower ofthe Quince, " which was the symbol of the House of Santafior. 

So great an impression made that ode that on the morrow the LordGiovanni came to me with a second bribe and a second threat of torture. I gave him a sonnet of Petrarchian manner which went near to outshiningthe merits of the ode. And now, these requests of the Lord Giovanni'sassumed an almost daily regularity, until it came to seem that didaffairs continue in this manner for yet a little while, I should haveearned me enough to have repurchased Biancomonte, and, so, ended mytroubles. And good was the value that I gave him for his gold. How good, he never knew; for how was he, the clod, to guess that this despisedjester of his Court was pouring out his very soul into the lines hewrote to the tyrant's orders?

It is scant wonder that, at last, Madonna Paola who had begun bysmiling, was touched and moved by the ardent worship that sighed fromthose perfervid verses. So touched, indeed, was she as to believe theLord Giovanni's love to be the pure and holy thing those lines presentedit, and to conclude that his love had wrought in him a wondrous andennobling transformation. That so she thought I have the best of allreasons to affirm, for I had it from her very lips one day. 

"Lazzaro, " she sighed, "it is occurring to me that I have done the LordGiovanni an injustice. I have misgauged his character. I held him tobe a shallow, unlettered clown, devoid of any finer feelings. Yet hisverses have a merit that is far above the common note of these writings, and they breathe such fine and lofty sentiments as could never springfrom any but a fine and lofty soul. "

How I came to keep my tongue from wagging out the truth I scarcely know. It may be that I was frightened of the punishment that might overtakeme did I betray my master; but I rather think that it was the fear ofbetraying myself, and so being flung into the outer darkness where therewas no such radiant presence as Madonna Paola's. For had I told her itwas I had penned those poems that were the marvel of the Court, she mustof necessity have guessed my secret, for to such quick wits as hers itmust have been plain at once that they were no vapourings of artistry, but the hot expressions of a burning truth. It was in that--in theirsupreme sincerity--that their chief virtue lay. 

Thus weeks wore on. The vintage season came and went; the roses fadedin the gardens of the Palazzo Sforza, and the trees put on their autumngarb of gold. October was upon us, and with it came, at last, the fearthat long ago should have spurred us into activity. And now that itcame it did not come to stimulate, but to palsy. Terror-stricken at theconquering advance of Valentino--which was the name they now gave CesareBorgia; a name derived from his Duchy of Valentinois--Giovanni Sforzaabruptly ceased his revelling, and made a hurried appeal for help toFrancesco Gonzaga, Lord of Mantua--his brother-in-law, through theLord of Pesaro's first marriage. The Mantuan Marquis sent him a hundredmercenaries under the command of an Albanian named Giacomo. As wellmight he have sent him a hundred figs wherewith to pelt the army ofValentino!

Disaster swooped down swiftly upon the Lord of Pesaro. His very people, seeing in what case they were, and how unprepared was their tyrant todefend them, wisely resolved that they would run no risks of fire andpillage by aiding to oppose the irresistible force that was being hurledagainst us. 

It was on the second Sunday in October that the storm burst over theLord Giovanni's head. He was on the point of leaving the Castle toattend Mass at San Domenico, and in his company were Filippo Sforza ofSantafior and Madonna Paola, besides courtiers and attendants, amountingin all to perhaps a score of gallant cavaliers and ladies. The cavalcadewas drawn up in the quadrangle, and Giovanni was on the point ofmounting, when, of a sudden, a rumbling noise, as of distant thunder, but too continuous for that, arrested him, his foot already in thestirrup. 

"What is that?" he asked, an ashen pallor overspreading his effeminateface, as, doubtless, the thought of the enemy came uppermost in hismind. 

Men looked at one another with fear in their eyes and some of the ladiesraised their voices in querulous beseeching for reassurance. They hadtheir answer even as they asked. The Albanian Giacomo, who was nowvirtually the provost of the Castle, appeared suddenly at the gates withhalf a score of men. He raised a warning hand, which compelled the LordGiovanni to pause; then he rasped out a brisk command to his followers. The winches creaked, and the drawbridge swung up even as with a clankand rattle of chains the portcullis fell. 

That done, he came forward to impart the ominous news which one of hisriders had brought him at the gallop from the Porta Romana. 

A party of some fifty men, commanded by one of Cesare's captains, hadridden on in advance of the main army to call upon Pesaro to yieldto the forces of the Church. And the people, without hesitation, hadbutchered the guard and thrown wide the gates, inviting the enemy toenter the town and seize the Castle. And to the end that this might bethe better achieved, a hundred or so had traitorously taken up arms, andwere pressing forward to support the little company that came, withsuch contemptuous daring, to storm our fortress and prepare the way forValentino. 

It was a pretty situation this for the Lord Giovanni, and here were fineopportunities for some brave acting under the eyes of his adored MadonnaPaola. How would he bear himself now? I wondered. 

He promised mighty well once the first shock of the news was overcome. 

"By God and His saints!" he roared, "though it may be all that it isgiven me to do, I'll strike a blow to punish these dastards who havebetrayed me, and to crush the presumption of this captain who attacks uswith fifty men. It is a contempt which he shall bitterly repent him. "

Then he thundered to Giacomo to marshal his men, and he called uponthose of his courtiers who were knights to put on their armour that theymight support him. Lastly he bade a page go help him to arm, that hemight lead his little force in person. 

I saw Madonna Paola's eyes gleam with a sudden light of admiration, and I guessed that in the matter of Giovanni's valour her opinions wereundergoing the same change as the verses had caused them to undergo inthe matter of his intellect. 

Myself, I was amazed. For here was a Lord Giovanni I seemed never tohave known, and I was eager to behold the sequel to so fine a prologue. 

CHAPTER IX. THE FOOL-AT-ARMS

That valorous bearing that the Lord Giovanni showed whilst, with MadonnaPaola's glance upon him, his fear of seeming afraid was greater than hisactual fear of our assailants, he cast aside like a mantle once he waswithin the walls of his Castle, and under the eyes of none save the pageand myself, for I followed idly at a respectful distance. 

He stood irresolute and livid of countenance, his eagerness to arm andto lead his mercenaries and his knights all departed out of him. It wasthat curiosity of mine to see the sequel to his stout words that had ledme to follow him, and what I saw was, after all, no more than I mighthave looked for--the proof that his big talk of sallying forth to battlewas but so much acting. Yet it must have been acting of such a qualityas to have deceived even his very self. 

Now, however, by the main steps, he halted in the cool gloom of thegallery, and I saw that fear had caught his heart in an icy grip and wassqueezing it empty. In his irresolution he turned about, and his gloomyeye fell upon me loitering in the porch. At that he turned to the pagewho followed in obedience to his command. 

"Begone!" he growled at the lad, "I will have Boccadoro, there, to helpme arm. " And with a poor attempt at mirth--"The act is a madness, " hemuttered, "and so it is fitting that folly should put on my armour forit. Come with me, you, " he bade me, and I, obediently, gladly, wentforward and up the wide stone staircase after him, leaving the page tospeculate as he listed on the matter of his abrupt dismissal. 

I read the Lord Giovanni's motives, as clearly as if they had beenwritten for me by his own hand. The opinion in which I might hold himwas to him a matter of so small account that he little cared that Ishould be the witness of the weakness which he feared was about toovercome him--nay, which had overcome him already. Was I not the one manin Pesaro who already knew his true nature, as revealed by that matterof the verses which I had written, and of which he had assumed theauthorship? He had no shame before me, for I already knew the veryworst of him, and he was confident that I would not talk lest he shoulddestroy me at my first word. And yet, there was more than that in hismotive for choosing me to go with him in that hour, as I was to learnonce we were closeted in his chamber. 

"Boccadoro, " he cried, "can you not find me some way out of this?" Underhis beard I saw the quiver of his lips as he put the question. 

"Out of this?" I echoed, scarce understanding him at first. 

"Aye, man--out of this Castle, out of Pesaro. Bestir those wits ofyours. Is there no way in which it might be done, no disguise underwhich I might escape?"

"Escape?" quoth I, looking at him, and endeavouring to keep from myeyes the contempt that was in my heart. Dear God! Had revenge been all Isought of him, how I might have gloated over his miserable downfall!

"Do not stand there staring with those hollow eyes, " he cried, angerand fear blending horridly in his voice and rendering shrill its pitch. "Find me a way. Come, knave, find me a way, or I'll have you broken onthe wheel. Set your wits to save that long, lean body from destruction. Think, I bid you. "

He was moving restlessly as he spoke, swayed by the agitation of terrorthat possessed him like a devil. I looked at him now without dissemblingmy scorn. Even in such an hour as this the habit of hectoring crueltyremained him. 

"What shall it avail me to think?" I asked him in a voice that was ascold and steady as his was hot and quavering. "Were you a bird I mightsuggest flight across the sea to you. But you are a man, a very human, avery mortal man, although your father made you Lord of Pesaro. "

Even as I was speaking, the thunder of the besiegers reached ourears--such a dull roar it was as that of a stormy sea in winter time. Maddened by his terror he stood over me now, his eyes flashing wildly inhis white face. 

"Another word in such a tone, " he rasped, his fingers on his dagger, "and I'll make an end of you. I need your help, animal!"

I shook my head, my glance meeting his without fear. I was of twice hisstrength, we were alone, and the hour was one that levelled ranks. Hadhe made the least attempt to carry out his threat, had he but drawn aninch of the steel he fingered, I think I should have slain him with myhands without fear or thought of consequences. 

"I have no help for you such as you need, " I answered him. "I am but theFool of Pesaro. Whoever looked to a Fool for miracles?"

"But here is death, " he almost moaned. 

"Lord of Pesaro, " I reminded him, "your mercenaries are under armsby your command, and your knights are joining them. They wait for thefulfilment of your promise to lead them out against the enemy. Shall youfail them in such an hour as this?"

He sank, limp as an empty scabbard, to a chair. 

"I dare not go. It is death, " he answered miserably. 

"And what but death is it to remain here?" I asked, torturing him withmore zest than ever he had experienced over the agonies of some poorvictim on the rack. "In bearing yourself gallantly there lies a slenderchance for you. Your people seeing you in arms and ready to defend themmay yet be moved to a return of loyalty. "

"A fig for their loyalty, " was his peevish, craven answer. "What shallit avail me when I'm slain!"

God! was there ever such a coward as this, such a weak-souled, water-hearted dastard?

"But you may not be slain, " I urged him. And then I sounded a freshnote. "Bethink you of Madonna Paola and of the brave things you promisedher. "

He flushed a little, then paled again, then sat very still. Shame hadtouched him at last, yet its grip was not enough to make a man of him. A moment he remained irresolute, whilst that shame fought a hard battlewith his fears. 

But those fears proved stronger in the end, and his shame was overthrownby them. 

"I dare not, " he gasped, his slender, delicate hands clutching at thearms of his chair. "Heaven knows I am not skilled in the use of arms. "

"It asks no skill, " I assured him. "Put on your armour, take a sword andlay about you. The most ignorant scullion in your kitchens could performit given that he had the spirit. "

He moistened his lips with his tongue, and his eyes looked dead as asnake's. Suddenly he rose and took a step towards the armour that waspiled about a great leathern chair. Then he paused and turned to me oncemore. 

"Help me to put it on, " he said in a voice that he strove torender steady. Yet scarcely had I reached the pile and taken up thebreast-plate, when he recoiled again from the task. He broke into atorrent of blasphemy. 

"I will not sacrifice myself, " he almost screamed. "Jesus! not I. I willfind a way out of this. I will live to return with an army and regain mythrone. "

"A most wise purpose. But, meanwhile, your men are waiting for you;Madonna Paola di Santafior is waiting for you, and--hark!--the bellowingcrowd is waiting for you. "

"They wait in vain, " he snarled. "Who cares for them? The Lord of Pesaroam I. "

"Care you, then, nothing for them? Will you have your name written inhistory as that of a coward who would not lift his sword to strike oneblow for honour's sake ere he was driven out like a beast by the meresound of voices?"

That touched him. His vanity rose in arms. 

"Take up that corselet, " he commanded hoarsely. I did his bidding, and, without a word, he raised his arms that I might fit it to his breast. Yet in the instant that I turned me to pick up the back-piece, a crashresounded through the chamber. He had hurled the breastplate to theground in a fresh access of terror-rage. He strode towards me, his eyesglittering like a madman's. 

"Go you!" he cried, and with outstretched arms he pointed wildly acrossthe courtyard. "You are very ready with your counsels. Let me beholdyour deeds, Do you put on the armour and go out to fight those animals. "

He raved, he ranted, he scarce knew what he said or did, and yet thewords he uttered sank deep into my heart, and a sudden, wild ambitionswelled my bosom. 

"Lord of Pesaro, " I cried, in a voice so compelling that it sobered him, "if I do this thing what shall be my reward?"

He stared at me stupidly for a moment. Then he laughed in a silly, crackling fashion. 

"Eh?" he queried. "Gesu!" And he passed a hand over his damp brow, andthrew back the hair that cumbered it. "What is the thing that you woulddo, Fool?"

"Why, the thing you bade me, " I answered firmly. "Put on your armour, and shut down the visor so that all shall think it is the Lord Giovanni, Tyrant of Pesaro, who rides. If I do this thing, and put to rout therabble and the fifty men that Cesare Borgia has sent, what shall be myreward?"

He watched me with twitching lips, his glare fixed upon me and a faintcolour kindling in his face. He saw how easy the thing might be. Perhapshe recalled that he had heard that I was skilled in arms--having spentmy youth in the exercise of them, against the time when I might flingthe challenge that had brought me to my Fool's estate. Maybe he recalledhow I had borne myself against long odds on that adventure with MadonnaPaola, years ago. Just such a vanity as had spurred him to have me writehim verses that he might pretend were of his own making, moved him nowto grasp at my proposal. They would all think that Giovanni's armourcontained Giovanni himself. None would ever suspect Boccadoro the Foolwithin that shell of steel. His honour would be vindicated, and he wouldnot lose the esteem of Madonna Paola. Indeed, if I returned covered withglory, that glory would be his; and if he elected to fly thereafter, he might do so without hurt to his fair name, for he would have amplyproved his mettle and his courage. 

In some such fashion I doubt not that the High and Mighty GiovanniSforza reasoned during the seconds that we stood, face to face andeye to eye, in that room, the cries of the impatient ones below almostdrowned in the roar of the multitude beyond. 

At last he put out his hands to seize mine, and drawing me to the lighthe scanned my face, Heaven alone knowing what it was he sought there. 

"If you do this, " said he, "Biancomonte shall be yours again, if itremains in my power to bestow it upon you now or at any future time. Iswear it by my honour. "

"Swear it by your fear of Hell or by your hope of Heaven and the compactis made, " I answered, and so palsied was he and so fallen in spirit thathe showed no resentment at the scorn of his honour my words implied, butthere and then took the oath I that demanded. 

"And now, " I urged, "help me to put on this armour of yours. "

Hurriedly I cast off my jester's doublet and my head-dress with itsjangling bells, and with a wild exultation, a joy so fierce as almostto bring tears to my eyes, I held my arms aloft whilst that poor cravenstrapped about my body the back and breast plates of his corselet. I, the Fool, stood there as arrogant as any knight, whilst with his noblehands the Lord of Pesaro, kneeling, made secure the greaves uponmy legs, the sollerets with golden spurs, the cuissarts and thegenouilleres. Then he rose up, and with hands that trembled in hiseagerness, he put on my brassarts and shoulder-plates, whilst I, myself, drew on my gauntlets. Next he adjusted the gorget, and handed me, lastof all, the helm, a splendid head-piece of black and gold, surmounted bythe Sforza lion. 

I took it from him and passed it over my head. Then ere I snapped downthe visor and hid the face of Boccadoro, I bade him, unless he wouldrender futile all this masquerade, to lock the door of his closet, andlie there concealed till my return. At that a sudden doubt assailed him. 

"And what, " quoth he, "if you do not return?"

In the fever that had possessed me this was a thing that had not enteredinto my calculations, nor should it now. I laughed, and from the hollowof my helmet not a doubt but the sound must have seemed charged withmockery. I pointed to the cap and doublet I had shed. 

"Why, then, Illustrious, it will but remain for you to complete thechange. "

"Dog!" he cried; "beast, do you deride me?"

My answer was to point out towards the yard. 

"They are clamouring, " said I. "They wax impatient. I had better gobefore they come for you. " As I spoke I selected a heavy mace for onlyweapon, and swinging it to my shoulder I stepped to the door. On thethreshold he would have stayed me, purged by his fear of what mightbefall him did I not return. But I heeded him not. 

"Fare you well, my Lord of Pesaro, " said I. "See that none penetrates toyour closet. Make fast the door. "

"Stay!" he called after me. "Do you hear me? Stay!"

"Others will hear you if you commit this folly, " I called back to him. "Get you to cover. " And so I left him. 

Below, in the courtyard, my coming was hailed by a great, enthusiasticclamour. They had all but abandoned hope of seeing the Lord Giovanni, solong had he been about his arming. As they brought forward my charger, Isought with my eyes Madonna Paola. I beheld her by her brother--who, itseemed, was not going with us--in the front rank of the spectators. Her cheeks were tinged with a slight flush of excitement, and her eyesglowed at the brave sight of armed men. 

I mounted, and as I rode past her to take my place at the head of thatcompany, I lowered my mace and bowed. She detained me a moment, settingher hand upon the glossy neck of my black charger. 

"My Lord, " she said, in a low voice, intended for my ear alone, "this isa brave and gallant thing you do, and however slight may be your hopeof prevailing, yet your honour will be safe-guarded by this act, andmen will remember you with respect should it come to pass that a usurpershall possess anon your throne. Bear you that in mind to lend you a gladcourage. I shall pray for you, my Lord, till you return. "

I bowed, answering never a word lest my voice should betray me; andmusing on the matter of the strange roads that lead to a woman's heart, I passed on, to gain the van. 

Two months ago, knowing Giovanni as he was, he had been detestable toher, and she contemplated with loathing the danger in which she stoodof being allied to him by marriage. Since then he had made good use of apoor jester's mental gifts to incline her by the fervour of some versesto a kindlier frame of mind, and now, making good use of that samejester's courage, he completed her subjection by the display of it. She was prepared to wed the Lord Giovanni with a glad heart and a proudwillingness whensoever he should desire it. 

But Giacomo was beside me now, and in the quadrangle a silence reigned, all waiting for my command. From without there came such a din as seemedto argue that all hell was at the Castle gates. There were shouts ofdefiance and screams of abuse, whilst a constant rain of stones beatagainst the raised drawbridge. 

They thought, no doubt, that Giovanni and his followers were at theirprayers, cowering with terror. No notion had they of the armed force, some six score strong, that waited to pour down upon them. I brisklyissued my command, and four men detached themselves and let down thebridge. It fell with a crash, and ere those without had well grasped thesituation we had hurled ourselves across and into them with the force ofa wedge, flinging them to right and to left as we crashed through withhideous slaughter. The bridge swung up again when the last of Giacomo'smercenaries was across, and we were shut out, in the midst of thatfierce human maelstrom. 

For some five minutes there raged such a brief, hot fight as will beremembered as long as Pesaro stands. No longer than that did it take forthe crowd of citizens to realise that war was not their trade, and thatthey had better leave the fighting to Cesare Borgia's men; and so theyfell away and left us a clear road to come at the men-at-arms. Butalready some forty of our saddles were empty, and the fight, thoughbrief, had proved exhausting to many of us. 

Before us, like an array of mirrors in the October sun, shone theserried ranks of the steel-cased Borgia soldiers, their lances in rest, waiting to receive us. Their leader, a gigantic man whose head was armedby no more than a pot of burnished steel, from which escaped thelong red ringlets of his hair, was that same Ramiro del' Orca who hadcommanded the party pursuing Madonna Paola three years ago. He was, since, become the most redoubtable of Cesare's captains, and his namewas, perhaps, the best hated in Italy for the grim stories that wereconnected with it. 

As we rode on he backed to join the foremost rank of his soldiers, andhis voice--a voice that Stentor might have envied--trumpeted a laugh atsight of us. 

"Gesu!" he roared, so that I heard him above the thunder of our hoofs. "What has come to Giovanni Sforza. Has he, perchance, become a man sinceMadonna Lucrezia divorced him? I will bear her the news of it, my goodGiovanni--my living thunderbolt of Jove!"

His men echoed his boisterous mood, infected by it, and this, I argued, boded ill for the courage of those that followed me. Another moment andwe had swept into them, and many there were who laughed no more, or wentto laugh with those in Hell. 

For myself I singled out the blustering Ramiro, and I let him know itby a swinging blow of my mace upon his morion. It was a mostfinely-tempered piece of steel, for my stroke made no impression onit, though Ramiro winced and raised his stout sword to return thecompliment. 

"Body of God!" he croaked, "you become a very god of war, Giovanni. Tome, then, my lusty Mars! We'll make a fight of it that poets shall singof over winter fires. Look to yourself!"

His sword caught me a cunning, well-aimed blow on the side of my helm, and thence, glanced to my shoulder. But for the quality of Giovanni'shead-piece of a truth there had been an end to the warring of a Fool. I smote him back, a mighty blow upon his epauliere that shore the steelplate from his shoulder, and left him a vulnerable spot. At that heswore ferociously, and his bloodshot eyes grew wicked as the fiend's. Asecond time he essayed that side-long blow upon my helm, and with suchforce and ready address that he burst the fastening of my visor on theleft, so that it swung down and left my beaver open. 

With a cry of triumph he closed with me, and shortened his sword to stabme in the face. And then a second cry escaped him, for the countenancehe beheld was not the countenance he had looked to see. Instead ofthe fair skin, the handsome features and the bearded mouth of theLord Giovanni, he beheld a shaven face, a hooked nose and a complexionswarthy as the devil's. 

"I know you, rogue, " he roared. "By the Host! your valour seemed toofierce for Giovanni Sforza. You are Bocca--"

Exerting all the strength that I had been gradually collecting, I hurledhim back with a force that almost drove him from the saddle, and risingin my stirrups I rained blow after blow upon his morion ere he couldrecover. 

"Dog!" I muttered softly, "your knowledge shall be the death of you. "

He drew away from me at last, and during the moments that I spent inreadjusting my visor he sallied, and charged me again. His blusteringwas gone and his face grown pale, for such blows as mine could not havebeen without effect. Not a doubt of it but he was taken with amazementto find such fighting qualities in a Fool--an amazement that musthave eclipsed even that of finding Boccadoro in the armour of GiovanniSforza. 

Again he swung his sword in that favourite stroke of his; but this timeI caught the edge upon my mace, and ere he could recover I aimed a blowstraight at his face. He lowered his head, like a bull on the point ofcharging, and so my blow descended again upon his morion, but with aforce that rolled him, senseless, from the saddle. 

Before I could take a breathing space I was beset by, at least, a dozenof his followers who had stood at hand during the encounter, neverdoubting that victory must be ultimately with their invincible captain. They drove me back foot by foot, fighting lustily, and performing--itwas said afterwards by the anxious ones that watched us from the Castle, among whom was Madonna Paola--such deeds of strength and prowess asnever romancer sang of in his wildest flight of fancy. 

My men had suffered sorely, but the brave Giacomo still held themtogether, fired by the example that I set him, until in the end the daywas ours. Discouraged by the disabling of their captain, so soon as theyhad gathered him up our opponents thought of nothing but retreat; andretreat they did, hotly pursued by us, and never allowed to pause orslacken rein until we had hurled them out of the town of Pesaro, toget them back to Cesare Borgia with the tale of their ignominiousdiscomfiture. 

CHAPTER X. THE FALL OF PESARO

As we rode back through the town of Pesaro, some fifty men of the sixscore that had sallied from the Castle a half-hour ago, we found thestreets well-nigh deserted, the rebellious citizens having fled back tothe shelter of their homes, like rats to their burrows in time of peril. 

As we advanced through the shambles that we had left about the Castlegates, it occurred to me that within the courtyard a crowd would bewaiting to receive and welcome me, and it became necessary to devisesome means of avoiding this reception. I beckoned Giacomo to my side. 

"Let it be given out that I will speak to no man until I haverendered thanks to Heaven for this signal victory, " I muttered to theunsuspecting Albanian. "Do you clear a way for me so soon a we arewithin. "

He obeyed me so well that when the bridge had been let down, he precededme with a couple of his men and gently but firmly pressed back thosethat would have approached--among the first of whom were Madonna Paolaand her brother. 

"Way!" he shouted. "Make way for the High and Mighty Lord of Pesaro!"

Thus I passed through, my half-shattered visor sufficiently closed stillto conceal my face, and in this manner I gained the door of the easternwing and dismounted. Two or three attendants sprang forward, ready togo with me that they might assist me to disarm. But I waved themimperiously back, and mounted the stairs alone. Alone I crossed theante-chamber, and tapped at the door of the Lord Giovanni's closet. Instantly it opened, for he had watched my return and been awaiting me. Hastily he drew me in and closed the door. 

He was flushed with excitement and trembling like a leaf. Yet at thesight that I presented he lost some of his high colour, and recoiled tostare at my armour, battered, dinted, and splashed with browning stains, which loudly proclaimed the fray through which I had been. 

He fell to praising my valour, to speaking of the great service I hadrendered him, and of the gratitude that he would ever entertain for me, all in terms of a fawning, cloying sweetness that disgusted me more thanever his cruelties had done. I took off my helmet whilst he spoke, andlet it fall with a crash. The face I revealed to him was livid withfatigue, and blackened with the dust that had caked upon my sweat. Hecame forward again and helped hastily to strip off my harness, and whenthat was done he fetched a great silver basin and a ewer of embossedgold from which he poured me fragrant rose-water that I might wash. Macerated sweet herbs he found me, lupin meal and glasswort, the betterthat I might cleanse myself; and when, at last, I was refreshed bymy ablutions, he poured me a goblet of a full-bodied golden wine thatseemed to infuse fresh life into my veins. And all the time he spokeof the prowess I had shown, and lamented that all these years he shouldhave had me at his Court and never guessed my worth. 

At length I turned to resume my clothes. And since it must excitecomment and perhaps arouse suspicion were I to appear in any but myjester's garish livery, I once more assumed my foliated cape, my cap andbells. 

"Wear it yet for a little while, " he said, "and thus complete theservice you have done me. Presently you may doff it for all time, andresume your true estate. Biancomonte, as I promised you, shall be yoursagain. The Lord of Pesaro does not betray his word. "

I smiled grimly at the pride of his utterance. 

"It is an easy thing, " said I, "freely to give that which is no longerours. "

He coloured with the anger that was ever ready. 

"What shall that mean?" he asked. 

"Why, that in a few days you will have Cesare Borgia here, and you willbe Lord of Pesaro no more. I have saved your honour for you. More thanthat it were idle to attempt. "

"Think not that I shall submit, " he cried. "I shall find in Italy thehelp I need to return and drive the usurper out. You must have faith inthat, yourself, else had you never bargained with me as you have donefor the return of your Estates. "

To that I answered nothing, but urged him to go below and show himself;and the better that he might bear himself among his courtiers, Idetailed to him the most salient features of that fight. 

He went, not without a certain uneasiness which, however, was soondispelled by the thunder of acclamation with which he was received; notonly by his courtiers, but by the soldiers who had fought in that hotskirmish, and who believed that it was he had led them. 

Meanwhile I sat above, in the closet he had vacated, and thence Iwatched him, with such mingling feelings in my heart as baffle now myhalting pen. Scorn there was in my mood and a hot contempt of himthat he could stand there and accept their acclamation with an air ofhumility that I am persuaded was assumed: a certain envious anger wasthere, too, to think that such a weak-kneed, lily-livered craven shouldreceive the plaudits of the deeds that I, his buffoon, had performed forhim. Those acclamations were not for him, although those who acclaimedhim thought so. They were for the man who had routed Ramiro del' Orcaand his followers, and that man assuredly was I. Yet there I crouchedabove, behind the velvet curtains where none might see me, whilst hestood smiling and toying with his brown beard and listening to the finewords of praise that, I could imagine, were falling from the lips ofMadonna Paola, who had drawn near and was speaking to him. 

There is in my nature a certain love of effectiveness, a certain tastefor theatrical parade and the contriving of odd situations. This bent ofmine was whispering to me then to throw wide the window, and, stemmingtheir noisy plaudits, announce to them the truth of what had passed. Yetwhat if I had done so? They would have accounted it but a new jest ofBoccadoro, the Fool, and one so ill-conceived that they might urge theLord Giovanni to have him whipped for it. 

Aye, it would have been a folly, a futile act that would have earned meunbelief, contempt and anger. And yet there was a moment when jealousyurged me almost headlong to that rashness. For in Madonna Paola'seyes there was a new expression as they rested on the face of GiovanniSforza--an expression that told me she had come to love this man whom alittle while ago she had despised. 

God! was there ever such an irony? Was there ever such a paradox? Sheloved him, and yet it was not him she loved. The man she loved was theman who had shown the qualities of his mind in the verses with which theCourt was ringing; the man who had that morning given proof of his highmettle and knightly prowess by the deeds of arms he had performed. I wasthat man--not he at whom so adoringly she looked. And so--I argued, inmy warped way and with the philosophy worthy of a Fool--it was Iwhom she loved, and Giovanni was but the symbol that stood for me. Herepresented the songs and the deeds that were mine. 

But if I did not throw wide that window and proclaim the fact to earsthat would have been deaf to the truth of them, what think you that Idid? I took a subtler vengeance. I repaired to my own chamber, procuredme pen and ink, and, there, with a heart that was brimming over withgall, I penned an epic modelled upon the stately lines of Virgil, wherein I sang the prowess of the Lord Giovanni Sforza, describing thatmorning's mighty feat of arms, and detailing each particular of thecombat 'twixt Giovanni and Ramiro del' Orca. 

It was a brave thing when it was done; a finer and worthier poeticalachievement than any that I had yet encompassed, and that night, afterthey had supped, as merrily as though Duke Valentino had never beenheard of, and whilst they were still sitting at their wine, I got me alute and stole down to the banqueting hall. 

I announced myself by leaping on a table and loudly twanging the stringsof my instrument. There was a hush, succeeded by a burst of acclamation. They were in a high good-humour, and the Fool with a new song was thevery thing they craved. 

When silence was restored I began, and whilst my fingers movedsluggishly across the strings, striking here and there a chord, I recited the epic I had penned. My voice swelled with a feverishenthusiasm whose colossal irony none there save one could guess. He, atfirst surprised, grew angry presently, as I could see by the cloud thathad settled on his brow. Yet he restrained himself, and the rest ofthe company were too enthralled by the breathless quality of my poem tobestow their glances on any countenance save mine. 

Madonna Paola sat upon the Lord of Pesaro's right, and her blue eyeswere round and her lips parted with enthusiasm as I proceeded. And whenpresently I came to that point in the fight betwixt Giovanni and Ramirodel' Orca, when Ramiro, having broken down the Lord Giovanni's visor, was on the point of driving his sword into his adversary's face, I sawher shrink in a repetition of the morning's alarm, and her bosom heavedmore swiftly, as though the issue of that combat hung now upon my linesand she were made anxious again for the life of the man whom she hadlearnt to love. 

I finished on a slow and stately rhythm, my voice rising and fallingsoftly, after the manner of a Gregorian chant, as I dwelt on the pietythat had succeeded the Lord of Pesaro's brave exploits, and how upon hisreturn from the stricken field he had repaired straight to his closet, his battered and bloody harness on his back, that he might kneel ere hedisarmed and render thanks to God for the victory vouchsafed him. 

On that "Te Deum" I finished softly, and as my voice ceased and thevibration of my last chord melted away, a thunder of applause was myreward. 

Men leapt from their chairs in their enthusiasm, and crowded round thetable on which I was perched, whilst, when presently I sprang down, onenoble woman kissed me on the lips before them all, saying that my mouthwas indeed a mouth of gold. 

Madonna Paola was leaning towards the Lord Giovanni, her eyes shiningwith excitement and filmed with tears as they proudly met his glance, and I knew that my song had but served to endear him the more to her bycausing her to realise more keenly the brave qualities of the adventurethat I sang. The sight of it almost turned me faint, and I would haveeluded them and got away as I had come but that they lifted me up andbore me so to the table at which the Lord Giovanni sat. He smiled, buthis face was very pale. Could it be that I had touched him? Could it bethat I had driven the iron into his soul, and that he could not bear toconfront me, knowing what a dastard I must deem him?

The splendid Filippo of Santafior had risen to his feet, and was wavinga white, bejewelled hand in an imperious demand for silence. When atlast it came he spoke, his voice silvery and his accents mincing. 

"Lord of Pesaro; I demand a boon. He who for years has suffered theignominy of the motley is at last revealed to us as a poet of suchmagnitude of soul and richness of expression that he would not sufferby comparison with the great Bojardo or tim greater Virgil. Let him bestripped for ever of that hideous garb he wears, and let him be treated, hereafter, with the dignity his high gifts deserve. Thus shall the daycome when Pesaro will take honour in calling him her son. "

Loud and long was the applause that succeeded his words, and when atlast it had died down, the Lord Giovanni proved equal to the occasion, like the consummate actor that he was. 

"I would, " said he, "that these high gifts, of which to-night he hasafforded proof, could have been employed upon a worthier subject. I fearme that since you have heard his epic you will be prone to overestimatethe deed of which it tells the story. I would, too, my friends, " hecontinued, with a sigh, "that it were still mine to offer him suchencouragement as he deserves. But I am sorely afraid that my days inPesaro are numbered, that my sands are all but run--at least, for alittle while. The conqueror is at our gates, and it would be vain toset against the overwhelming force of his numbers the handful ofvaliant knights and brave soldiers that to-day opposed and scattered hisforerunners. It is my intention to withdraw, now that my honour is safeby what has passed, and that none will dare to say that it was throughfear that I fled. Yet my absence, I trust, may be but brief. I go tocollect the necessary resources, for I have powerful friends in thisItaly whose interests touching the Duca Valentino go hand in hand withmine, and who will, thus, be the readier to lend me assistance. Once Ihave this, I shall return and then--woe to the vanquished!"

The tide of enthusiasm that had been rising as he spoke, now overflowed. Swords leapt from their scabbards--mere toy weapons were they, meantmore for ornament than offence, yet were they the earnest of the stouterarms those gentlemen were ready to wield when the time came. He quietedtheir clamours with a dignified wave of the hand. 

"When that day comes I shall see to it that Boccadoro has his deserts. Meanwhile let the suggestion of my illustrious cousin be acted upon, andlet this gifted poet be arrayed in a manner that shall sort better withthe nobility of his mind that to-night he has revealed to us. "

Thus was it that I came, at last, to shed the motley and move among mengarbed as themselves. And with my outward trappings I cast off, too, the name of Boccadoro, and I insisted upon being known again as LazzaroBiancomonte. 

But in so far as the Court of Pesaro was concerned, this new life uponwhich I was embarked was of little moment, for on the Tuesday thatfollowed that first Sunday in October of such momentous memory, the LordGiovanni's Court passed out of being. 

It came about with his flight to Bologna, accompanied by the Albaniancaptain and his men, as well as by several of the knights who had joinedin Sunday's fray. Ardently, as I came afterwards to learn, did he urgeMadonna Paola and her brother to go with them, and I believe that thelady would have done his will in this had not the Lord Filippo opposedthe step. He was no warrior himself, he swore--for it was a thing hemade open boast of, affecting to despise all who followed the coarsetrade of arms--and, as for his sister, it was not fitting that sheshould go with a fugitive party made up of a handful of knights and somefifty rough mercenaries, and be exposed to the hardships and perilsthat must be theirs. Not even when he was reminded that the advancingconqueror was Cesare Borgia did it affect him, for despite his shallow, mincing ways, and his paraded scorn of war and warriors, the LordFilippo was stout enough at heart. He did not fear the Borgia, heanswered serenely, and if he came, he would offer him such hospitalityas lay within his power. 

He came at last, did the mighty Cesare, although between his coming andGiovanni's flight a full fortnight sped. As for myself, I spent the timeat the Sforza Palace, whither the Lord Filippo had carried me as hisguest, he being greatly taken with me and determined to become mypatron. We had news of Giovanni, first from Bologna and later fromRavenna, whither he was fled. At first he talked of returning to Pesarowith three hundred men he hoped to have from the Marquis of Mantua. Butprobably this was no more than another piece of that big talk of his, meant to impress the sorrowing and repining Madonna Paola, who sufferedmore for him, maybe, than he suffered himself. 

She would talk with me for hours together of the Lord Giovanni, of hismental gifts, and of his splendid courage and military address, andfor all that my gorge rose with jealousy and with the force of thisinjustice to myself, I held my peace. Indeed, indeed, it was betterso. For all that I was no longer Boccadoro the Fool, yet as LazzaroBiancomonte, the poet, I was not so much better that I could indulgeany mad aspirations of my own such as might have led me to betray thedastard who had arrayed his craven self in the peacock feathers of myachievements. 

In the course of the confidence with which the Lord Filippo honoured meI made bold, on the eve of Cesare's arrival, to suggest to him that heshould remove his sister from the Palace and send her to the Convent ofSanta Caterina whilst the Borgia abode in the town, lest the sight ofher should remind Cesare of the old-time marriage plans which his familyhad centred round this lady, and lead to their revival. Filippo heardme kindly, and thanked me freely for the solicitude which my counselargued. For the rest, however, it was a counsel that he frankly admittedhe saw no need to follow. 

"In the three years that are sped since the Holy Father entertained suchplans for the temporal advancement of his nephew Ignacio, the fortunesof the House of Borgia have so swollen that what was then a desirablematch for one of its members is now scarcely worthy of their attention. I do not think, " he concluded, "that we have the least reason to fear arenewal of that suit. "

It may be that I am by nature suspicious and quick to see ignoblemotives in men's actions, but it occurred to me then that the LordFilippo would not be so greatly put about if indeed the Borgias were toreopen negotiations for the bestowing of Madonna Paola's hand upon thePope's nephew Ignacio. That swelling of the Borgia fortunes which in thethree years had taken place and which, he contended, would renderthem more ambitious than to seek alliance with the House of Santafior, rendered them, nevertheless, in his eyes a more desirable family to beallied with than in the days when he had counselled his sister's flightfrom Rome. And so, I thought, despite what stood between her and theLord Giovanni, Filippo would know no scruple now in urging her into analliance with the House of Borgia, should they manifest a willingness tohave that old affair reopened. 

On the 29th of that same month of October, Cesare arrived in Pesaro. Hisentry was a triumphant procession, and the orderliness that prevailedamong the two thousand men-at-arms that he brought with him was a thingthat spoke eloquently for the wondrous discipline enforced by this greatcondottiero. 

The Lord Filippo was among those that met him, and like the time-serverthat he was, he placed the Sforza Palace at his disposal. 

The Duca Valentino came with his retinue and the gentlemen of hishousehold, among whom was ever conspicuous by his great size and redugliness the Captain Ramiro del' Orca, who now seemed to act in manyways as Cesare's factotum. This captain, for reasons which it isunnecessary to detail, I most sedulously avoided. 

On the evening of his arrival Cesare supped in private with Filippo andthe members of Filippo's household--that is to say, with Madonna Paolaand two of her ladies, and three gentlemen attached to the person ofthe Lord Filippo. Cesare's only attendants were two cavaliers of hisretinue, Bartolomeo da Capranica, his Field-Marshal, and Dorio Savelli, a nobleman of Rome. 

Cesare Borgia, this man whose name had so terrible a sound in the earsof Italy's little princelings, this man whose power and whose greatgifts of mind had made him the subject of such bitter envy and fear, until he was the best-hated gentleman in Italy--and, therefore, the mostcalumniated--was little changed from that Cardinal of Valencia, inwhose service I had been for a brief season. The pallor of his face wasaccentuated by the ill-health in which he found himself just then, andthe air of feverish restlessness that had always pervaded him was grownmore marked in the years that were sped, as was, after all, but natural, considering the nature of the work that had claimed him since he haddeposed his priestly vestments. He was splendidly arrayed, and he borehimself with an imperial dignity, a dignity, nevertheless, tempered withgraciousness and charm, and as I regarded him then, it was borne in uponme that no fitter name could his godfathers have bestowed on him thanthat of Cesare. 

The Lord Filippo exerted all his powers worthily to entertain his nobleand illustrious guest, and by his extreme, almost servile affability itnot only would seem that he had forgotten the favour and shelter hehad received at the hands of the Lord Giovanni, but it confirmed mysuspicions of his willingness to advance his own fortunes by breakingwith the fallen tyrant in so far as his sister was concerned. 

Short of actually making the proposal itself, it would seem that Filippodid all in his power to urge his sister upon the attention of Cesare. But Duke Valentino's mind at that time was too full of the concerns ofconquest and administration to find room for a matter to him so triflingas the enriching of his cousin Ignacio by a wealthy alliance. To thisalone, I thought, was it due that Madonna Paola escaped the persecutionthat might then have been hers. 

On the morrow Cesare moved on to Rimini, leaving his administratorsbehind him to set right the affairs of Pesaro, and ensure its propergoverning, in his name, hereafter. 

And now that, for the present, my hopes of ever seeing my own wrongsredressed and my estates returned to me were too slender to justify myremaining longer in Pesaro, I craved of the Lord Filippo permission towithdraw, telling him frankly that my tardily aroused duty called me tomy widowed mother, whom for some six years I had not seen. He threw nodifficulty in the way of my going; and I was free to depart. And nowcame the hidden pain of my leave-taking of Madonna Paola. She seemed togrieve at my departure. 

"Lazzaro, " she cried, when I had told her of my intention, "do you, too, desert me? And I have ever held you my best of friends. "

I told her of the mother and of the duty that I owed her, whereupon sheremonstrated no more, nor sought to do other than urge me to go to her. And then I spoke of Madonna's kindness to me, and of the friendship withwhich she had honoured one so lowly, and in the end I swore, with myhand on my heart and my soul on my lips, that if ever she had work forme, she would not need to call me twice. 

"This ring, Madonna, " said I, "was given me by the Lord Cesare Borgia, and was to have proved a talisman to open wide for me the door tofortune. It did better service than that, Madonna. It was the talismanthat saved you from your pursuers that day at Cagli, three years ago. "

"You remind me, Lazzaro, " she cried, "of how much you have sacrificedin my service. Yours must be a very noble nature that will do so much toserve a helpless lady without any hope of guerdon. "

"Nay, nay, " I answered lightly, "you must not make so much of it. Itwould never have sorted with my inclinations to have turned man-at-arms. This ring, Madonna, that once has served you, I beg that you will keep, for it may serve you again. "

"I could not, Lazzaro! I could not!" she exclaimed, recoiling, yetwithout any show of deeming presumptuous my words or of being offendedby them. 

"If you would make me the reward that you say I have earned, you willdo this for me. It will make me happier, Madonna. Take it"--I thrust itinto her unwilling hand--"and if ever you should need me send it back tome. That ring and the name of the place where you abide by the lips ofthe messenger you choose, and with a glad heart, as fast as horse canbear me, shall I ride to serve you once again. "

"In such a spirit, yes, " said she. "I take it willingly, to treasure itas a buckler against danger, since by means of it I can bring you to myaid in time of peril. "

"Madonna, do not overestimate my powers, " I besought her. "I would haveyou see in me no more than I am. But it sometimes happens that the mousemay aid the lion. "

"And when I need the lion to aid the mouse, my good Lazzaro, I will sendfor you. "

There were tears in her voice, and her eyes were very bright. 

"Addio, Lazzaro, " she murmured brokenly. "May God and His saints protectyou. I will pray for you, and I shall hope to see you again some day, myfriend. "

"Addio, Madonna!" was all that I could trust myself to say ere I fledfrom her presence that she might not see my deep emotion, nor hear thesobs that were threatening to betray the anguish that was ravaging mysoul. 

PART II. THE OGRE OF CESENA

CHAPTER XI. MADONNA'S SUMMONS

However great the part that my mother--sainted woman that she was--mayhave played in my life, she nowise enters into the affairs of thischronicle, so that it would be an irrelevance and an impertinence tointroduce her into these pages. Of the joy with which she welcomed me tothe little home near Biancomonte, in which the earnings of Boccadoro theFool had placed her, it could interest you but little to read in detail, nor could it interest you to know of the gentle patience with whichshe cheered and humoured me during the period that I sojourned there, tilling the little plot she owned, reaping and garnering like any bornvillano. With a woman's quick intuition she guessed perhaps the cankerthat was eating at my heart, and with a mother's blessed charity shesought to soothe and mitigate my pain. 

It was during this period of my existence that the poetic gifts I haddiscovered myself possessed of whilst at Pesaro, burst into fullbloom; and not a little relief did I find in the penning of thoselove-songs--the true expression of what was in my heart--which havesince been given to the world under the title of Le Rime di Boccadoro. And what time I tended my mother's land by day, and wrote by night ofthe feverish, despairing love that was consuming me, I waited for thecall that, sooner or later, I knew must come. What prophetic instinctit was had rooted that certainty in my heart I do not pretend to say. Perhaps my hope was of such a strength that it assumed the form ofcertainty to solace the period of my hermitage. But that some dayMadonna Paola's messenger would arrive bringing me the Borgia ring, Iwas as confident as that some day I must die. 

Two years went by, and we were in the Autumn of 1502, yet my faithknew no abating, my confidence was strong as ever. And, at last, thatconfidence was justified. One night of early October, as I sat at supperwith my mother after the labours of the day, a sound of hoofs disturbedthe peace of the silent night. It drew rapidly nearer, and long beforethe knock fell upon our door, I knew that it was the messenger from mylady. 

My mother looked at me across the board, an expression of alarmoverspreading her old face. "Who, " her eyes seemed to ask me, "was thishorseman that rode so late?"

My hound rose from the hearth with a growl, and stood bristling, hiseyes upon the door. White-haired old Silvio, the last remaining retainerof the House of Biancomonte, came forth from the kitchen, with inquiryand fear blending on his wrinkled, weather-beaten countenance. 

And I, seeing all these signs of alarm, yet knowing what awaited meon the threshold, rose with a laugh, and in a bound had crossed theintervening space. I flung wide the door, and from the gloom without aman's voice greeted me with a question. 

"Is this the house of Messer Lazzaro Biancomonte?"

"I am that Lazzaro Biancomonte, " answered I. "What may your pleasurebe?"

The stranger advanced until he came within the light. He was plainlydressed, and wore a jerkin of leather and long boots. From his air Ijudged him a servant or a courier. He doffed his hat respectfully, andheld out his right hand in which something was gleaming yellow. It wasthe Borgia ring. 

"Pesaro, " was all he said. 

I took the ring and thanked him, then bade him enter and refresh himselfere he returned, and I called old Silvio to bring wine. 

"I am not returning, " the man informed me. "I am a courier riding toParma, whom Madonna charged with that message to you in passing. "

Nevertheless he consented to rest him awhile and sip the wine we setbefore him, and what time he did so I engaged him in talk, and led himto tell me what he knew of the trend of things at Pesaro, and what newsthere was of the Lord Giovanni. He had little enough to tell. Pesarowas flourishing and prospering under the Borgia dominion. Of the LordGiovanni there was little news, saving that he was living under theprotection of the Gonzagas in Mantua, and that so long as he was contentto abide there the Borgias seemed disposed to give him peace. 

Next I made him tell me what he knew of Filippo di Santafior and MadonnaPaola. On this subject he was better informed. Madonna Paola was welland still lived with her brother at the Palace of Pesaro. The LordFilippo was high in favour with the Borgias, and Cesare lately had beenfrequently his guest at Pesaro, whilst once, for a few days, the LordIgnacio de Borgia had accompanied his illustrious cousin. 

I flushed and paled at that piece of news, and the reason of her summonsno longer asked conjecture. It was an easy thing for me, knowing what Iknew, to fill in the details which the courier omitted in ignorance fromthe story. 

The Lord Filippo, seeking his own advancement, had so urged his sisterupon the notice of the Borgia family--perhaps even approached Cesare--insuch a manner that it was again become a question of wedding her toIgnacio, who had, meanwhile, remained unmarried. I could read thatopportunist's motives as easily as if he had written them down for myinstruction. Giovanni Sforza he accounted lost beyond redemption, and Icould imagine how he had plied his wits to aid his sister to forgethim, or else to remember him no longer with affection. Whether he hadsucceeded or not I could not say until I had seen her; but meanwhile, deeming ripe the soil of her heart for the new attachment that shouldredound so much to his own credit--now that the House of Borgia hadrisen to such splendid heights--he was driving her into this alliancewith Ignacio. 

Faithful to the very letter of the promise I had made her, I set outthat same night, after embracing my poor, tearful mother, and promisingto return as soon as might be. All night I rode, my soul now torturedwith anxiety, now exalted at the supreme joy of seeing Madonna, whichwas so soon to be mine. I was at the gates of Pesaro before matins, andwithin the Palazzo Sforza ere its inmates had broken their fast. 

The Lord Filippo welcomed me with a certain effusion, chiding me for mylong absence and the ingratitude it had seemed to indicate, and neverdreaming by what summons I was brought back. 

"You are well-returned, " he told me in conclusion. "We shall need yousoon, to write an epithalamium. "

"You are to be wed, Magnificent?" quoth I at last, at which he laughedconsumedly. 

"Nay, we shall need the song for my sister's nuptials. She is to wed theLord Ignacio Borgia, before Christmas. "

"A lofty theme, " I answered with humility, "and one that may well demandresources nobler than those of my poor pen. "

"Then get you to work at once upon it. I will have your chamberprepared. "

He sent for his seneschal, a person--like most Of the servants at thePalace--strange to me, and he gave orders that I should be sumptuouslylodged. He was grown more splendid than ever in the prosperity thatseemed to surround him here at Pesaro, in this Palace that had undergonesuch changes and been so enriched during the past two years as to gonear defying recognition. 

When the seneschal had shown me to the quarters he had set apart for me, I made bold to make inquiries concerning Madonna Paola. 

"She is in the garden, Illustrious, " answered the seneschal, deemingme, no doubt, a great lord, from the respect which Filippo had indicatedshould be shown me. "Madonna has the wisdom to seek the little sunshinethe year still holds. Winter will be soon upon us. "

I agreed with the old man, and dismissed him. So soon as he was gone, Iquitted my chamber, and all dust staineded as I was I made my way downto the garden. A turn in one of the boxwood-bordered alleys brought mesuddenly face to face with Madonna Paola. 

A moment we stood looking at each other, my heart swelling within meuntil I thought that it must burst. Then I advanced a step and sank onone knee before her. 

"You sent for me, Madonna. I am here. " There was a pause, and whenpresently I looked up into her blessed face I saw a smile of infinitesorrow on her lips, blending oddly with the gladness that shone from hersweet eyes. 

"You faithful one, " she murmured at last. "Dear Lazzaro, I did not lookfor you so soon. "

"Within an hour of your messenger's arrival I was in the saddle, nor didI pause until I had reached the gates of Pesaro. I am here to serve youto the utmost of my power, Madonna, and the only doubt that assails meis that my power may be all too small for the service that you need. "

"Is its nature known to you?" she asked in wonder. Then, ere I hadanswered, she bade me rise, and with her own hand assisted me. 

"I have guessed it, " answered I, "guided by such scraps of informationas from your messenger I gleaned. It concerns, unless I err, the LordIgnacio Borgia. "

"Your wits have lost nothing of their quickness, " she said, with a sadsmile, "and I doubt me you know all. "

"The only thing I did not know your brother has just told me--thatyou are to be wed before Christmas. He has ordered me to write yourepithalamium. "

She drew into step beside me, and we slowly paced the alley side byside, and, as we went, withered leaves overhead, and withered leaves tomake a carpet for our fret, she told me in her own way more or lesswhat I have set down, even to her brother's self-seeking share in thetransaction that she dubbed hideous and abhorrent. 

She was little changed, this winsome lady in the time that was sped. Shewas in her twenty-first year, but in reality she seemed to me no olderthan she had been on that day when first I saw her arguing with hergrooms upon the road to Cagli. And from this I reassured myself that shehad not been fretted overmuch by the absence of the Lord Giovanni. 

Presently she spoke of him and of her plighted word which her brotherand those supple gentlemen of the House of Borgia were inducing her todishonour. 

"Once before, in a case almost identical, when all seemed lost, youcame--as if Heaven directed--to my rescue. This it is that gives meconfidence in such aid as you might lend me now. "

"Alas! Madonna, " I sighed, "but the times are sorely changed and thesituations with them. What is there now that I can do?"

"What you did then. Take me beyond their reach. "

"Ah! But whither?"

"Whither but to the Lord Giovanni? Is it not to him that my troth isplighted?"

I shook my head in sorrow, a thrust of jealousy cutting me the while. 

"That may not be, " said I. "It were not seemly, unless the Lord Giovanniwere here himself to take you hence. "

"Then I will write to the Lord Giovanni, " she cried. "I will write, andyou shall bear my letter. "

"What think you will the Lord Giovanni do?" I burst out, with a scornthat must have puzzled her. "Think you his safety does not give him careenough in the hiding-place to which he has crept, that he should drawupon himself the vengeance of the Borgias?"

She stared at me in ineffable surprise. "But the Lord Giovanni isbrave and valiant, " she cried, and down in my heart I laughed in bittermockery. 

"Do you love the Lord Giovanni, Madonna?" I asked bluntly. 

My question seemed to awaken fresh astonishment. It may well be that itawakened, too, reflection. She was silent for a little space. Then--

"I honour and respect him for a noble, chivalrous and gifted gentleman, "she answered me, and her answer made me singularly content, spreading abalm upon the wounds my soul had taken. But to her fresh intercessionsthat I should carry a letter to him, I shook my head again. My mood wasstubborn. 

"Believe me, Madonna, it were not only unwise, but futile. "

She protested. 

"I swear it would be, " I insisted, with a convincing force that left herstaring at me and wondering whence I derived so much assurance. "Wemust wait. From now till Christmas we have more than two months. In twomonths much may befall. As a last resource we may consider communicationwith the Lord Giovanni. But it is a forlorn hope, Madonna, and so wewill leave it until all else has failed us. "

She brightened at my promise that at least if other measures provedunavailing, we should adopt that course, and her brightening flatteredme, for it bore witness to the supreme confidence she had in me. 

"Lazzaro, " said she, "I know you will not fail me. I trust you more thanany living mam; more, I think, than even the Lord Giovanni, whom, if Godpleases, I shall some day wed. "

"Thanks, Madonna mia, " I answered, gratefully indeed. "It is a trustthat I shall ever strive to justify. Meanwhile have faith and hope, andwait. "

Once before, when, to escape the schemes of her brother who would havewed her to the Lord Giovanni, she had appealed to me, the counsel I hadgiven her had been much the same as that which I gave her now. At theirony of it I could have laughed had any other been in question butMadonna Paola--this tender White Flower of the Quince that was like tobe rudely wilted by the ruthless hands of scheming men. 

CHAPTER XII. THE GOVERNOR OF CESENA

That night I would have supped in my own quarters but that Filippo sentfor me and bade me join him and swell the little court he kept. At timesI believe he almost thought that he was the true Lord of Pesaro--anopinion that may have been shared by not a few of the citizensthemselves. Certainly he kept a greater state and was better housed thanthe duke of Valentinois' governor. 

It was a jovial company of perhaps a dozen nobles and ladies that metabout his board, and Filippo bade his servants lay for me beside him. Aswe ate he questioned me touching the occupation that I had found duringmy absence from Pesaro. I used the greatest frankness with him, andanswered that my life had been partly a peasants, partly a poet's. 

"Tell me what you wrote, " he bade me his eyes resting on my face with anew look of interest, for his love of letters was one of the few thingsabout him that was not affected. 

"A few novelle, dealing with court-life; but chiefly verses, " answeredI. 

"And with these verses--what have you done?"

"I have them by me, Illustrious, " I answered. He smiled, seemingly wellpleased. 

"You must read them to us, " he cried. "If they rival that epic of yours, which I have never forgotten, they should be worth hearing. "

And presently, supper being done, I went at his bidding to my chamberfor my precious manuscripts, and, returning, I entertained the companywith the reading of a portion of what I had written. They heard me withan attention that might have rendered me vain had my ambition reallylain in being accounted a great writer; and when I paused, now andagain, there was a murmur of applause, and many a pat on the shoulderfrom Filippo whenever a line, a phrase or a stanza took his fancy. 

I was perhaps too absorbed to pay any great attention to the impressionmy verses were producing, but presently, in one of my pauses, theLord Filippo startled me with words that awoke me to a sense of myimprudence. 

"Do you know, Lazzaro, of what your lines remind me in an extraordinarymeasure?"

"Of what, Excellency?" I asked politely, raising my eyes from mymanuscript. They chanced to meet the glance of Madonna Paola. It wasriveted upon me, and its expression was one I could not understand. 

"Of the love-songs of the Lord Giovanni Sforza, " answered he. "Theyresemble those poems infinitely more than they resemble the epic youwrote two years ago. "

I stammered something about the similarity being merely one of subject. But he shook his head at that, and took good note of my confusion. 

"No, " said he, "the resemblance goes deeper. There is the same facilebeauty of the rhymes the same freshness of the rhythm--remotelyresembling that of Petrarca, yet very different. Conceits similar tothose that were the beauty spots of the Lord Giovanni's versesare ubiquitous in yours, and above all there is the same ferventearnestness, the same burning tone of sincerity that rendered hisstrambotti so worthy of admiration. "

"It may be, " I answered him, my confusion growing under the steady gazeof Madonna Paola, "it may be that having heard the verses of the LordGiovanni, I may, unconsciously, have modelled my own lines upon thosethat made so deep an impression on me. "

He looked at me gravely for a moment. 

"That might be an explanation, " he answered deliberately, "but frankly, if I were asked, I should give a very different one. "

"And that would be?" came, sharp and compelling, the voice of Madonna. 

He turned to her, shrugged his shoulders and laughed. "Why, since youask me, " he said, "I should hazard the opinion that Lazzaro, here, wasof considerable assistance to the Lord Giovanni in the penning of thoseverses with which he delighted us all--and you, Madonna, I believe, particularly. "

Madonna Paola crimsoned, and her eyes fell. The others looked at uswith inquiring glances--at her, at Filippo and at me. With a fresh laughFilippo turned to me. 

"Confess now, am I not right?" he asked good-humouredly. 

"Magnificent, " I murmured in tones of protest, "ask yourself thequestion. Was it a likely thing that the Lord Giovanni would enlist theservices of his jester in such a task?"

"Give me a straightforward answer, " he insisted. "Am I right or wrong?"

"I am giving you more than a straightforward answer, my lord, " I stillevaded him, and more boldly now. "I am setting you on the high-road tosolve the matter for yourself by an appeal to your own good sense andreason. Was it in the least likely, I repeat, that the Lord Giovanniwould seek the services of his Fool to aid him write the verses inhonour of the lady of his heart?"

With a burst of mocking laughter, Filippo smote the table a blow of hisclenched hand. 

"Your prevarications answer me, " he cried. "You will not say that I amwrong. "

"But I do say that you are wrong!" I exclaimed, suddenly inspired. "Idid not assist the Lord Giovanni with his verses. I swear it. "

His laughter faded; and his eyes surveyed me with a sudden solemnity. 

"Then why did you evade my question?" he demanded shrewdly. And then hiscountenance changed as swiftly again. It was illumined by the light ofsudden understanding. "I have it, " he cried. "The answer is plain. Youdid not assist the Lord Giovanni to write them. Why? Because you wrotethem yourself, and you gave them to him that he might pass them off ashis own. "

It was a merciful thing for me that the whole company fell into a burstof laughter and applauded Filippo's quick discernment, which they neverdoubted. All talked at once, and a hundred proofs were advanced insupport of Filippo's opinion. The Lord Giovanni's celebrated dullnessof mind, amounting almost to stupidity, was cited, and they reminded oneanother of the profound astonishment with which they had listened to thecompositions that had suddenly burst from him. 

Filippo turned to his sister, on whose pale face I saw it written thatshe was as convinced as any there, and my feelings were those of adastard who has broken faith with the man who trusted him. 

"Do you appreciate now, Madonna, " he murmured, "the deceits and wiles bywhich that craven crept like a snake into your esteem?"

I guessed at once that by that thrust he sought to incline her more tothe union he had in view for her. 

"At least he was no craven, " answered she. "His burning desire to pleaseme may have betrayed him into this foolish duplicity. But he stillmust live in my memory as a brave and gallant gentleman; or have youforgotten, Filippo, that noble combat with the forces of Ramiro del'Orca?"

To such a question Filippo had no answer, and presently his mood sobereda little. For myself, I was glad when the time came to withdraw fromthat company that twitted and pestered me and played upon my sense ofshame at the imprudence I had committed. 

Now that I look back, I can scarce conceive why it should have sowrought upon me; for, in truth, the little love I bore the Lord Giovannimight rather have led me to rejoice that his imposture should be laidbare to the eyes of all the world. I think that really there was anelement of fear in my feelings--fear that, upon reflection, MadonnaPaola might ask herself how came that burning sincerity into thelove-songs written in her honour which it was now disclosed that I hadpenned. The answer she might find to such a question was one that mightarouse her pride and so outrage it as to lead her to cast me out of herfriendship and never again suffer me to approach her. 

Such a conclusion, however, she fortunately did not arrive at. Haply sheaccounted the fervour of those lines assumed, for when on the morrow shemet me, she did no more than gently chide me for the deceit that I hadhad a hand in practising upon her. She accepted my explanation that myshare in that affair had been wrung from me with threats of torture, andputting it from her mind she returned to the matter of the approachingalliance she sought to elude, renewing her prayers that I should aidher. 

"I have, " she told me then, "one other friend who might assist us, andwho has the power perhaps if he but has the will. He is the Governor ofCesena, and for all that he holds service under Cesare Borgia, yethe seems much devoted to me, and I do not doubt that to further myinterests he would even consent to pit his wits against those of thefamily he serves. "

"In which case, Madonna, " answered I, spurred to it, perhaps, by aninsensate pang of jealousy at the thought that there should be anotherbeside myself to have her confidence, "he would be a traitor. And itis ever an ill thing to trust a traitor. Who once betrays may betrayagain. "

That she manifested no resentment, but, on the contrary, readily agreedwith me, showed me how idle had been that jealousy of mine, and made meashamed of it. 

"Why yes, " she mused, "it is the very thought that had occurred to me, and caused me to spurn the aid he proffered when last he was here. "

"Ah!" I cried. "What aid was that?"

"You must know, Lazzaro, " said she, "that he comes often to Pesaro fromCesena, being a man in whom the Duke places great trust, and on whom hehas bestowed considerable powers. He never fails to lie at the Palacewhen he comes, and he seems to--to have conceived a regard for me. He isa man of twice my years, " she added hurriedly, "and haply looks upon meas he might upon a daughter. "

I sniffed the air. I had heard of such men. 

"A week ago, when last he came, I was cast down and grieved by theaffair of this marriage, which Filippo had that day disclosed to me. TheGovernor of Cesena, observing my sadness, sought my confidence with akindliness of which you would scarce believe him capable; for he is afierce and blustering man of war. In the fulness of my heart there wasnothing that seemed so desirable as a friendly ear into which I mightpour the tale of my affliction. He heard me gravely, and when I had donehe placed himself at my disposal, assuring me that if I would but trustmyself to him, he would defeat the ends of the House of Borgia. Notuntil then did I seem to bethink me that he was the servant of thathouse, and his readiness to betray the hand that paid him sowed mistrustand a certain loathing of him in my mind. I let him see it, perhaps, which was unwise, and, may be, even ungrateful. He seemed deeplywounded, and the subject was abandoned. But I have since thought thatperhaps I acted with a rashness that was--"

"With a rashness that was eminently justifiable, " I interrupted her. "You could not have been better advised than to have mistrusted such aman. "

But touching this same Governor of Cesena, there was a fine surprise instore for me. At dusk some two days later there was a sudden commotionin the courtyard of the Palace, and when I inquired of a groom into itscause, I was informed that his Excellency the Governor of Cesena hadarrived. 

Curious to see this man whose willingness to betray the house he served, where Madonna was concerned, was by no means difficult to probe, Idescended to the banqueting-hall at supper time. 

They were not yet at table when I entered, and a group was gathered inthe centre of the room about a huge man, at sight of whose red head andcrimson, brutal face I would have turned and sought again the refuge ofmy own quarters but that his wolf's eye had already fastened on me. 

"Body of God!" he swore, and that was all. But his eyes were on me in amarvellous stare, as were now--impelled by that oath of his--the eyesof all the company. We looked at each other for a moment, then a greatlaugh burst from him, shaking his vast bulk and wrinkling his hideousface. He thrust the intervening men aside as if they had been a growthof sedges he would penetrate, and he advanced towards me; the LordFilippo and his sister looking on with all the rest in interestedsurprise. 

In front of me he halted, and setting his hands on his hips he regardedme with a brutal mirth. 

"What may your trade be now?" he asked at last contemptuously. 

I had taken rapid stock of him in the seconds that were sped, and fromthe surpassing richness of his apparel, his gold-broidered doublet andcrimson, fur-edged surcoat, I knew that Messer Ramiro del' Orca wasgrown to the high estate of Governor of Cesena. 

"A new trade even as yours, " I answered him. 

"Nay, that is no answer, " he cried, overlooking my offensiveness. "Doyou still follow the trade of arms?"

"I think, " Filippo interposed, "that our Excellency is in some error. This gentleman is Lazzaro Biancomonte, a poet of whom Italy will one daybe proud, despite the fact that for a time he acted as the Lord GiovanniSforza's Fool. "

Ramiro looked at his interlocutor, as the mastiff may look at the lapdog. He grunted, and blew out his cheeks. 

"There is yet another part he played, " said he, "as I have good causeto remember--for he is the only man that can boast of having unhorsedRamiro del' Orca. He was for a brief season the Lord Giovanni Sforzahimself. "

"How?" asked the profoundly amazed Filippo, whilst all present pressedcloser to miss nothing of the disclosure that seemed to impend. Myself, I groaned. There was naught that I could say to stem the tide ofrevelation that was coming. 

"Do you then keep this paladin here arrayed like a clerk?" quoth Ramiroin his sardonic way. "And can it be that the secret of his feat of armshas been guarded so well that you are still in ignorance of it?"

Filippo's wits worked swiftly, and swiftly they pieced together thehints that Ramiro had let fall. 

"You will tell us, " said he, "that the fight in the streets of Pesaro, in which your Excellency's party suffered defeat, was led by Biancomontein the armour of Giovanni Sforza?"

Ramiro looked at him with that displeasure with which the jester visitsthe man who by anticipation robs his story of its points. 

"It was known to you?" growled he. 

"Not so. I have but learnt it from you. But it nowise astonishes me. "

And he looked at his sister, whose eyes devoured me, as if they wouldread in my soul whether this thing were indeed true. Under her eyes Idropped my glance like a man ashamed at hearing a disgraceful act of hisparaded. 

"Had it indeed been the Lord Giovanni, he had been dead that day, "laughed Ramiro grimly. "Indeed it was nothing but my astonishmentat sight of the face I was about to stab, after having broken thefastenings of his visor that stayed my hand for long enough to give himthe advantage. But I bear you no grudge for that, " he ended, turning onme with a ferocious smile, "nor yet for that other trick by which--asBoccadoro the Fool--you bested me. I am not a sweet man when thwarted, yet I can admire wit and respect courage. But see to it, " he ended, with a sudden and most unreasonable ferocity, his visage empurpling ifpossible still more, "see to it that you pit neither that courage northat wit against me again. I have heard the story of how you came tobe Fool of the Court of Pesaro. Cesena is a dull place, and we mightenliven it by the presence of a jester of such nimble wits as yours. "

He turned without awaiting my reply, and strode away to take his placeat table, whilst I walked slowly to my accustomed seat, and took littlepart in the conversation that ensued, which, as you may imagine, had meand that exploit of mine for scope. 

Anon an elephantine trumpeting of laughter seemed to set the aira-quivering. Ramiro was lying back in his chair a prey to such a passionof mirth that it swelled the veins of his throat and brow until Ithought that they must burst--and, from my soul, I hoped they would. Adown his rugged cheeks two tears were slowly trickling. The LordFilippo, as presently transpired, had been telling him of the epic Ihad written in praise of the Lord Giovanni's prowess. Naught would nowsatisfy that ogre but he must have the epic read, and Filippo, who hadretained a copy of it, went in quest of it, and himself read it aloudfor the delight of all assembled and the torture of myself who saw inMadonna Paola's eyes that she accounted the deception I had practised onher a thing beyond pardon. 

Filippo had a taste for letters, as I think I have made clear, and heread those lines with the same fire and fervour that I, myself, hadbreathed into them two years ago. But instead of the rapt and breathlessattention with which my reading had been attended, the present companylistened with a smile, whilst ever and anon a short laugh or a quietchuckle would mark how well they understood to-night the subtle ironieswhich had originally escaped them. 

I crept away, sick at heart, while they were still making sport over mywork, cursing the Lord Giovanni, who had forced me to these things, andmy own mad mood that had permitted me in an evil hour to be so forced. Yet my grief and bitterness were little things that night compared withwhat Madonna was to make them on the morrow. 

She sent for me betimes, and I went in fear and trembling of her wrathand scorn. How shall I speak of that interview? How shall I describe theimmeasurable contempt with which she visited me, and which I felt wasperhaps no more than I deserved. 

"Messer Biancomonte, " said she coldly, "I have ever accounted you myfriend, and disinterested the motives that inspired a heart seeminglynoble to do service to a forlorn and helpless lady. It seems that Iwas wrong. That the indulging of a warped and malignant spirit was theinspiration you had to appear to befriend me. "

"Madonna, you are over-cruel, " I cried out, wounded to the very soul ofme. 

"Am I so?" she asked, with a cold smile upon her ivory face. "Is it notrather you who were cruel? Was it a fine thing to do to trick a ladyinto giving her affection to a man for gifts which he did not possess?You know in what manner of regard I held the Lord Giovanni Sforza solong as I saw him with the eyes of reason and in the light of truth. Andyou, who were my one professed friend, the one man who spoke so loudlyof dying in my service, you falsified my vision, you masked him--eitherat his own and at my brother's bidding, or else out of the malignancy ofyour nature--in a garb that should render him agreeable in my eyes. Doyou realise what you have done? Does not your conscience tell you? Youhave contrived that I have plighted my troth to a man such as I believedthe Lord Giovanni to be. Mother of Mercy!" she ended, with a scornineffable; "when I dwell upon it now, it almost seems that it was toyou I gave my heart, for yours were the deeds that earned my regard--nothis. "

Such was the very argument that I had hugged to my starving soul, atthe time the things she spoke of had befallen, and it had consoled me asnaught in life could have consoled me. Yet now that she employed it withsuch a scornful emphasis as to make me realise how far beneath her Ireally was, how immeasurably beyond my reach was she, it was as muchconsolation to me as confession without absolution may be to theperishing sinner. I answered nothing. I could not trust myself to speak. Besides, what was there that I could say?

"I summoned you back to Pesaro, " she continued pitilessly, "trusting inyour fine words and deeming honest the offer of services you made me. Now that I know you, you are free to depart from Pesaro when you will. "

Despite my shame, I dared, at last, to raise my eyes. But her face wasaverted, and she saw nothing of the entreaty, nothing of the grief thatmight have told her how false were her conclusions. One thing alonethere was might have explained my actions, might have revealed them in anew light; but that one thing I could not speak of. 

I turned in silence, and in silence I quitted the room; for that, Ithought, was, after all, the wisest answer I could make. 

CHAPTER XIII. POISON

Despite Madonna Paola's dismissal, I remained in Pesaro. Indeed, hadI attempted to leave, it is probable that the Lord Filippo would havedeterred me, for I was much grown in his esteem since the disclosuresthat had earned me the disfavour of Madonna. But I had no thought ofgoing. I hoped against hope that anon she might melt to a kinder mood, or else that by yet aiding her, despite herself, to elude the Borgiaalliance, I might earn her forgiveness for those matters in which sheheld that I had so gravely sinned against her. 

The epithalamium, meanwhile, was forgotten utterly and I spent my daysin conceiving wild plans to save her from the Lord Ignacio, only toabandon them when in more sober moments their impracticable quality wasborne in upon me. 

In this fashion some six weeks went by, and during the time she neveronce addressed me. We saw much during those days of the Governor ofCesena. Indeed his time seemed mainly spent in coming and going 'twixtCesena and Pesaro, and it needed no keen penetration to discern theattraction that brought him. He was ever all attention to Madonna, andthere were times when I feared that perhaps she had been drawn intoaccepting the aid that once before he had proffered. But these fearswere short-lived, for, as time sped, Madonna's aversion to the man grewplain for all to see. Yet he persisted until the very eve, almost, ofher betrothal to Ignacio. 

One evening in early December I chanced, through the purest accident, to overhear her sharp repulsion of the suit that he had evidently beenpressing. 

"Madonna, " I heard him answer, with a snarl, "I may yet prove to youthat you have been unwise so to use Ramiro del' Orca. "

"If you so much as venture to address me again upon the subject, " shereturned in the very chilliest accents, "I will lay this matter of yourodious suit before your master Cesare Borgia. "

They must have caught the sound of my footsteps in the gallery in whichthey stood, and Ramiro moved away, his purple face pale for once, andhis eyes malevolent as Satan's. 

I reflected with pleasure that perhaps we had now seen the last of him, and that before that threat of Madonna's he would see fit to ride hometo Cesena and remain there. But I was wrong. With incredible effronteryand daring he lingered. The morrow was a Sunday, and, on the Tuesday orWednesday following, Cesare Borgia and his cousin Ignacio were expected. Filippo was in the best of moods, and paid more heed to the Governorof Cesena's presence at Pesaro than he did to mine. It may be that heimagined Ramiro del' Orca to be acting under Cesare's instructions. 

That Sunday night we supped together, and we were all tolerably gay, thetopic of our talk being the coming of the bridegroom. Madonna's was theonly downcast face at the board. She was pale and worn, and there weredark circles round her eyes that did much to mar the beauty of her angelface, and inspired me with a deep and sorrowing pity. 

Ramiro announced his intention of leaving Pesaro on the morrow, and erehe went he begged leave to pledge the beautiful Lady of Santafior, who was so soon to become the bride of the valiant and mighty IgnacioBorgia. It was a toast that was eagerly received, so eager anduproariously that even that poor lady herself was forced to smile, for all that I saw it in her eyes that her heart was on the point ofbreaking. 

I remember how, when we had drunk, she raised her goblet--a beautifulchaste cup of solid gold--and drank, herself, in acknowledgment; and Iremember, too, how, chancing to move my head, I caught a most singular, ill-omened smile upon the coarse lips of Messer Ramiro. 

At the time I thought of it no more, but in the morning when thehorrible news that spread through the Palace gained my ears, that smileof Ramiro del' Orca recurred to me at once. 

It was from the seneschal of the Palace that I first heard that tragicnews. I had but risen, and I was descending from my quarters, when Icame upon him, his old face white as death, a palsy in his limbs. 

"Have you heard the news, Ser Lazzaro?" he cried in a quavering voice. 

"The news of what?" I asked, struck by the horror in his face. 

"Madonna Paola is dead, " he told me, with a sob. 

I stared at him in speechless consternation, and for a moment I seemedforlorn of sense and understanding. 

"Dead?" I remember whispering. "What is it you say?" And I leanedforward towards him, peering into his face. "What is it you say?"

"Well may you doubt your ears, " he groaned. "But, Vergine Santissima!it is the truth. Madonna Paola, that sweet angel of God, lies cold andstiff. They found her so this morning. "

"God of Heaven!" I cried out, and leaving him abruptly I dashed down thesteps. 

Scarce knowing what I did, acting upon an impulsive instinct that was asirresistible as it was unreasoning, I made for the apartments of MadonnaPaola. In the antechamber I found a crowd assembled, and on every facewas pallid consternation written. Of my own countenance I had a glimpsein a mirror as I passed; it was ashen, and my hollow eyes were wild as amadman's. 

Someone caught me by the arm. I turned. It was the Lord Filippo, paleas the rest, his affectations all fallen from him, and the man himselfrevealed by the hand of an overwhelming sorrow. With him was a grave, white-bearded gentleman, whose sober robe proclaimed the physician. 

"This is a black and monstrous affair, my friend, " he murmured. 

"Is it true, is it really true, my lord?" I cried in such a voice thatall eyes were turned upon me. 

"Your grief is a welcome homage to my own, " he said. "Alas, Dio Santo!it is most hideously true. She lies there cold and white as marble, Ihave just seen her. Come hither, Lazzaro. " He drew me aside, away fromthe crowd and out of that antechamber, into a closet that had beenMadonna's oratory. With us came the physician. 

"This worthy doctor tells me that he suspects she has been poisoned, Lazzaro. "

"Poisoned?" I echoed. "Body of God! but by whom? We all loved her. Therewas not in Pesaro a man worthy of the name but would have laid down hislife in her service. Who was there, then, to poison that dear saint?"

It was then that the memory of Ramiro del' Orca, and the look that inhis eyes I had surprised whilst Madonna drank, flashed back into mymind. 

"Where is the Governor of Cesena?" I cried suddenly. Filippo looked atme with quick surprise. 

"He departed betimes this morning for his castle. Why do you ask?"

I told him why I asked; I told him what I knew of Ramiro's attentions toMadonna, of the rejection they had suffered, and of the vengeance he hadseemed to threaten. Filippo heard me patiently, but when I had done heshook his head. 

"Why, all being as you say, should he work so wanton a destruction?" heasked stupidly, as if jealousy were not cause enough to drive an evilman to destroy that which he may not possess. "Nay, nay, your wits aredisordered. You remember that he looked at Madonna whilst she drank, andyou construe that into a proof that he had poisoned the cup she drankfrom. But then it is probable that we all looked at her in that samemoment. "

"But not with such eyes as his, " I insisted. 

"Could he have administered the poison with his own hands?" asked thedoctor gravely. 

"No, " said I, "that were a difficult matter. But he might have bribed aservant to drop a powder in her wine. "

"Why then, " said he, "it should be an easy thing to find the servant. Doyou chance to remember who served the wine?"

"I remember, " answered Filippo readily. 

"Let the man be questioned; let him be racked if necessary. Thus shallyou probably arrive at a true knowledge; thus discover under whosedirections he was working. "

It was the only thing to do, and Filippo sent me about it there andthen, telling me the servant in question was a Venetian of the name ofZabatello. If confirmation had been needed that this fellow had been thetool of the poisoner--there was no reason to suppose that he would havedone the thing to have served any ends of his own--that confirmationI had upon discovering that Zabatello was fled from Pesaro, leaving notrace behind him. 

Men were sent out by the Lord Filippo in every direction to endeavourto find the rogue and bring him back. Whether they caught him or notseemed, after all a little thing to me. She was dead; that was theone all-absorbing, all-effacing fact that took possession of my mind, blotting out all minor matters that might be concerned with it. Eventhe now assured fact that she had been poisoned was a thing that foundlittle room in my consideration on that day of my burning grief. 

She was dead, dead, dead! The hideous phrase boomed again and againthrough my distracted mind. Compared with that overwhelming catastrophe, what signified to me the how or why or when she had died. She was dead, and the world was empty. 

For hours I sat on the rocks, alone by the sea, on that stormy day ofDecember, and I indulged my grief where no prying eyes could witness it, amid the solitude of wild and angry Nature. And the moan and thud withwhich the great waves hurled themselves against the base of the blackrock on which I was perched afforded but a feeble echo of the storm thatraged and beat within my desolated soul. 

She was dead, dead, dead! The waves seemed to shout it as they leaptup and spattered me with brine; the wind now moaned it piteously, nowshrieked it fiercely as it scudded by, wrapping its invisible coilsabout me, and seeming intent on tearing me from my resting-place. 

Towards evening, at last, I rose, and skirting the Castle, I entered thetown, dishevelled and bedraggled, yet caring nothing what spectacle Imight afford. And presently a grim procession overtook me, and at sightof the black, cowled and visored figures that advanced in the luridlight of their wax torches, I fell on my knees there in the street, andso remained, my knees deep in the mud, my head bowed, until her saintedbody had been borne past. None heeded me. They bore her to San Domenico, and thither I followed presently, and in the shadow of one of thepillars of the aisle I crouched whilst the monks chanted their funerealpsalms. 

The singing ended, the friars departed, and presently those of the Courtand the sight-seers from the streets began to leave the church. In anhour I was alone--alone with the beloved dead, and there, on my knees, I stayed, and whether I prayed or blasphemed during that horrid hour, mymemory will not let me say. 

It may have been towards the third hour of night when at last Istaggered up--stiff and cramped from my long kneeling on the cold stone. Slowly, in a half-dazed condition, I move down the aisle and gained thedoor of the church. I essayed to open it. It resisted my efforts, andthen I realised that it was locked for the night. 

The appreciation of my position afforded me not the slightest dismay. Onthe contrary, I think my feelings were rather of relief. I had not knownwhither I should repair--so distraught was my mood--and now chance hadsettled the matter for me by decreeing that I should remain. 

I turned and slowly I paced back until I stood beside the great blackcatafalque, at each corner of which a tall wax taper was burning. Myfootsteps rang with a hollow sound through the vast, gloomy spaces ofthat cold, empty church; my very breathing seemed to find an echo in it. But these were not things to occupy my mind in such a season, no morethan was the icy cold by which I was half-numbed--yet of which I seemedto remain unconscious in the absorbing anguish that possessed me. 

Near the foot of the bier there was a bench, and there I sat me down, and resting my elbows on my knees I took my dishevelled head between myfrozen hands. My thoughts were all of her whose poor murdered clay wasthere encased above me. I reviewed, I think, each scene of my life whereit had touched on hers; I evoked every word she had addressed to mesince first I had met her on the road to Cagli. 

And anon my mood changed, and, from cold and frozen that it had beenby grief, it grew ablaze with the fire of anger and the lust to wreakvengeance upon him that had brought her to this condition. Let Filippofear to move without proofs, let him doubt such proofs as I had setbefore him and deem them overslender to warrant action. Such scruplesshould not serve to restrain me. I was no lukewarm brother. Here inPesaro I would remain until her poor body was delivered to the earth, and then I would set out upon a last emprise. Messer Ramiro del' Orcashould account to me for this vile deed. 

There in the House of Peace I sat gnawing my hands and maturing mybloody plans whilst the night wore on. Later a still more frenzied moodobsessed me--a burning desire to look again upon the sweet face of her Ihad loved, the sainted visage of Madonna Paola. What was there to determe? Who was there to gainsay me?

I stood up and uttered that challenge aloud in my madness. My voiceechoed mournfully up the aisles, and the sound of the echo chilled me, yet my purpose gathered strength. 

I advanced, and after a moment's pause, with the silver-broidered hem ofthe pall in my hands, I suddenly swept off that mantle of black cloth, setting up such a gust of wind as all but quenched the tapers. I caughtup the bench on which I had been sitting, and, dragging it forward, Imounted it and stood now with my breast on a level with the coffin-lid. I laid hands on it and found it unfastened. Without thought or care ofhow I went about the thing, I raised it and let it crash over to theground. It fell on the stone flags with a noise like that of thunder, which boomed and reverberated along the gloomy vault above. 

A figure, all in purest white, lay there under my eyes, the face coveredby a veil. With deepest reverence, and a prayer to her sainted soul toforgive the desecration of my loving hands, I tremblingly drew that veilaside. How beautiful she was in the calm peace of death! She lay therelike one gently sleeping, the faintest smile upon her lips, and as Ilooked it seemed hard to believe that she was truly dead. Why, herlips had lost nothing of their colour; they were as rosy red--or nearlyso--as ever I had seen them in life. How could this be? The lips of thedead are wont to put on a livid hue. I stared a moment, my reverence andgrief almost effaced by the intensity of my wonder. This face, so ivorypale, wore not the ashen aspect of one that would never wake again. There was a warmth about that pallor. And then I caught my nether lipin my teeth until it bled, and it is a miracle that I did not scream, seeing how overwrought was my condition. 

For it had seemed to me that the draperies on her bosom had slightlymoved, a gentle, almost imperceptible heave as if she breathed. Ilooked, and there it came again. 

God! into what madness was I come that my eyes could so deceive me? Itwas the draught that stirred the air about the church and blew greatshrouds of wax adown the taper's yellow sides. I manned myself to a moresober mood, and looked again. 

And now my doubts were all dispelled. I knew that I had mastered anyerrant fancy, and that my eyes were grown wise and discriminating, and Iknew, too, that she lived. Her bosom slowly rose and fell; the colourof her lips, the hue of her cheeks confirmed the assurance that shebreathed. The poison had failed in its work. 

I paused a second yet to ponder. That morning her appearance had beensuch that the physician had been deceived by it, and had pronounced hercold. Yet now there were these signs of life. What could it portendbut that the effects of the poison were passing off and that she wasrecovering?

In the wild madness of joy that sent the blood drumming and beatingthrough my brain, my first impulse was to run for help. Then I bethoughtme of the closed doors, and I realised that no matter how I shouted nonewould hear me. I must succour her myself as best I could, and meanwhileshe must be protected from the chill air of that December night inthat church that was colder than the tomb. I had my cloak, a heavy, serviceable garment; and if more were needed, there was the pall which Ihad removed, and which lay in a heap about the legs of my bench. 

I leaned forward, and passing my hand under her head, I gently raisedit. Then slipping it downwards, I thrust my arm after it until I had herround the waist in a firm grip. Thus I raised her from the coffin, and the warmth of her body on my arm, the ready, supple bending of herlimbs, were so many added proofs that she was not dead. 

Gently and reverently I lifted her in my arms, an intoxication of holyjoy pervading me, and the prayers falling faster from my lips than everthey had done since as a lad I had recited them at my mother's knee. Amoment I laid her on the bench, whilst I divested myself of my cloak. Then suddenly I paused, and stood listening, holding my breath. 

Steps were advancing towards the door. 

My first impulse was to rush forward and call to those who came, shouting my news and imploring their help. Then a sudden, an almostinstinctive suspicion caught and chilled me. Who was it came at such anhour? What could any man seek in the Church of San Domenico at dead ofnight? Was the church indeed their goal, or were they but passers-by?

That last question went not long unanswered. The steps came nearer, whilst I stood appalled, my skin roughening like a dog's. They halted atthe door. Something heavy hurtled against it. 

A voice, the voice of Ramiro del' Orca--I knew it upon theinstant--reached my ears which concentration had rendered superacute. 

"It is locked, Baldassare. Get out those tools of yours and force it. "

My wits were working now at fever-pace. It may be that I am swift ofthought beyond the ordinary man, or it may be that what then came to mewas either a flash of inspiration or the conclusion to which I leapt byinstinct. But in that moment the whole plot of Madonna's poisoning wasrevealed to me. Poisoned she had been--aye, but by some drug that didbut produce for a little while the outward appearance of death so trulysimulated as to deceive the most experienced of doctors. I had heardof such poisons, and here, in very truth, was one of them at work. Hisvengeance on her for her indifference to his suit was not so clumsyand primitive as that of simply slaying her. He had, by his infernalartifice, intended, secretly, to bear her off. To-morrow when men founda broken church-door and a violated bier, they would set the sacrilegedown to some wizard who had need of the body for his dark practices ofmagic. 

I cursed myself in that hour that I had not earlier been moved to peerinto her coffin whilst yet there might have been time to have saved her. Now? The sweat stood out in beads upon my brow. At that door there were, to judge by the sound of footsteps and of voices, some three or four menbesides Messer Ramiro. For only weapon I had my dagger. What could Ido with that to defend her? Ramiro's plan would suffer no frustrationthrough my discovery; when to-morrow the sacrilege was discovered thecold body of Lazzaro Biancomonte lying beside the desecrated bier wouldbe but an item in the work of profanation they would find--an item thatnowise would modify the conclusion to which I anticipated they wouldcome. 

CHAPTER XIV. REQUIESCAT!

A strange and mysterious thing is the working of terror on the humanmind. Some it renders incapable of thought or action, paralysing theirlimbs and stagnating the blood in their veins; such creatures die inanticipating death. Others under the stress of that grim passion havetheir wits preternaturally sharpened. The instinct of self-preservationassumes command of all their senses, and urges them to swift andfeverish action. 

I thank God with a full heart that to this latter class do I belong. After one gelid moment, spent with eyes and mouth agape, my hands fallenlimp beside me and my hair bristling with affright, I became myselfagain and never calmer than in that dread moment. I went to work withsuperhuman swiftness. My cheeks may have been livid, my very lipsbloodless; but my hands were steady and my wits under full control. 

Concealment--concealment for myself and her--was the thing that nowimported; and no sooner was the thought conceived than the means weredevised. Slender means were they, yet Heaven knows I was in no caseto be exacting, and since they were the best the place afforded I musttrust to them without demurring, and pray God that Messer Ramiro mightlack the wit to search. And with that fresh hope it came to me thatI must find a way so to dispose as to make him believe that to searchwould be a futile waste of energy. 

The odds against me lay in the little time at my disposal. Yet a littletime there was. The door was stout, and Messer Ramiro might takeno violent means of bursting it, lest the noise should arouse thestreet--and I well could guess how little he would relish having lightsto shine upon this deed of night of his. 

With what tools his sbirro was at work I could not say; but surely theymust be such as would leave me a few moments. Already the fellow hadbegun. I could make out a soft crunching sound, as of steel biting intowood. To act, then!

With movements swift as a cat's, and as silent, I went to work. Likea ghost I glided round the coffin to the other side, where the lid waslying. I took it up, and when for a moment I had deposited Madonna Paolaon the ground, I mounted the bench and gently but quickly set back thatlid as it had been. Next, I gathered up the cumbrous pall, and mountingthe bench once more I spread it across the coffin. This way and that Ipulled it, straightening it into the shape that it had worn when first Ihad entered, and casting its folds into regular lines that would lend itthe appearance of having remained undisturbed. 

And what time I toiled, the half of my mind intent upon my task, theother half was as intent upon the progress of the worker at the door. 

At last it was done. I set the bench where first it had been, at thefoot of the catafalque, and gathering up Madonna in my arms, as thoughher weight had been an infant's, I bore her swiftly out of the circle oflight of those four tapers into the black, impenetrable gloom beyond. On I sped towards the high-altar, flying now as men fly in evil dreams, with the sensation of an enemy upon them and their progress a merestanding-still. 

Thus I gained the chancel, hurtling against the railing as I passed, andpausing for an instant, wondering whether those without could have heardthe noise which in my clumsiness I had made. But the grinding soundcontinued uninterrupted, and I breathed more freely. I mounted thealtar-steps, the distant light behind me still feebly guiding me; I ranround to the right, and heaved a great sigh of relief to find my hopesverified, and that the altar of San Domenico was as the altar of otherchurches I had known. It stood a pace or so from the wall, and behind itthere was just such narrow hiding-room as I had looked to find. 

I paused at the mouth of that black opening, and even as I paused, something hard that gave out a metallic sound fell at the far end of thechurch. Instinct told me it was the lock which those miscreants had cutfrom the door. I waited for no more, but like a beast scudding to coverI plunged into that black space. 

Madonna, wrapped in my cloak as she was, I set down upon the ground, andthen I crept forward on hands and knees and thrust out my head, trustingto the darkness to envelop me. 

I waited thus for some seconds, my heart beating now against my ribs asif it would hurl itself out of my bosom, my head and face on fire withthe fever of reaction that succeeded my late cold pallor. 

From where I watched it was impossible to see the door hidden in theblack gloom. Away in the centre of the church, an island of light inthat vast sea of blackness, stood the catafalque with its four waxtorches. Something creaked, and almost immediately I saw the flames ofthose tapers bend towards me, beaten over by the gust that smote themfrom the door. Thus I surmised that Ramiro and his men had entered. Thesoft fall of their feet; for they were treading lightly now, succeeded, and at last they came into view, shadowy at first, then sharply outlinedas they approached the light. 

A moment they stood in half-whispered conversation, their voices amere boom of sound in which no word was to be distinguished. Then I sawRamiro suddenly step forward--I knew him by his great height--and dragaway, even as I had done, the pall that hid the coffin. Next he seizedthe bench and gave a brisk order to his men in a less cautious voice, sothat I caught his words. 

"Spread a cloak, " said he, and, in obedience, the four that were withhim took a cloak among them, each holding one of its corners. It wasthus that he meant to bear her with him. 

He mounted now the bench, and I could imagine with what elation of mindhe put out his hands to remove the coffin-lid. As well as if his soulhad been transformed into a book conceived for my amusement did Isurmise the exultant mood that then possessed him. He had trickedFilippo; he had out-witted us all--Madonna herself, included--and he wasleaving no trace behind him that should warrant any so much as to dareto think that this vile deed was the work of Messer Ramiro del' Orca, Governor of Cessna. 

But Fate, that arch-humourist, that jester of the gods, delights inmighty contrasts, and has a trick of exalting us by false hopes andhollow lures on the very eve of working our discomfiture. From the soulthat but a moment back had been aglow with evil satisfaction there bursta sudden blasphemous cry of rage that disregarded utterly the sanctityof that consecrated place. 

"By the Death of Christ! the coffin is empty!"

It was the roar of a beast enraged, and it was succeeded by a heavycrash as he let fall the coffin-lid; a second later a still louder soundawoke the night-echoes of that silent place. In a burst of maniacalfrenzy he had caught the coffin itself a buffet of his mighty fist, andhurled it from its trestles. 

Then he leapt down from the bench, and flung all caution to the winds inthe excitement that possessed him. 

"It is a trick of that smooth-faced knave Filippo, " he cried. "They havelaid a trap for us, animals, and you never informed yourselves. "

I could imagine the foam about the corners of his mouth, the swellingveins in his brow, and the mad bulging of his hideous eyes, for terrorspoke in his words, and the Governor of Cesena, overbearing bully thoughhe was, could on occasion, too, become a coward. 

"Out of this!" he growled at them. "See that your swords hang ready. Away!"

One of them murmured something that I could not catch. Mother inHeaven! if it should be a suggestion of what actually had taken place, asuggestion that the church should be searched ere they abandoned it? ButRamiro's answer speedily relieved my fears. 

"I'll take no risks, " he barked. "Come! Let us go separately. I first, and do you follow me and get clear of Pesaro as best you can. " His voicegrew lower, and from what else he said I but caught the words, "Cesena"and "to-morrow night, " from which I gathered that he was appointing thatas their next meeting-place. 

Ramiro went, and scarce had the echoes of his footsteps died away erethe others followed in a rush, fearful of being caught in some trap thatwas here laid for them, and but restrained from flying on the instant bytheir still greater fear of that harsh master, Ramiro. 

Thanking Heaven for this miraculous deliverance, and for the wit ithad lent me so to prepare a scene that should thoroughly mislead thoseravishers, I turned me now to Madonna Paola. Her breathing was grownmore heavy and more regular, so that in all respects she was as onesleeping healthily. Soon I hoped that she might awaken, for to seek tobear her thence and to the Palace in my arms would have been a madness. And now it occurred to me that I should have restoratives at handagainst the time of her regaining consciousness. Inspiration suggestedto me the wine that should be stored in the sacristy for altar purposes. It was unconsecrated, and there could be no sacrilege in using it. 

I crept round to the front of the altar. At the angle a candle-branchprotruded, standing no higher than my head. It held some three or fourtapers, and was so placed to enable the priest to read his missal atearly Mass on dark winter mornings. I plucked one of the candles fromits socket, and hastening down the church, I lighted it from one of theburning tapers of the bier. Screening it with my hand, I retraced mysteps and regained the chancel. Then turning to the left, I made for adoor that I knew should give access to the sacristy. It yielded to mytouch, and I passed down a short stone-flagged passage, and entered thespacious chamber beyond. An oak settle was placed against one wall, andabove it hung an enormous, rudely-carved crucifix. Facing it against theother wall loomed a huge piece of furniture, half-cupboard, half-buffet. On a bench in a corner stood a basin and ewer of metal, whilst a fewvestments hanging beside these completed the furniture of this austereand white-washed chamber. Setting my candle on the buffet, I opened oneof the drawers. It was full of garments of different kinds, among whichI noticed several monks' habits. I rummaged to the bottom only to findsome odd pairs of sandals. 

Disappointed, I closed the drawer and tried another, with no betterfortune. Here were under-vestments of fine linen, newly washed andfragrant with rosemary. I abandoned the drawer and gave my attention tothe cupboard above. It was locked, but the key was there. It opened, and my candle reflected a blaze on gold and silver vessels, consecratedchalices; a dazzling monstra, and several richly-carved ciboria of solidgold, set with precious stones. But in a corner I espied a dark-brown, gourd-shaped object. It was a skin of wine, and, with a half-suppressedcry of joy, I seized it. In that instant a piercing scream rang throughthe stillness of the church, and startled me so that I stood there forsome seconds, frozen in horror, a hundred wild conjectures leaping to mymind. 

Had Ramiro remained hidden, and was he returned? Did the scream meanthat Madonna Paola had been awakened by his rough hands?

A second time it came, and now it seemed to break the hideous spell thatits first utterance had cast over me. Dropping the leather bottle, I sped back, down the stone passage to the door that abutted on thechancel. 

There, by the high-altar, I saw a form that seemed at first luminous andghostly, but in which presently I recognised Madonna Paola, the dim raysof the distant tapers finding out the white robe with which her limbswere hung. She was alone, and I knew then that it was but the verynatural fear consequent upon awakening in such a place that had provokedthe cry I had heard. 

"Madonna, " I called, advancing swiftly towards her. "Madonna Paola!"There was a gasp, a moment's stillness, then--

"Lazzaro?" She cried, questioningly. "What has happened? Why am I here?"

I was beside her now, and found her trembling like an aspen. 

"Something horrible has happened, Madonna, " I answered. "But it is overnow, and the evil is averted. "

"But how came I here?"

"That you shall learn. " I stooped to gather up the cloak which hadslipped from her shoulders as she advanced. "Do you wrap this aboutyou, " I urged her, and with my own hands I assisted to enfold her inthat mantle. "Are you faint, Madonna?" I asked. 

"I scarce know, " she answered in a frightened voice. "There is a blackhorror upon me. Tell me, " she implored again, "what does it mean?"

I drew her away now, promising to satisfy her in the fullest manner onceshe were out of these forbidding surroundings. I led her to the sacristyand seating her upon the settle I produced that wine-skin once again. 

At first she babbled like a child of not being thirsty; but I wasinsistent. 

"It is no matter of quenching thirst, Madonna, " I told her. "The winewill warm and revive you. Come Madonna mia, drink. "

She obeyed me now, and having got the first gulp down her throat shedrank a lusty draught that was not long in bringing a healthier colourto replace the ashen pallor of her cheeks. 

"I am so cold, Lazzaro, " she complained. 

I turned to the drawer in which I had espied the rough monks' habits, and pulling one out I held it for her to don. She sat there now, in thatgarment of coarse black cloth, the cowl flung back upon her shoulder, the fairest postulate that ever entered upon a novitiate. 

"You are good to me, Lazzaro, " she murmured plaintively, "and I haveused you very ill. " She paused a second, passing her hand across herbrow. Then--"What is the hour?" she asked. 

It was a question that I left unheeded. I bade her brace herself andhave courage for the tale I was to tell. I assured her that the horrorof it was all passed and that she had naught to fear. So soon as hernatural curiosity should be satisfied it should be hers to return to herbrother at the Palace. 

"But how came I thence?" she cried. "I must have lain in a swoon, forI remember nothing. " And then her swift mind, leaping to a reasonableconclusion; and assisted, perhaps, by the memory of the shatteredcatafalque which she had seen--"Did they account me dead, Lazzaro?" sheasked of a sudden, her eyes dilating with a curious affright as theywere turned upon my own. 

"Yes, Madonna, " answered I, "you were accounted dead. " And, with that, Itold her the entire story of what had befallen, saving only that I leftmy own part unmentioned, nor sought to explain my opportune presencein the church. When I spoke of the coming of Ramiro and his knaves sheshuddered and closed her eyes in very awe. At length, when I had done, she opened them again, and again she turned them full upon me. Theirbrightness seemed to increase a moment, and then I saw that she wasquietly weeping. 

"And you were there to save me, Lazzaro?" she murmured brokenly. "Lazzaro mio, it seems that you are ever at hand when I have need ofyou. You are indeed my one true friend--the one true friend that neverfails me. "

"Are you feeling stronger, Madonna?" I asked abruptly, roughly almost. 

"Yes, I am stronger. " She stood up as if to test her strength. "Indeedlittle ails me saving the horror of this thing. The thought of it seemsto turn me sick and dizzy. "

"Sit then and rest, " said I. "Presently, when you are more recovered, wewill set out. "

"Whither shall we go?" she asked. 

"Why, to the Palace, to your brother. "

"Why, yes, " she answered, as though it were the last suggestion thatshe had been expecting, "And to-morrow--it will be to-morrow, will itnot?--comes the Lord Ignacio to claim his bride. He will owe you no meanthanks, Lazzaro. "

There was a pause. I paced the chamber, a hundred thoughts crowding mymind, but overriding them all the conjecture of how far it might be frommatins, and how soon we might be discovered by the monks. Presently shespoke again. 

"Lazzaro, " she inquired very gently, "what was it brought you to thechurch?"

"I came with the others, Madonna, to the burial service, " answered I, and fearing such questions as might follow--questions that I had beendreading ever since I had brought her to the sacristy--"If you arerecovered we had best be going, " I told her gruffly. 

"Nay, I am not yet enough recovered, " answered she. "And before we go, there are some points in this strange adventure that I would have youmake clear to me. Meanwhile, we are very well here. If the good fatherscome upon us, what shall it signify?"

I groaned inwardly, and I grew, I think, more afraid than when Ramiroand his men had broken into the church an hour ago. 

"What kept you here after all were gone?"

"I remained to pray, Madonna, " I answered brusquely. "Is aught else tobe done in a church?"

"To pray for me, Lazzaro?" she asked. 

"Assuredly, Madonna. "

"Faithful heart, " she murmured. "And I had used you so cruelly forthe deception you practised. But you merited my cruelty, did you not, Lazzaro? Say that you did, else must I perish of remorse. "

"Perhaps I deserved it, Madonna. But perhaps not so much as youbestowed, had you but understood my motives, " I said unguardedly. 

"If I had understood your motives?" she mused. "Aye, there is much I donot understand. Even in this night's transactions there are not wantingthings that remain mysterious despite the explanations you have suppliedme. Tell me, Lazzaro, what was it led you to suppose that I still lived?

"I did not suppose it, " I blundered like a fool, never seeing whitherher question led. 

"You did not?" she cried, in deep surprise; and now, when it wastoo late, I understood. "What was it, then, induced you to lift thecoffin-lid?"

"You ask me more than I can tell you, " I answered, almost roughly. "Doyou thank God, Madonna, that it was so, and never plague your mind tolearn the 'why' of it. "

She looked at me with eyes that were singularly luminous. 

"But I must know, " she insisted. "Have I not the right? Tell me now: Wasit that you wished to see my face again before they gave me over to thegrave?"

"Perhaps it was that, Madonna, " I answered in confusion, avoiding herglance. Then--"Shall we be going?" I suggested fiercely. But she neverheeded that suggestion. 

She spoke as if she had not heard, and the words she uttered seemed toturn me into stone. 

"Did you love me then so much, dear Lazzaro?"

I swung round to face her now, and I know that my face was white--whiterthan hers had been when I had beheld her in her coffin. My eyes seemedto burn in their sockets as they met hers. A madness overtook me andwhelmed my better judgment. I had undergone so much that day throughgrief, and that night through a hundred emotions, that I was no longerfully master of myself. Her words robbed me, I think, of my lastlingering shred of reason. 

"Love you, Madonna?" I echoed, in a voice that was as unlike my own aswas the mood that then possessed me. "You are the air I breathe, thesun that lights my miserable world. You are dearer to me than honour, sweeter than life. You are the guardian angel of my existence, the saintto whom I have turned morning and evening in my prayers for grace. Do Ilove you, Madonna--?"

And there I paused. The thought of what I did and what the consequencesmust be rushed suddenly upon me. I shivered as a man shivers in awaking. I dropped on my knees before her, bowing my head and flinging wide myarms. 

"Forgive, Madonna, " I cried entreatingly. "Forgive and forget. Neveragain will I offend. "

"Neither forgive nor forget will I, " came her voice, charged with anineffable sweetness, and her hands descended on my bowed bead, as ifshe would bless and soothe me. "I am conscious of no offence that cravesforgiveness, and what you have said I would not forget if I could. Whence springs this fear of yours, dear Lazzaro? Am I more than woman, or you less than man that you should tremble for the confession that ina wild moment I have dragged from you? For that wild moment I shall bethankful to my life's end; for your words have been the sweetest evermy poor ears listened to. Once I thought that I loved the Lord GiovanniSforza. But it was you I loved; for the deeds that earned him myaffection were deeds of yours and not of his. Once I told you so inscorn. Yet since then I have come soberly to ponder it. I account you, Lazzaro, the noblest friend, the bravest gentleman and the truest loverthat the world has known. Need it surprise you, then, that I love youand that mine would be a happy life if I might spend it in growingworthy of this noble love of yours?"

There was a knot in my throat and tears in my eyes--a matter at which Itake no shame. Air seemed to fail me for a moment, and I almost thoughtthat I should swoon, so overcome was I. Transport the blackest soul fromamong the damned of Hell, wash it white of its sins and seat it on oneof the glorious thrones of Heaven, then ponder its emotions, and youmay learn something of what I felt. At last, when I had mastered theexquisite torture of my joy--

"Madonna mia, " I cried, "bethink you of what you say. You are the noblelady of Santafior, and I--"

"No more of this, " she interrupted me. "You are Lazzaro Biancomonte, ofpatrician birth, no matter to what odd shifts a cruel fortune may havedriven you. Will you take me?"

She had my face between her palms, and she forced my glance to meet herown saintly eyes. 

"Will you take me, Lazaro?" she repeated. 

"Holy Flower of the Quince!" was all that I could murmur, whereat shegently smiled. "Santo Fior di Cotogno!"

And then a great sadness overwhelmed me. A tide that neaped the frailbark of happiness high and dry upon the shores of black despair. 

"To-morrow Madonna, comes the Lord Ignacio Borgia, " I groaned. 

"I know, I know, " said she. "But I have thought of that. Paula Sforzadi Santafior is dead. Requiescat! We must dispose that they will let herrest in peace. "

CHAPTER XV. AN ILL ENCOUNTER

Speechless I stared at her a moment, so taken was I with the immensityof the thing that she suggested. Fear, amazement, and joy jostled oneanother for the possession of my mind. 

"Why do you look so, Lazzaro?" she exclaimed at last. "What is it dauntsyou?

"How is the thing possible?" quoth I. 

"What difficulty does it present?" she questioned back. "The Governorof Cesena has rendered very possible what I propose. We may look on himto-morrow as our best friend. "

"But Ramiro knows, " I reminded her. 

"True, but do you think that he will dare to tell the world what heknows? He might be asked to say how he comes by his knowledge, and thatshould prove a difficult question to answer. Tell me, Lazzaro, " shecontinued, "if he had succeeded in carrying me away, what think youwould have been said in Pesaro to-morrow when the coffin was foundempty?"

"They would assume that your body had been stolen by some wizard or somedaring student of anatomy. "

"Ah! And if we were quietly to quit the church and be clear of Pesarobefore morning, would not the same be said?"

"Probably, " answered I. 

"Then why hesitate? Is it that you do not love me enough, Lazzaro?"

I smiled, and my eyes must have told her more than any protestationcould. Then I sighed. "I hesitate, Madonna, because I would not have youdo now what you might come, hereafter, bitterly to repent. I wouldnot let you be misled by the impulse of a moment into an act whoseconsequences must endure as long as life itself. "

"Is that the reasoning of a lover?" she asked me, very quietly. "Isthis cold argument, this weighing of issues, consistent with the stormypassion you professed so lately?"

"It is, " I answered stoutly. "It is because I love you more than I lovemyself that I would have you reflect ere you adventure your life uponsuch a broken raft as mine. You are Paola Sforza di Santafior, and I--"

"Enough of that, " she interrupted me, rising. She swept towards me, andbefore I knew it her hands were on my shoulders, her face upturned, andher blue eyes on mine, depriving me of all will and all resistance. 

"Lazzaro, " said she, and there was an intensity almost fierce in herlow tones, "moments are flying and you stand here reasoning with me, and bidding me weigh what is already weighed for all time. Will you waituntil escape is rendered impossible, until we are discovered, before youwill decide to save me, and to grasp with both hands this happiness ofours that is not twice offered in a lifetime?"

She was so close to me that I could almost feel the beating of herheart. Some subtle perfume reaching me and combining with thedominion that her eyes seemed to have established over me completedmy subjugation. I was as warm wax in her hands. Forgotten were allconsiderations of rank and station. We were just a man and a woman whosefates were linked irrevocably by love. I stooped suddenly, under thesway of an impulse, I could not resist, and kissed her upturned face, turning almost dizzy in the act. Then I broke from her clasp, andbracing myself for the task to which we stood committed by that kiss--

"Paola, " said I, "we must devise the means to get away. I will bear youto my mother's home near Biancomonte, that you may dwell there at leastuntil we are wed. But the thing that exercises my mind is how to makeour unobserved escape from Pesaro. "

"I have thought of it already, " she informed me quietly. 

"You have thought of it?" I cried. "And of what have you thought?"

For answer she stepped back a pace, and drew the cowl of the monk'shabit over her head until her features were lost in the shadows of it. She stood before me now, a diminutive Dominican brother. Her meaningwas clear to me at once. With a cry of gladness I turned to the drawerwhence I had taken the habit in which she was arrayed, and selectinganother one I hastily donned it above the garments that I wore. 

No sooner was it done than I caught her by the arm. 

"Come, Madonna, " I bade her in an urgent voice. At the first step shestumbled. The habit was so long that it cumbered her feet. But that wasa difficulty soon conquered. With my dagger I cut a piece from the skirtof it, enough to leave her freedom of movement; and, that accomplished, we set out. 

We crossed the church swiftly and silently, and a moment I left herin the porch whilst I surveyed the street. All was quiet. Pesaro stillslept, and it must have wanted some two hours or more to the dawn. 

A fine rain was falling as we sallied out, and there was a sting in theDecember wind which made us draw our cowls the tighter about our face. Abandoning the main street, I led her down some narrow alleys, desertedlike all the rest of the city, and not so much as a stray cat abroad inthat foul weather. It was very dark, and a hundred times we stumbled, whilst in some places I almost carried her bodily to avoid the filth ofthe quarter we were traversing. At length we gained the space in frontof the gates that open on to the northern road, known as Porta Venezia, and I would have blundered on and roused the guard to let us out, usingthe Borgia ring once more--that talisman whose power had grown duringthese years, so that it would now open me almost any door in Italy. ButPaola stayed me. Wisely she counselled that we should do nothing thatmight draw too much attention upon ourselves, and she urged me to waituntil the dawn, when the guard would be astir and the gates opened. 

So we fled to the shelter of a porch, and there we waited, huddlingourselves out of the reach of the icy rain. We talked little during thetime we spent there. For my own part I had overmuch food for thought, and a very natural anxiety racked me. Soon the monks would be descendingto the church, and they would discover the havoc there, and spread thealarm. 

Who could say but that they might even discover the abstraction of thetwo habits from the sacristy, and the hue and cry for two men in thesackcloth of Dominicans would be afoot--for they would infer thattwo men so disguised had made off with the body of Madonna Paola. The thought stirred me like a goad. I stood up. The night was growingthinner, and, suddenly, even as I rose, a light gleamed from one of theWindows of the guard-house. 

"God be thanked for that fellow's early rising, " I cried out. "Come, Madonna, let us be moving. "

And I added my newly-conceived reasons for quitting the place withoutfurther delay. 

Cursing us for being so early abroad--a curse to which I responded witha sonorous "Pax Domini sit tecum" the still somnolent sentinel openedthe post and let us pass. I was glad in the end that we had waited andthus avoided the necessity of showing my ring, for should inquiries bemade concerning two monks, that ring of mine might have betrayed theidentity of one of them. I gave thanks to Heaven that I knew the countrywell. A quarter of a league or so from Pesaro we quitted the high-roadand took to the by-paths with which I was well acquainted. 

Day came, grey and forbidding at first, but presently the rainceased and the sun flashed out a thousand diamonds from the drenchedhedge-rows. 

We plodded on; and at length, towards noon, when we had gained theneighbourhood of the village of Cattolica, we halted at the hut of apeasant on a small campagna. I had divested myself of my monk's habit, and cut away the cowl from Madonna's. She had thereafter fashioned itby means that were mysterious to my dull man's mind into a morefeminine-looking garb. 

Thus we now presented ourselves to the old man who was the sole tenantof that lonely and squalid house. A ducat opened his door as wide as itwould go, and gave us free access to every cranny of his dwelling. Foodhe procured us--rough black bread, some pieces of roasted goat, and somegoat's milk--and on this we regaled ourselves as though it had been aducal banquet, for hunger had set us in the mood to account anythingdelicious. And when we had eaten we fell to talking, the old man havingleft us to go about such peasant duties as claimed his attention, andour talk concerned ourselves, our future first, and later on our past. Iremember that Madonna returned to the matter of the deception that I hadpractised, seeking to learn what reasons had impelled me, and I answeredher in all truth. 

"Madonna mia, I think it must have been to win your love. When GiovanniSforza bade me, with many a threat, to write those verses, I undertookthe task with ready gladness, for in its performance I was to pour outthe tale of the passion that was consuming my poor heart. It occurred tome that if those verses were worthy, you might come to love their authorfor their beauty, and so I strove to render them beautiful. It was thesame spirit urged me to don the Lord Giovanni's armour and fight in thatsplendid if futile skirmish. Even as you had come to love the author forhis verses, so might you come to love the warrior for his valour. Thatyou should account the one and the other the work of Giovanni Sforzawas to me a little thing, since I was well content to think that youbut loved him because you accounted his the things that I had performed. Therefore was I the one you truly loved, although you did not know it. Could you but conceive what consolation that reflection was to me, youwould deal lightly with me for my deceit. "

"I can conceive it, " she answered, very gently, her eyes downcast; "andnow that I know the motives that impelled you, I almost love you forthat deceit itself, for it seems to me that it holds some quality wellworthy of devotion. "

Such was our talk, all of a nature to help us to a better understandingof each other, and all seeming to endear us more and more by showing ushow close the past had already drawn us. 

Later I rose and announced my intention of adventuring into Cattolica, there to procure her garments more seemly than those she wore, in whichshe might journey on and come into the presence of my mother. Also, there was in Cattolica a man I knew, of whom I hoped for the loan ofenough money to enable me to purchase mules, to the end that we mightjourney in more dignity and comfort. It was then about the twentiethhour, and I hoped to return by nightfall. I took my leave of Madonna, enjoining her to rest and to seek sleep whilst I was absent; and withthat I set out. 

Cattolica was no more than a half-league distant, and I looked to reachit in a half-hour or so. I fell into thought as I trudged along, and Iwas building plans for the sunlit future that was to be ours. I was aman transformed that day, and I could have sung in spite of the chillDecember wind that buffeted me, so full of joy and gladness was myheart. 

At Biancomonte I was likely to spend my days as little better than apeasant, but surely a peasant's estate with such a companion as was tobe mine was preferable to an emperor's throne without her. 

The bleak landscape seemed to me invested with a beauty that at no othertime I should have noticed. God was good. I swore a thousand times, theworld was a good world--so good that Heaven could scarce be better. 

I had come, perhaps, the better half of the distance I had to travel, and I was giving full rein to my joyous fancy, when suddenly I espiedahead a company of horsemen. They were approaching me at a briskpace, but I took no thought of them, accounting myself secure from anymolestation. If it so happened that it was a search party from Pesaro, seeking two men disguised as monks who had ravished the coffinof Madonna Paola di Santafior, what should they want of LazzaroBiancomonte? And so, in my confidence, I advanced even as they trottedquickly towards me. 

Not until they were within a matter of a hundred paces did I raise myeyes to take their measure; and then I halted on my step, smitten of asudden by an unreasoning and unreasonable fear, to see at their headthe bulky form of the Governor of Cesena. He saw me, too, and, whatwas worse, he recognised me on the instant, for he clapped spurs to hishorse and came at me as if he would ride me down. Within three paces ofme he drew up his steed. Whether the memory of the other two occasionson which I had thwarted him arose now in his mind and made him wonderhad not some fatality brought me across his path again to send awry hispretty schemes concerning Madonna Paula, I cannot say for certain; yetsome suspicion of it occurred to me and filled me with apprehension. 

"Body of Bacchus!" he roared. "Is it truly you, Boccadoro?"

"They call me Biancomonte now, Magnificent, " I answered him. But my tonewas respectful, for it could profit me nothing to incense him. 

"A fig for what they call you, " he snapped contemptuously. "Whence areyou?"

"From Pesaro, " I answered truthfully. 

"From Pesaro? But you are travelling towards it. "

"True. I was making for Cattolica, but I missed my way in seeking toshorten it. I am now returning by the high-road. "

The explanation satisfied him on that point, and being satisfied, heasked me when I had left Pesaro. A moment I hesitated. 

"Late last night, " said I at last. He looked, at me, my foolishhesitation having perhaps unslipped a suspicion that was straining atits leash. 

"In that case, " said he, "you can scarcely have heard the strange storythat is being told there?"

I looked at him, as if puzzled, for a second. "If you mean the story ofMadonna Paoia's end, I heard it yesterday. "

"Why, what story was that?" quoth he in some surprise, his beetlingbrows coming together in one broad line of fur. 

I shrugged my shoulders. "Men said that she had been poisoned. "

"Oh, that, " he cried indifferently. "But men say to-day that herbody was stolen from the Church of San Domenico where it lay. An oddhappening, is it not?" And his eyes covered me in a fierce scrutiny thatagain suggested to me those suspicions of his that I might be the manwho had anticipated him. I was soon to learn that he had more groundsthan at first I thought for those same suspicions. 

"Odd, indeed, " I answered calmly, for all that I felt my pulsesquickening with apprehension. "But is it true?" I added. 

He shrugged his shoulders. "Rumour's habit is to lie, " he answered. "Yet for such a lie as that, so monstrous an imagination would be neededthat, rather, am I inclined to account it truth. There are no more poetsin Pesaro since you left. But at what hour was it that you quitted thecity?"

To hesitate again were to betray myself; it were to suggest that Iwas seeking an answer that should sort well with the rest of my story. Besides, what could the hour signify?

"It would be about the first hour of night, " I said. He looked at mewith increasing strangeness. 

"You must indeed have wandered from your road to have got no fartherthan this in all that time. Perhaps you were hampered by some heavyburden?" He leered evilly, and I turned cold. 

"I was burdened with nothing heavier than this body of mine and a ratheruneasy conscience. "

"Where, then, have you tarried?"

At this I thought it time to rebel. Were I too meekly to submit to thisexamination, my very meekness might afford him fresh grounds for doubts. 

"Once have I told you, " I answered wearily, "that I lost my way. And, however much it may flatter me to have your Excellency evincing such aninterest in my concerns, I am at a loss to find a reason for it. "

He leered prodigiously once more, and his eyebrows shot up to the levelof his cap. 

"I will tell you, brute beast, " he answered me. "I question you becauseI suspect that you are hiding something from me. "

"What should I hide from your Excellency?"

He dared not enlighten me on that point, for should his suspicions proveunfounded he would have uselessly betrayed himself. 

"If you are honest, why do you lie?"

"I?" I ejaculated. "In what have I lied?"

"In that you have told me that you left Pesaro at the first hour ofnight. At the third hour you were still in the Church of San Domenico, whither you followed Madonna Paola's bier. "

It was my turn to knit my brows. "Was I indeed?" quoth I. "Why, yes, itmay well be. But what of that? Is the hour in which I quitted Pesaro amatter of such moment as to be worth lying over? If I said that I leftabout the first hour, it is because I was under the impression that itwas so. But I was so distraught by grief at Madonna's death that I mayhave been careless in my account of time. "

"More lies, " he blazed with sudden passion. "It may have been the thirdhour, you say. Fool, the gates of Pesaro close at the second hour ofnight. Where are your wits?"

Outwardly calm, but inwardly in a panic--more for Madonna's sake thanfor my own--I promptly held out the hand on which I wore the Borgiaring. In a flash of inspiration did that counter suggest itself to me. 

"There is a key that will open any gate in Romagna at any hour. "

He looked at the ring, and of what passed in his mind I can but offer asurmise. He may have remembered that once before I had fooled himwith the help of that gold circlet; or he may have thought that Iwas secretly in the service of the Borgias, and that, acting in theirinterests, I had carried off Madonna Paola. Be that as it may, the sightof the ring threw him into a fury. He turned on his horse. 

"Lucagnolo!" he called, and a man of officer's rank detached himselffrom the score of men-at-arms and rode forward. "Let six men escort mehome to Cesena. Take you the remainder and beat up the country forthree leagues about this spot. Do not leave a house outside Cattolicaunsearched. You know what we are seeking?"

The man inclined his head. 

"If it is within the circle you have appointed, we will find it, " heanswered confidently. 

"Set about it, " was the surly command, and Ramiro turned again to me. "You have gone a little pale, good Messer Boccadoro, " he sneered. "Weshall soon learn whether you have sought to fool me. Woe betide you, should it be so. We bear a name for swift justice at Cesena. "

"So be it then, " I answered as calmly as I might. "Meanwhile, perhapsyou will now suffer me to go my ways. "

"The readier since your way must lie with ours. "

"Not so, Magnificent, I am for Cattolica. "

"Not so, animal, " he mimicked me with elephantine grace, "you are forCesena, and you had best go with a good will. Our manner of constrainingmen is reputed rude. " He turned again. "Ercole, take you this man behindyou. Assist him, Stefano. "

And so it was done, and a few minutes later I was riding, strapped tothe steel-clad Ercole, away from Paola at every stride. Thus at everystride the anguish that possessed me increased, as the fear that theymust find her rose ever higher. 

CHAPTER XVI. IN THE CITADEL OF CESENA

I will not harass you at any further length with the feelings that weremine as we sped northward towards Cesena. If you are a person of someimagination and not destitute of human sympathy you will be able tosurmise them; if you are not--why then, my tale is not for you, andit is more than probable that you will have wearied of it and flung itaside long before you reach this page. 

We rode so hard that by sunset Cesena was in sight, and ere night hadfallen we were within the walls of the citadel. It was when we haddismounted and I stood in the courtyard between Ercole and another ofthe soldiers that Ramiro again addressed me. 

"Animal, " said he, "they tell me that I bear a name for harsh measuresand rough ways. You shall be a witness hereafter of how deeply I ammaligned. For instead of putting you to the question and loosening yourlying tongue with the rack, I am content to keep you a prisoner until mymen return with that which I suspect you to be hiding from me. But ifI then discover that you have sought to fool me, you shall flutter fromRamiro del' Orca's flagstaff. "

He pointed up to the tower of the Castle, from which a beam protruded, laden at that moment with a ghastly burden just discernible in thethickening gloom. He named it well when he called it his "flagstaff, "and the miserable banner of carrion that hung from it was a fittingpennon for the ruthless Governor of Cesena. Worthy was he to have wornthe silver hauberk of Werner von Urslingen with its motto, "The enemy ofGod, of pity and of mercy. "

Forbidding, black-browed men caught me with rough hands and dragged meoff to a dank, unlighted prison, as empty of furniture as it was full ofnoisome smells. And there they left me to my ugly thoughts and mydeeply despondent mood what time the Governor of Cesena supped with hisofficers in the hall of the Castle. 

Ramiro drank deep that night as was his habit, and being overladenwith wine it entered his mind that in one of his dungeons lay LazzaroBiancomonte, who, at one time, had been known as Boccadoro, the merriestFool in Italy. In his drunkenness he grew merry, and when Ramiro del'Orca grew merry men crossed themselves and betook them to their prayers. He would fain be amused, and to serve that end he summoned one of hissbirri and bade the fellow drag Boccadoro from his dungeon and fetch himinto his presence. 

When they came for me I turned cold with fear that Madonna was alreadytaken, and, by contrast with such a fear as that, the reflection that hemight carry out his threat to hang me from that black beam of his, fadedinto insignificant proportions. 

They ushered me into a great hall, not ill-furnished, the floor strewedplentifully with rushes, and warmed by an enormous fire of blazing oak. By the door stood two pikemen in armour, like a pair of statues; in thecentre of the floor was a heavy oaken board, laden now with flagons andbeakers, at which sat Ramiro with a pair of gossips so villainous tolook at, that the sight of them reminded me of the adage "God makes aman and then accompanies him. "

The Governor made a hideous noise at sight of me, which I wasconstrained to accept as an expression of horrid glee. 

"Boccadoro, " said he, "do you recall that when last I had the honour ofbeing entertained by your pert tongue, I promised you that did you evercross my path again I would raise you to the dignity of Fool of my Courtof Cesena?"

Into what magniloquence does vanity betray us! His Court of Cesena! Aswell might you describe a pig-sty as a bower of roses. 

But his words, despite the unsavoury thing of which they seemed tohold a promise, fell sweetly on my ear, inasmuch as for the time theyrelieved my fears touching Madonna. It was not to advise me of hercapture that he had had me haled into his odious presence. I gatheredcourage. 

"Have you not fools enough already at Cesena?" I asked him. 

A moment he looked as if he were inclining to anger. Then he burst intoa coarse laugh, and turned to one of his gossips. 

"Did I not tell you, Lampugnani, that his wit was quick and penetrating?Hear him, rogue. Already has he discerned your quality. " He laughedconsumedly at his own jest, and turning to me he pointed to a crimsonbundle on a chair beside me. "Take those garments, " he roughly bade me. "Go dress yourself in them, then come you back and entertain us. "

Without answering him, and already anticipating the nature of theclothes he bade me don, I lifted one of the garments from the heap. Itwas a foliated jester's cap, with a bell hanging from every point, whichgave out a tinkling sound as I picked it up. I let it fall again asthough it had scorched me, the memory of what stood between MadonnaPaola and me rising like a warning spectre in my mind. I would not againdefile myself by the garb of folly; not again would I incur the shame ofplaying the Fool for the amusement of others. 

"May it please your Excellency to excuse me, " I answered in a firm tone. "I have made a vow never again to put on motley. "

He eyed me sardonically for a moment, as if enjoying in anticipation thepleasure of compelling me against my will. He sat back in his chair andthrew one heavily-booted leg across the other. 

"In the Citadel of Cesena, " said he, "we fear neither God nor Devil, andvows are as water to us--things we cannot stomach. It does not please meto excuse you. "

I may have paled a little before the sinister smile with which heaccompanied his words, but I stood my ground boldly. 

"It is not, " said I, "a question of what a vow may be to you and yours, but of what a vow is to me. It is a thing I cannot break. "

"Sangue di Cristo!" he snarled, "we will break it for you, then--thator your bones. Resolve yourself, beast, the motley or the rack--or yet, if you prefer it, there is the cord yonder. " And he pointed to the farend of the chamber where some ropes were hanging from a pulley, theimplements of the ghastly torture of the cord. Of such a nature was thismonster that he made a torture-chamber of his dining-hall. 

"Let the rogue make acquaintance with it, " laughed Lampugnani, showinga mouthful of yellow teeth behind the black beard that bushed his lips. "I'll swear his dancing would afford us more amusement than his quips. Swing him up, Illustrious. "

But the Illustrious seemed to ponder the matter. 

"You shall have five minutes in which to decide, " he informed mepresently. "They say that I am cruel. Behold how patient is my clemency. Five minutes shall you have where many another would hang you out ofhand for bearding him as you have done me. "

"You may begin at once, " said I. "neither five minutes nor five yearswill alter my determination. "

His brow grew black with anger. "We shall see, " was all he said. 

There was a silence now in which we waited, a storm of thoughts battlingin my mind. Presently Ramiro caught up one of the flagons and appliedit to his cup. It proved empty, and in a gust of passion he hurled itagainst the wall where it burst into a thousand pieces. Clearly he wasvery angry, and it taxed my wits to account for the little measure ofpatience he was showing me. 

"Beppo!" he called. A page lounging by the buffet sprang to attention. He was a slender, rather delicate lad, fair of hair and blue of eyes, not more than twelve years of age. An elderly man who stood besidehim--one Mariani, the seneschal of Cesena--stepped forward also, solicitude in his glance. 

"Bring me wine, " bawled the ogre. "Must I tell you what I need? If youdo not put those eyes of yours to better service, I'll have them pluckedfrom your empty head. Bestir, animal. "

The old man caught up a beaker from the buffet and handed it to the boy. 

"Here, my son, " said he. "Hasten to his Excellency. "

The lad took the beaker from his father's hands, and trembling in hisfear of Ramiro's anger, he sprang forward to serve him. In his hastethe poor youth slipped in some grease that had clung to the rushes. In seeking to recover himself he tripped over the feet of one of thehalberdiers that guarded me, and measured his length upon the floor atRamiro's feet, flooding the Governor's legs with the wine he carried. 

How shall I tell you of the horror that was the sequel?

For just one instant Ramiro looked down at the sprawling lad, his eyesglowing like a madman's. Then suddenly he rose, stooped, and set onehand to the boy's belt, the other to the collar of his jerkin. Feelinghimself lifted, and knowing whose were the dread hands that held him, poor Beppo uttered a single scream of terror. Then Ramiro swung himround with an ease that displayed the man's prodigious strength. Forjust a second he seemed to hesitate how to dispose of the human bundlethat he held. Then, as if suddenly taking his resolve, that devil hurledthe lad across the little intervening space, straight into the heart ofthe blazing fire. 

Beppo hurtled against the logs with a sickening crash, and a thousandsparks leapt up and vanished in the cavern of the chimney. Ramirowheeled sharply about, and snatching the pike from the hands of one ofmy guards, he pinned down the poor body of the boy to make sure of hisvictim's entire destruction. 

Away by the buffet old Mariani looked on with a face as grey as ashes, his eyes protruding in horror at the thing they witnessed. One glimpse Ihad of him, and I scarce know which was the sight that sickened me more, the fathers anguish or the twitching limbs of the burning child. Twolegs and two arms protruded from the blaze and writhed and wriggledhorribly what time the flames peeled the garments from them and lickedthe flesh from the bones. At length they fell still and sank down intothe white heat of the logs, a hideous, pungent odour spreading throughthe chamber. From the old man by the buffet, who had stood spellboundduring this ghastly scene, there broke at last an anguished cry. 

"Mercy, my lord, mercy!"

The Governor of Cesena straightened himself from his task, pulled thepike from the flames, and restored it to the man-at-arms. Then turningto Mariani:

"Fetch me wine, " he bade him curtly, as he seated himself once moreupon the chair from which he had risen to perform that deed of ghastlyruthlessness. 

A torch spluttered suddenly in its sconce, and the fierce hissing of thefire--like some monster licking its chops over a bloody meal--were theonly sounds that disturbed the stillness that ensued. 

Every man there, including Ramiro's table companions, was white to thelips; for accustomed though they might be to horrors in that brigand'snest, this was a horror that surpassed anything they had ever witnessed. The silence irked Messer Ramiro. He looked round from under his shaggybrows, and he spluttered out an oath. 

"Will you bring me this wine, pig?" he growled at the almost senselessMariani, and in his air and voice there was a promise of such terrificthings that the old man put aside his horror to make room for his fears, and mechanically seizing another flagon he hurried forward to ministerto the wants of his fearful lord. 

Ramiro eyed him with cynical amusement. 

"Your hand shakes, Mariani, " he derided him. "Are you cold? Go warmyourself, " he added, with a brutal laugh and a jerk of his thumb towardsthe fire. 

My eyes have looked upon some gruesome sights, and I have heard suchtales of ruthless cruelty as you would deem almost passing possibility. I have read of the awful doings of the Lord Bernabo Visconti at Milan inthe olden time, but I believe that compared with this monster of Cesenathat same Bernabo was no worse than a sucking dove. How it befell thatmen permitted him to live, how it was that none bethought him to putpoison in his wine or a knife in his back, is something that I shallnever wholly understand. Could it be that these robbers of whom he madea hedge for his protection were no better than himself, or was it thatthe man's terrific brutality was on such a scale that it filled themwith an almost supernatural awe of him? To men better versed than am Iin the mysterious ways of human nature do I leave the answering of thesequestions. 

The ogre turned his bloodshot eyes upon me, as with his hand he caressedhis tawny beard. He seemed to have cooled a little now, and to haveregained some mastery of his drunken self. Old Mariani tottered back tohis buffet, and stood leaning against it, his eyes wandering, with thelook of a man demented, to the fire that had devoured his child. There, indeed, if he escaped the madness with which the poignancy of his griefwas threatening him, was a tool that might turn its edge against thisinhuman monster, this devil, this bloody carnifex of a Governor. 

"Chance, " said Ramiro, "has designed that you should see something ofhow we deal with clumsy knaves at Cesena, Boccadoro. To disobedientones I can assure you that we are not half so merciful. There is no suchshort shrift for them. You have had more than the time I promised youfor reflection. The garments await you yonder. Let us know--"

The door opened suddenly, and a servant entered. 

"A courier from the Lord Vitellozzo Vitelli, Tyrant of Città diCastello, " he announced, unwittingly breaking in upon Ramiro's words, "with urgent messages for the high and Mighty Governor of Cesena. "

On the instant Ramiro rose, the expression of his face changing fromcynical amusement to sober concern, the task upon which he was engagedforgotten. 

"Admit him instantly, " he commanded. And whilst he waited he paced thechamber in long strides, his chin thrust slightly forward, suggestive ofdeep thought. And during that pause, I, too, was thinking. Not indeedof him, nor vainly speculating upon such matters as might be involvedin the message, the announcement of which seemed so deeply to engage hismind, but chiefly of my own and Madonna Paola's concerns. 

It was not fear of what I had seen that now sent my thoughts into a newchannel and inspired me with the wisdom of obeying Ramiro del' Orca'sbehest that I should don the hateful motley and play the Fool for hisdiversion. It was not that I feared death; it was that I feared what theconsequences of my death might be to Paola di Santafior. 

However desperate a position may seem, unlooked-for loopholes oftenpresent themselves, and so long as we live and have sound limbs to aidus to seize such opportunities as may offer, it is a weak thing utterlyto abandon hope. 

Was it, then, not better to submit to the shame of the motley once againfor a little time, when by so doing I might perhaps live to work myown salvation, and Madonna's should she suffer capture, rather thanstubbornly to invite him to put me to death out of a feeling of falsepride?

The very resolve seemed to lend me strength and to revive the hope thatlay moribund in my breast. And then, scarce was it taken, when the dooragain opened, and a man, who was splashed from head to foot with mud, inearnest of how hard he had ridden, was ushered in. 

He advanced to Meser Ramiro, bowed and presented a package. Ramiro brokethe seal, and standing with his back to the fire, immediately in thelight shed by one of the wax torches, he read the letter. Then his eyeswandered to the man who had brought it, and to me it seemed that theydwelt particularly upon the hat the courier was holding in his hand. 

"Take this good fellow to the kitchen, " he bade the servant that hadintroduced him, "let him be fed and rested. " Then, turning to the man, himself, "I shall require you to set out at daybreak with my answer, "he said; and so, with a wave of the hand, he dismissed him. As themessenger departed Ramiro returned to the table, filled himself a cup ofwine and drank. 

"What says the Lord Vitelli?" Lampugnani ventured to ask him. 

"If he knew you, " answered Ramiro, with a scowl, "he would counsel me tostrangle some of the over-inquisitive rascals that surround me. "

"Over-inquisitive?" echoed Lampugnani boldly. "Body of God! Itwere enough to wake the curiosity of an ecstatic hermit to have amud-splashed courier from Citta di Castello at Cesena three times withinone little week. "

Ramiro looked at him, and by his glance it was plain to see that thewords had jarred his temper. Whatever it was that Vitelli wrote toRamiro, this gentleman was not minded to divulge it. 

"If you have supped, Lampugnani, " said the Governor slowly, his eyesupon his offending officer, "perhaps you will find some duty to performere you seek your bed. "

Lampugnani turned crimson, and for a moment seemed to hesitate. Then herose. He was a man of choleric aspect, and that he served under Ramirodel' Orca was as much a danger to the Governor as to himself. He had notthe air of one whom it was wise to threaten in however veiled a manner. 

"Shall I fetch you this fellow's hat ere I sleep?" he inquired, withcontemptuous insolence. 

Not a word did Ramiro answer him, but his glance fastened uponLampugnani with an expression before which that impudent ruffian loweredhis own bold eyes. Thus for a moment; then with an awkward laugh tocover the intimidation that he felt, Lampugnani walked heavily from theroom and banged the door after him. 

There was about it all a strangeness that set my wits to work in amighty busy fashion. That work suffered interruption by the harsh voiceof Ramiro. 

"Are you resolved, Boccadoro?" he growled at me. "Have you decided forthe motley or the cord?"

Instantly I fell into the part I was to play. 

"Did I choose the latter, " said I, with an assumption of sudden airinessand such a grimace as was part and parcel of my old-time trade, "thenwere I truly worthy of the former, for I should have proved myself, indeed, a fool. Yet if I choose the former, I pray that you'll notfollow the same course of reasoning, and hold me worthy of the latter. "

When he had understood its subtleties; for his wits were of a qualitythat would have disgraced a calf, he roared at the conceit, andseemingly thrown into a better humour by the promise of more suchentertainment, he bade my guards release me, and urged me to assume themotley without more delay. 

What time I was obeying him my mind was returning to that matter ofLampugnani's words, and it is not difficult to understand how I shouldarrive at the only possible conclusion they suggested. The hats of theother messengers from Vitelli, that the officer had mentioned, had beenbrought to Ramiro. The reason for this that at once arose in my mindwas that within the messenger's hat there was a second and more secretcommunication for the Governor. 

This secrecy and Ramiro's display of anger at seeing a hint of itbetrayed by Lampugnani struck me, not unnaturally, as suspicious. Whatwere these hidden communications that passed between Vitellozzo Vitelliand the Governor of Cesena? It was a matter of which I could not pretendto offer a solution, but, nevertheless, it was one, I thought, thatpromised to repay investigation. 

Ramiro grew impatient, and my reflections suffered interruption by hisrough command that I should hasten. One of the men-at-arms helped me totruss my points, and when that was done I stepped forward--Boccadoro theFool once more. 

CHAPTER XVII. THE SENESCHAL

For an hour or so that night I played the Fool for Messer Ramiro'sentertainment in a manner which did high justice to the fame that atPesaro I had earned for the name of Boccadoro. 

Beginning with quip and jest and paradox, aimed now at him, now at theofficer who had remained to keep him company in his cups, now at theservants who ministered to him, now at the guards standing at attention, I passed on later to play the part of narrator, and I delighted his fouland prurient mind with the story of Andreuccio da Perugia and anotherof the more licentious tales of Messer Giovanni Boccacci. I crimson nowwith shame at the manner in which I set myself to pander to his moodthat with my wit I might defend my life and limbs, and preserve them forthe service of my Holy Flower of the Quince in the hour of her need. 

One man alone of all those present did I spare my banter. This was theold seneschal, Miriani. He stood at his post by the buffet, and ever andanon he would come forward to replenish Messer Ramiro's cup in obedienceto the monsters imperious orders. 

What fortitude was it, I wondered, that kept the old man outwardly socalm? His face was as the face of one who is dead, its features set andrigid, its colour ashen. But his step was tolerably firm, and his handseemed to have lost the trembling that had assailed it under the firstshock of the horror he had witnessed. 

As I watched him furtively I thought that were I Ramiro I should bewareof him. That frozen calm argued to me some terrible labour of the mindbeneath that livid mask. But the Governor of Cesena appeared insensible, or else he was contemptuous of danger from that quarter. It may evenhave delighted his outrageous nature to behold a man whose son he haddone to death with such brutality continue obedient and submissive tohis will, for it may have flattered his vanity by the concession thatbearing seemed to make to his grim power. 

An hour went by, my second tale was done, and I was now entrancingMesser Ramiro with some impromptu verses upon the divorce of GiovanniSforza, a theme set me by himself, when I was interrupted by the arrivalof a soldier, who entered unannounced. 

I paled and turned cold at the cry with which Ramiro rose to greet him, and the words he dropped, which told me that here was one of the ridersof the party that, under Lucagnolo, had been ordered to search thecountry about Cattolica. Had they found Madonna?

"Messer Lucagnolo, " the fellow announced, "has sent me to report to youthe failure of his search to the west and north of Cattolica. He hasbeaten the country thoroughly for three leagues of the town on those twosides, as you desired him, but unfortunately without result. He isnow spreading his search to the south, and not a house is being leftunvisited. By morning he hopes to report again to your Excellency. "

A wild wave of joy swept through my soul. They had ransacked the countrywest and north of Cattolica without result. Why then, assuredly, theyhad missed the peasant's hut that sheltered her, and where she waitedyet for my return. Their search to the south I knew would prove equallyfutile. I could have fallen on my knees in a prayer of thanksgiving hadmy surroundings been other than they were. 

Ramiro's eye wandered round to me and settled on me in a loweringglance. By his face it was plain that the message disappointed him. 

"I wonder, " said he, "whether we could make you talk?" And from me hiseyes roamed on to the instrument of torture at the end of that longchamber. I grew sick with fear, for if he were to do this thing, andmaim me by it, how should I avail myself or her hereafter?

"Excellency, " I cried, "since you met me you have hinted at somethingthat I am hiding from you, at something touching which I could give youinformation did I choose. What it may be passes all thought of mine. Butthis I do assure you: no torture could make me tell you what I do notknow, nor is any torture needed to extract from me such information as Imay be possessed of. I do but beg that you wilt frankly question me uponthis matter, whatever it may be, and your Excellency shall be answeredto the best of my knowledge. "

He looked at me as if taken aback a little by my assurance and theseemingly transparent candour of my speech, and in his face I saw thathe believed me. A moment he hesitated yet; then--

"I am seeking knowledge concerning Madonna Paolo di Santafior, " he saidpresently, resuming, as he spoke, his seat at table. "As I told you, thebody, which was believed to be dead, was stolen in the night from SanDomenico. Know you aught of this?"

It may be an ignoble thing to lie, but with what other weapon was I tofight this brigand? Surely if an exception can be made to the rule, anda lie become a meritorious thing, such an occasion as this would surelyjustify such an exception. 

"I know nothing, " I answered boldly, unhesitatingly, and even with aring of truth and sincerity that was calculated to convince, "nor canI even believe this rumour. It is a wild story. That the body has beenstolen may be true enough. Such things occur; though he was a bold manwho laid hands upon the body of a person of such importance. But thatshe lives--Gesu! that is an old wife's tale. I had, myself, the word ofthe Lord Filippo's physician that she was dead. "

"Nevertheless, this old wife's tale, as you dub it, is one of which Ihave had confirmation. Lend me your wits, Boccadoro, and you shallnot regret it. Exercise them now, and conjecture me who could haveabstracted the body from the church. In seeking this information I amacting in the interests of the noble House of Borgia which I serve andto which she was to have been allied, as you well know. "

I could have laughed to see how the apparent sincerity of my denial hadconvinced him to such an extent that he even sought my help to discoverthe true thief, and to account for his interest in the matter he lied tome of his service to the House of Borgia. 

"I will gladly lend you these wits, " said I, "to disprove to you therumour of which you say that you have confirmation. Let us accept thestatement that the body has been stolen. That much, no doubt, is true, for even rumours require some slight foundation. But who in all thisworld could say that when the body was taken it was not dead?Clearly but one man--he that administered the poison. And, I ask yourExcellency, would he be likely to tell the world what he had done?"

He might have answered me: "I am that man. " But he did not. Instead, hehung his head, as if pondering the words of wisdom I had uttered--wordsmeant to convince him of my own innocence in the matter; and this theyachieved, at least in part. He flashed me a look of sudden suspicion, itis true; but it faded almost as soon as it shone from his brooding eye. 

"Maybe I am a fool that I do not string you up and test the truth ofwhat you say, " he grumbled. "But I incline to believe you, and you are amerry rogue. You shall remain and have peace and comfort so long as youamuse me. But tremble if I discover that you have sought to deceive me. You shall have the cord first and other things after, and your deathshall be the thing you'll pray for long before it takes you from myvengeance. If you know aught, speak now and you shall find me merciful. Your life and liberty shall be the recompense of your honesty towardsme. "

"I repeat, Excellency, " I answered, without changing colour, "that allthat I know have I already told you. "

He was convinced, I think, for the time being. 

"Get you gone, then, " he bade me. "I have other business to deal withere I sleep. Mariani, see that Boccadoro is well lodged. "

The old man bowed, and lifting a torch from its socket, he silentlymotioned me to go with him. I made Messer Ramiro a profound obeisance, and withdrew in the wake of the seneschal. 

He led me up a flight of stairs that rose from the hall and along agallery that ran half round it, then plunging down a corridor he haltedpresently, and, opening a door, ushered me into a tolerably furnishedroom. 

A servant followed hanging the clothes that I had worn when I arrived. 

The old man lingered a moment after the servant had withdrawn, and hishollow eyes rested on me for a second. I thought that he was on thepoint of saying something, and I waited returning his glance with onethat quailed before the anguish of his own. I feared to speak, to offeran expression of the sympathy that filled my heart; for in that strangeplace I could not tell how far a man was to be trusted--even a man sowronged as this one. On his own part it may be that a like doubt besethim concerning me, for in the end he departed as he had come, no wordhaving passed his ashen lips. 

Left alone, I surveyed my surroundings by the light of the taper he hadleft in the iron sconce on the wall. The single window overlooked thecourtyard, so that even had I been disposed and able to cut through theiron that barred it, I should but succeed in falling into the hands ofthe guards who abounded in that nest of infamy. 

So that, for the night at least, the notion of flight must be abandoned. What the morrow would bring forth we must wait and see. Perhaps some wayof escape would offer itself. Then my thoughts returned to Paola, and Iwas tortured by surmises as to her fate, and chiefly as to how she couldhave eluded the search that must have been made for her in the hut whereI had left her. Had the peasant befriended her, I wondered; and whatdid she think of my protracted absence? I sat on the edge of the bed andgave rein to my conjectures. The noises in the castle had all ceased, and still I sat on, unconscious of time, my taper burning low. 

It may have been midnight when I was startled by the sound of a stealthystep in the corridor near my door. A heavy footfall I should have leftunheeded, but this soft tread aroused me on the instant, and I satlistening. 

It halted at my door, and was succeeded by a soft, scratching sound. Noiselessly I rose, and with ready hands I waited, prepared, in theinstinct of self-preservation, to fall upon the intruder, however futilethe act might be. But the door did not open as I expected. Instead, thescratching sound continued, growing slightly louder. Then it occurred tome, at last, that whoever came might be a friend craving admittance, andproceeding stealthily that others in the castle might not overhear him. 

Swiftly I crossed to the door, and opened. On the threshold a darkfigure straightened itself from a stooping posture, and the light of thetaper behind me fell on a face of a pallor that seemed to glisten in itsintensity. It was the face of Mariani, the seneschal of the Castle ofCessna. 

One glance we exchanged, and intuitively I seemed to apprehend themotive of this midnight visit. He came either to bring me aid or to seekmine, with vengeance for his guerdon. I stood aside, and silently heentered my room and closed the door. 

"Quench your taper, " he bade me in a husky whisper. 

Without hesitation I obeyed him, a strange excitement thrilling me. Fora second we stood in the dark, then another light gleamed as he pluckedaway the cloak that masked a lanthorn which he had brought with him. Heset the lanthorn on the floor, and held the cloak in his hand, readyat a moment's notice to conceal the light in its folds. Then pulling medown beside him on the bed, where he had perched himself:

"My friend, " said he, "it may be that I bring you assistance. "

"Speak, then, " I bade him. "You shall not find me slow to act if thereis the need or the way. "

"So I had surmised, " he said. "Are you not that same Boccadoro, Fool ofthe Court of Pesaro, who donned the Lord Giovanni's armour and rode outto do battle in his stead?"

I answered him that I was that man. 

"I have heard the tale, " said he. "Indeed, all Italy has heard it, andknows you for a man of steel, as strong and audacious as you are cunningand resourceful. I know against what desperate odds you fought that day, and how you overcame this terrible Ramiro. This it is that leads me tohope that in the service of your own ends you may become the instrumentof my vengeance. "

"Unfold your project, man, " I muttered, fiercely almost, in my burningeagerness. "Let me hear what you would have me do. "

He did not answer me until a sob had shaken his old frame. 

"That boy, " he muttered brokenly, "that golden-haired angel sent me forthe consolation of my decaying years, that lad whom Ramiro destroyed sofoully and wantonly, was my son. Futile though the attempt had proved, Ihad certainly set my hands at the tyrants neck, but that I founded hopeson you of a surer and more terrible revenge. That thought has manned meand upheld me when anguish was near to slaying me outright. To see theboy burn so under my very eyes! God of mercy and pity! That I shouldhave lived so long!"

"Your child burned but a moment, suffered but an instant; for thedeed, Ramiro will burn in Hell through countless generations, throughinterminable ages. "

It was a paltry consolation, perhaps, but it was the best that thenoccurred to me. 

"Meanwhile, " I begged him, "do you tell me what you would have me do. "

I urged him to it that he might, thereby, suffer his mind to rest amoment from pondering that ghastly thing that he had witnessed, thatscene that would live before his eyes until they closed in their lastsleep. 

"You heard Lampugnani quip Ramiro with the fact that three messengershave ridden desperately within the week from Citta di Castello toCesena, and you heard, perhaps, his obscure reference to the hat?"

"I heard both, and both I weighed, " said I. The old man looked at me asif surprised. 

"And what, " he asked, "was the conclusion you arrived at?"

"Why, simply this: that whilst the messenger bore some letter fromVitelli to Ramiro that should serve to lull the suspicions of any who, wondering at so much traffic between these two, should be moved to takea peep into those missives, the true letter with which the courier ridesis concealed within the lining of his hat--probably unknown even tohimself. "

He stared at me as though I had been a wizard. 

"Messer Boccadoro--" he began. 

"My name, " I corrected him, "is Biancomonte--Lazzaro Biancomonte. "

"Whatever be your name, " he returned, "of the quality of your wits therecan be no question. You have guessed for yourself the half of what I wascome to tell you. Has your shrewdness borne you any further? Have youconcluded aught concerning the nature of those letters?"

"I have concluded that it might repay some trouble to discover what iscontained in letters that are sent with so much secrecy. I can conceivenothing that might lie between the Lord of Citta di Castello and thisruffian of Cesena, and yet--treason lurks often where least it isexpected, and treason makes stranger bed-fellows than misfortune. "

"Lampugnani was no fool, and yet a great fool, " the old man murmured. Hesurmised what you have surmised. With each of the messengers Ramirohas dealt in the same manner. He has sent each to be fed and refreshedwhilst waiting to return with the answer he was penning. For theirrefreshment he has ordered a very full, stout wine--not drugged, forthat they might discover upon awaking; but a wine that of itself woulddo the work of setting them to sleep very soundly. Then, when all slept, and only he remained at table, like the drunkard that he is, it has beenhis habit to descend himself to the kitchen and possess himself ofthe messenger's hat. With this he has returned to the hall, opened thelining and withdrawn a letter. 

"Then, as I suppose, he has penned his answer, thrust it into thelining, where the other one had been, and secured it, as it was before, with his own hands. He has returned the hat to the place from whence hetook it, and when the courier awakens in the morning there is anotherletter put into his hand, and he is bidden to bear it to Vitelli. "

He paused a moment; then continued: "Lampugnani must have suspectedsomething and watched Ramiro to make sure that his suspicions were wellfounded. In that he was wise, but he was a fool to allow Ramiro to seewhat lie he had discovered. Already he has paid the penalty. He is lyingwith a dagger in his throat, for an hour ago Ramiro stabbed him while heslept. "

I shuddered. What a place of blood was this! Could it be that CesareBorgia had no knowledge of what things were being performed by hisGovernor of Cesena?

"Poor Lampugnani!" I sighed. "God rest his soul. "

"I doubt but he is in Hell, " answered Mariani, without emotion. "Hewas as great a villain as his master, and he has gone to answer for hisvillainy even as this ugly monster of a Ramiro shall. But let Lampugnanibe. I am not come to talk of him. 

"Returning from his bloody act, Ramiro ordered me to bed. I went, andas I passed Lampugnani's room I saw the door standing wide. It was thusthat I learnt what had befallen. I remembered his words concerning thehat and I remembered old suspicions of my own aroused by the thoughtof the potent wine which Ramiro had ordered me to see given to thecouriers. I sped back to the gallery that overlooks the hall. Ramiro wasabsent, and I surmised at once that he was gone to the kitchen. Then wasit that I thought of you and of what service you might render if thingswere indeed as I now more than suspected. Like an inspiration it came tome how I might prepare your way. I ran down to the hall, sweating inmy terror that he should return ere I had performed the task I went on. From the buffet I drew a flagon of that same stout wine that Ramiro usedupon his messengers. I ripped away the seal and crimson cord by which itis distinguished, and placing it on the table I removed the flagon I hadset for him before I had first departed. 

"Then I fled back to the gallery, and from the shadows I watched for hisreturn. Soon he came, bearing a hat in his hand; and from that hat hetook a letter, all as you have surmised. He read it, and I saw his facelighten with a fierce excitement. Then he helped himself freely to wine, and drank thirstily, for all that he was overladen with it. One of thequalities of this wine is that in quenching thirst it produces yet agreater. Ramiro drank again, then sat with the letter before him in thelight of the single taper I had left burning. Presently he grew sleepy. He shook himself and drank again. Then again he sat conning his epistle, and thus I left him and came hither in quest of you. "

There followed a pause. 

"Well?" I asked at length. "What is it you would have me do? Stab him ashe sleeps?"

He shook his head. "That were too sweet and sudden a death for him. Ifit had been no more than a matter of that, my old arms would have lentme strength enough. But think you it would repay me for having seen myboy pinned by that monster's pike to the burning logs?"

"What is it, then, you ask of me?"

"If that letter were indeed the treasonable document we account it; ifits treason should be aimed at Cesare Borgia--it could scarce be aimedat another--would it not be a sweet thing to obtain possession of it?"

"Aye, but when he wakes to-morrow and finds it gone--what then? You knowthis Governor of Cesena well enough to be assured that he would ransackthe castle, torture, rack, burn and flay us all until the missive wereforthcoming. "

"That, " he groaned, "is what deterred me. If I had the means of gettingthe letter sent to Cesare Borgia, or of escaping with it myself fromCesena, I should not have hesitated. Cesare Borgia is lying at Faenza, and I could ride there in a day. But it would be impossible for me toleave the place before morning. I have duties to perform in the town, and I might get away whilst I am about them, but before then the letterwill have been missed, and no one will be allowed to leave the citadel. "

"Why then, " said I, "the only hope lies in abstracting that letter insuch a manner that he shall not suspect the loss; and that seems a verydesperate hope. "

We sat in silence for some moments, during which I thought intently tolittle purpose. 

"Does he sleep yet, think you?" I asked presently. 

"Assuredly he must. "

"And if I were to go to the gallery, is there any fear that I should bediscovered by others?"

"None. All at Cesena are asleep by now. "

"Then, " said I, rising, "let us take a look at him. Who knows what maysuggest itself? Come. " I moved towards the door, and he took up hislanthorn and followed me, enjoining me to tread lightly. 

CHAPTER XVIII. THE LETTER

On tiptoe I crept down that corridor to the gallery above thebanqueting-hall, secure from sight in the enveloping darkness, andintent upon allowing no sound to betray my presence, lest Ramiro shouldhave awakened. Behind me, treading as lightly, came Messer Mariani. 

Thus we gained the gallery. I leaned against the stout oaken balustrade, and looked down into the black pit of the hall, broken in the centre bythe circle of light from the two tapers that burnt upon the table. Theother torches had all been quenched. 

At the table sat Messer Ramiro, his head fallen forward and sidewaysupon his right arm which was outstretched and limp along the board. Before him lay a paper which I inferred to be the letter whosepossession might mean so much. 

I could hear the old man breathing heavily beside me as I leaned therein the dark, and sought to devise a means by which that paper might beobtained. No doubt it would be the easiest thing in the world to snatchit away without disturbing him. But there was always to be consideredthat when he waked and missed the letter we should have to reckon withhis measures to regain possession of it. 

It became necessary, therefore, to go about it in a manner that shouldleave him unsuspicious of the theft. A little while I pondered this, deeming the thing desperate at first. Then an idea came to me on asudden, and turning to Mariani I asked him could he find me a sheet ofpaper of about the size of that letter held by Ramiro. He answered methat he could, and bade me wait there until he should return. 

I waited, watching the sleeper below, my excitement waxing with everysecond of the delay. Ramiro was snoring now--a loud, sonorous snore thatrang like a trumpet-blast through that vast empty hall. 

At last Mariani returned, bringing the sheet of paper I had asked for, and he was full of questions of what I intended. But neither the placenor the time was one in which to stand unfolding plans. Every momentwasted increased the uncertainty of the success of my design. Someonemight come, or Ramiro might awaken despite the potency of the wine hehad been given--for on so well-seasoned a toper the most potent of winescould have but a transient effect. 

So I left Mariani, and moved swiftly and silently to the head of thestaircase. 

I had gone down two steps, when, in the dark, I missed the third, thebells in my cap jangling at the shock. I brought my teeth together andstood breathless in apprehension, fearing that the noise might awakenhim, and cursing myself for a careless fool to have forgotten thoseinfernal bells. Above me I heard a warning hiss from old Mariani, which, if anything, increased my dread. But Ramiro snored on, and I wasreassured. 

A moment I stood debating whether I should go on, or first return todivest myself of that cap of mine. In the end I decided to pursue thelatter course. The need for swift and sudden movement might come ereI was done with this adventure, and those bells might easily be theundoing of me. So back I went to the surprise and infinite dismayof Mariani until I had whispered in his ear the reason. We retreatedtogether to the corridor, and there, with his help, I removed myjangling headgear, which I left him to restore to my chamber. 

Whilst he went upon that errand I returned once more on mine, and thistime I gained the foot of the stairs without mishap, and stood in thehall. Ramiro's back was towards me. On my right stood the tall buffetfrom which the boy had fetched him wine that evening; this I marked outas the cover to which I must fly in case of need. 

A second I stood hesitating, still considering my course; then I wentsoftly forward, my feet making no sound in the rushes of the floor. Ihad covered half the distance, and, growing bolder, I was advancing moreswiftly and with less caution, when suddenly my knee came in contactwith a three-legged stool that had been carelessly left where none wouldhave suspected it. The blow may have hurt afterwards, indeed, I wasconscious of a soreness at the knee; but at the moment I had no thoughtor care for physical pain. The bench went over with a crash, and for allthat the rushes may have deadened in part the sound of its fall, to mynervous ear it boomed like the report of a cannon through the stillnessof the place. 

I turned cold as ice, and the sweat of fear sprang out to moistenme from head to foot. Instantly I dropped on all fours, lest Ramiro, awaking suddenly, should turn; and I waited for the least sign thatshould render advisable my seeking the cover of the buffet. In thegallery above I could picture old Mariani clenching his teeth at thenoise, his knees knocking together, and his face white with horror; forRamiro's snoring had abruptly ceased. It came to an end with a chokingcatch of the breath, and I looked to see him raise his head and start upto ascertain what it was that had aroused him. But he never stirred, and for all that he no longer snored, his breathing continued heavy andregular, so that I was cheered by the assurance that I had but disturbedhis slumber, not dispelled it. 

Yet, since I had disturbed and lightened it, a greater precaution wasnow necessary, and I waited there for some ten minutes maybe, a periodthat must have proved a very eternity to the old man upstairs. At last Ihad the reward of hearing the snoring recommence; lightly at first, butsoon with all its former fullness. 

I rose and proceeded now with a caution that must guard me from anymore unlooked-for obstacles. Moreover, as I approached, the darkness wasdispelled more and more at every stride in the direction of the light. At last I reached the table, and stood silent as a spectre at Ramiro'sside, looking down upon the features of the sleeping man. 

His face was flushed, and his tawny hair tumbled about his damp brow;his lips quivered as he breathed. For a moment, as I stood gazing onhim, there was murder in my mind. His dagger hung temptingly in hisgirdle. To have drawn it and rid the world of this monster might havebeen a worthy deed, acceptable in the eyes of Heaven. But how shouldit profit me? Rather must it prove my destruction at the hands of hisfollowers, and to be destroyed just then, with Paola depending upon me, and life full of promise once I regained my liberty, was something I hadno mind to risk. 

My eyes wandered to the letter lying on the table. If this were of thenature we suspected, it should prove a safer tool for his destruction. 

To read it as it lay was an easy matter, and it came to me then thatere I decided upon my course it might be well that I should do so. Ifby chance it were innocent of treason, why, then, I might resort to therisk of that other and more desperate weapon--his own dagger. 

At the foot of the short flight of steps that led from the hall to thecourtyard I could hear the slow pacing of the sentry placed there byRamiro. But unless he were summoned, it was extremely unlikely that thefellow would leave his post, so that, I concluded, I had little to fearfrom that quarter. I drew back and taking up a position behind Ramiro'schair--a position more favourable to escape in the untoward event ofhis awaking--I craned forward to read the letter over his shoulder. Ithanked God in that hour for two things: that my sight was keen, andthat Vitellozzo Vitelli wrote a large, bold hand. 

Scarcely breathing, and distracted the while by the mad racing of mypulses, I read; and this, as nearly as I can remember, is what theletter contained:

"ILLUSTRIOUS RAMIRO--Your answer to my last letter reached mesafely, and it rejoiced me to learn that you had found a man for ourundertaking. See that you have him in readiness, for the hour of actionis at hand. Cesare goes south on the second or third day of the NewYear, and he has announced to me his intention of passing through Cesenaon his way, there to investigate certain charges of maladministrationwhich have been preferred against you. These concern, in particular, certain misappropriation of grain and stores, and an excessive severityof rule, of which complaints have reached him. From this you will gatherthat out of a spirit of self-defence, if not to earn the reward whichwe have bound ourselves to pay you, it is expedient that you should notfail us. The occasion of the Duke's visit to Cesena will be, of all, themost propitious for our purpose. Have your arbalister posed, and may Godstrengthen his arm and render true his aim to the end that Italy maybe rid of a tyrant. I commend myself to your Excellency, and I shallanxiously await your news. 

"VITELLOZZO VITELLI. "

Here indeed were my hopes realised. A plot there was, and it aimed atnothing less than the Duca Valentino's life. Let that letter be borne toCesare Borgia at Faenza, and I would warrant that within a dozen hoursof his receipt of it he would so dispose that all who had suffered bythe cruel tyranny of Ramiro del' Orca would be avenged, and thosewho were still suffering would be relieved. In this letter lay my ownfreedom and the salvation of Madonna Paula, and this letter it behovedme at once to become possessed. It was a safer far alternative than thatdagger of his. 

A moment I stood pondering the matter for the last time, then steppingsideways and forward, so that I was again beside him, I put out my handand swiftly whipped the letter from the table. Then standing very still, to prevent the slightest rustle, I remained a second or two observinghim. He snored on, undisturbed by my light-fingered action. 

I drew away a pace or two, as lightly as I might, and folding the letterI thrust it into my girdle. Then from my open doublet I drew the sheetthat Mariani had supplied me, and, advancing again, I placed it on thetable in a position almost identical with that which the original hadoccupied, saving that it was removed a half-finger's breadth from hishand, for I feared to allow it actually to touch him lest it shouldarouse him. 

Holding my breath, for now was I come to the most desperate part of myundertaking, I caught up one of the tapers and set fire to a corner ofthe sheet. That done, I left the candle lying on its side againstthe paper, so as to convey the impression to him, when presently heawakened, that it had fallen from it sconce. Then, without waiting formore, I backed swiftly away, watching the progress of the flames as theydevoured the paper and presently reached his hand and scorched it. 

At that I dropped again on all fours, and having gained the corner ofthe buffet, I crouched there, even as with a sudden scream of pain hewoke and sprang upright, shaking his blistered hand. As a matter ofinstinct he looked about to see what it was had hurt him. Then his eyesfell upon the charred paper on the table, and the fallen candle, whichwas still burning across one end of it, and even to the dull wits ofRamiro del' Orca the only possible conclusion was suggested. He staredat it a moment, then swept that flimsy sheet of ashes from the tablewith an oath, and sank back once more into his great leathern chair. 

"Body of God!" he swore aloud, "it is well that I had read it a dozentimes. Better that it should have been burnt than that someone shouldhave read it whilst I slept. "

The idea of such a possibility seemed to rouse him to fresh action, forseizing the fallen candle and replacing it in its socket, he rose oncemore, and holding it high above his head he looked about the hall. 

The light it shed may have been feeble, and the shadows about my buffetthick; but, as I have said, my doublet was open, and some ray of thatweak candlelight must have found out the white shirt that was showingat my breast, for with a sudden cry he pushed back his chair and took astep towards me, no doubt intent upon investigating that white somethingthat he saw gleaming there. 

I waited for no more. I had no fancy to be caught in that corner, utterly at his mercy. I stood up suddenly. 

"Magnificent, it is I, " I announced, with a calm and boundlesseffrontery. 

The boldness of it may have staggered him a little, for he paused, although his eyes were glowing horribly with the frenzy that possessedhim, the half of which was drunkenness, the other fear and wrath lest Ishould have seen his treacherous communication from Vitelli. 

"What make you here?" he questioned threateningly. 

"I thirsted, Excellency, " I answered glibly. "I thirsted, and Ibethought me of this buffet where you keep your wine. "

He continued to eye me, some six paces off, his half-drunken wits nodoubt weighing the plausibility of my answer. At last--

"If that be all, what cause had you to hide?" he asked me shrewdly. 

"One of your candles fell over and awakened you, " said I. "I feared youmight resent my presence, and so I hid. "

"You came not near the table?" he inquired. "You saw nothing of thepaper that I held? Nay, by the Host! I'll take no risks. You were born'neath an unlucky star, fool; for be your reason for your presence hereno more than you assert, you have come in a season that must be fatal toyou. "

He set the candle on the table, then carrying his hand to his girdle hewithdrew it sharply, and I caught the gleam of a dagger. 

In that instant I thought of Mariani waiting above, and like a flash itcame to me that if I could outpace this drunken brigand, and, gainingthe gallery well ahead of him, transfer that letter to the old man'shands, I should not die in vain. Cesare Borgia would avenge me, andMadonna Paola, at least, would be safe from this villain. If Marianicould reach Valentino at Faenza, I would answer for it that withinfour-and-twenty hours Messer Ramiro del' Orca would be the banner onthat ghastly beam that he facetiously dubbed his flagstaff; and he wouldbe the blackest, dirtiest banner that ever yet had fluttered there. 

The thought conceived in the twinkling of an eye, I acted upon withouta second's hesitation. Ere Ramiro had taken his first step towards me, I had sprung to the stairs and I was leaping up them with the franticspeed of one upon whose heels death is treading closely. 

A singular, fierce joy was blent with my measure of fear; a joy at thethought that even now, in this extremity, I was outwitting him, fornever a doubt had he that the burnt paper he had found on the table wasall that was left of Vitelli's letter. His fears were that I might haveread it, but never a suspicion crossed his mind of such a trick as I hadplayed upon him. 

So I sped on, the gigantic Ramiro blundering after me, panting andblaspheming, for although powerful, his bulk and the wine he had takenleft him no nimbleness. The distance between us widened, and if onlyMariani would have the presence of mind to wait for me at the mouth ofthe passage, all would be as I could wish it before his dagger found myheart. 

I was assuring myself of this when in the dark I stumbled, andstriking my legs against a stair I hurtled forward. I recovered almostimmediately, but, in my frenzy of haste to make up for the instant lost, I stumbled a second time ere I was well upon my feet. 

With a roar Ramiro must have hurled himself forward, for I felt my anklecaught in a grip from which there was no escaping, and I was roughly andbrutally dragged back and down those stairs; now my head, now my breastbeating against the steps as I descended them one by one. 

But even in that hour the letter was my first thought, and I found a wayto thrust it farther under my girdle so that it should not be seen. 

At last I reached the hall, half-stunned, and with all the misery ofdefeat and the certainty of the futility of my death to further torturemy last moments. Over me stood Ramiro, his dagger upheld, ready tostrike. 

"Dog!" he taunted me, "your sands are run. "

"Mercy, Magnificent, " I gasped. "I have done nothing to deserve yourponiard. "

He laughed brutally, delaying his stroke that he might prolong my agonyfor his drunken entertainment. 

"Address your prayers to Heaven, " he mocked me, "and let them concernyour soul. "

And then, like a flash of inspiration came the words that should delayhis hand. 

"Spare me, " I cried "for I am in mortal sin. "

Impious, abandoned villain, though he was, he said too much when heboasted that he feared neither God nor Devil. He was prone to forgethis God, and the lessons that as a babe he had learnt at his mother'sknee--for I take it that even Ramiro del' Orca had once been a babe--butdeep down in his soul there had remained the fear of Hell and an almostinstinctive obedience to the laws of Mother Church. He could performsuch ruthless cruelties as that of hurling a page into the fire topunish his clumsiness; he could rack and stab and hang men with theleast shadow of compunction or twinge of conscience, but to slay a manwho professed himself to be in mortal sin was a deed too appalling evenfor this ruthless butcher. 

He hesitated a second, then he lowered his hand, his face telling meclearly how deeply he grudged me the respite which, yet, he dared not doother than accord me. 

"Where shall I find me a priest?" he grumbled. "Think you the Citadel ofCesena is a monastery? I will wait while you make an act of contritionfor your sins. It is all the shrift I can afford you. And get it done, for it is time I was abed. You shall have five minutes in which to clearyour soul. "

By this it seemed to me--as it may well seem to you--that matters werebut little mended, and instead of employing the respite he accorded mein the pious collecting of thoughts which he enjoined, I sat up--verysore from my descent of the stairs--and employed those precious momentsin putting forward arguments to turn him from, his murderous purpose. 

"I have lived too ungodly a life, " I protested, "to be able to squeezeinto Paradise through so narrow a tate. As you would hope for your ownultimate salvation, Excellency, I do beseech you not to imperil mine. "

This disposed him, at least, to listen to me, and proceeded to assurehim of the harmless nature of my visit to the hall in quest of wine toquench my thirst. I was running the grave risk of dying with lies on mylips, but I was too desperate to give the matter thought just then. Hismood seemed to relent; the delay, perhaps, had calmed his first accessof passion, and he was grown more reasonable. But when Ramiro cooled hewas, perhaps, more malignant than ever, for it meant a return tonatural condition, and Ramiro's natural condition was one of crueltyunsurpassed. 

"It may be as you say, " he answered me at last, sheathing his dagger, "and at least you have my word that I will not slay you without firstassuring myself that you have lied. For to-night you shall remain indurance. To-morrow we will apply the question to you. "

The hope that had been reviving in my breast fell dead once more, andI turned cold at that threat. And yet, between now and to-morrow, much might betide, and I had cause for thankfulness, perhaps, for thisrespite. Thus I sought to cheer myself. But I fear I failed. To-morrowhe would torture me, not so much to ascertain whether I had spokentruly, but because to his diseased mind it afforded diversion to witnessa man's anguish. No doubt it was that had urged him now to spare my lifeand accord me this merciless piece of mercy. 

In a loud voice he called the sentry who was pacing below; and in amoment the man appeared in answer to that summons. 

"You will take this knave to the chamber set apart for him up there, andyou will leave him secure under lock and bar, bringing me the key of hisdoor. "

The fellow informed himself which was the chamber, then turning to me hecurtly bade me go with him. Thus was I haled back to my room, with thepromise of horrors on the morrow, but with the night before me in whichto scheme and pray for some miracle that might yet save me. But the daysof miracles were long past. I lay on my bed and deplored with many asigh that bitter fact. And if aught had been wanting to increase theweight of fear and anguish on my already over-burdened mind, and to aidin what almost seemed an infernal plot to utterly distract me, I had itin fresh, wild conjectures touching Madonna Paola. Where indeed couldshe be that Ramiro's men had failed to find her for all that they hadscoured that part of the country in which I had left her to wait for myreturn? What if, by now, worse had befallen her than the capture withwhich Ramiro's lieutenant was charged?

With such doubts as these to haunt me, fretted as I was by my utterinability to take a step in her service, I lay. There for an hour orso in such agony of mind as is begotten only of suspense. In my girdlestill reposed the treasonable letter from Vitelli to Ramiro, a mightyweapon with which to accomplish the butcher's overthrow. But how was Ito wield it imprisoned here?

I wondered why Mariani had not returned, only to remember that thesoldier who had locked me in had carried the key of my prison-chamber toRamiro. 

Suddenly the stillness was disturbed by a faint tap at my door. Myinstincts and my reason told me it must be Mariani at last. In aninstant I had leapt from the bed and whispered through the keyhole:

"Who is there?"

"It is I--Mariani--the seneschal, " came the old man's voice, verysoftly, but nevertheless distinctly. "They have taken the key. "

I groaned, then in a gust of passion I fell to cursing Ramiro for thatprecaution. 

"You have the letter?" came Mariani's voice again. 

"Aye, I have it still, " I answered. 

"Have you seen what it contains?"

"A plot to assassinate the Duke--no less. Enough to get this bloodyRamiro broken on the wheel. "

I was answered by a sound that was as a gasp of malicious joy. Then theold man's voice added:

"Can you pass it under the door? There is a sufficient gap. "

I felt, and found that he was right; I could pass the half of my handunderneath. I took the letter and thrust it through. His hands fastenedon it instantly, almost snatching it from my fingers before they wereready to release it. 

"Have courage, " he bade me. "Listen. I shall endeavour to leave Cesenain the morning, and I shall ride straight for Faenza. If I find the Dukethere when I arrive, he should be here within some twelve or fourteenhours of my departure. Fence with Ramiro, temporise if you can tillthen, and all will be well with you. "

"I will do what I can, " I answered him. "But if he slays me in themeantime, at least I shall have the satisfaction of knowing that he willnot be long in following me. "

"May God shield you, " he said fervently. 

"May God speed you, " I answered him, with a still greater fervour. 

That night, as you may well conceive, I slept but little, and thatlittle ill. The morning, instead of relieving the fears that in thedarkness had been with me, seemed to increase them. For now was the timefor Mariani to act, and I was fearful as to how he might succeed. Iwas full of doubts lest some obstacle should have arisen to prevent hisdeparture from Cesena, and I spent my morning in wearisome speculation. 

I took an almost childish satisfaction in the thought that since, beinga prisoner, I could no longer count myself the Fool of the Courtof Cesena, I was free to strip the motley and assume the more sobergarments in which I had been taken, and which--as you may recall--hadbeen placed in my chamber on the previous evening. It was the veryplainest raiment. For doublet I wore a buff brigandine, quilted anddagger-proof, and caught at the waist by a girdle of hammered steel; mywine-coloured hose was stout and serviceable, as were my long boots ofuntanned leather. Yet prouder was I of this sober apparel than ever kingof his ermine. 

It may have been an hour or so past noon when, at last, my solitudewas invaded by a soldier who came to order me into the presence of theGovernor. I had been sitting at the window, leaning against the bars andlooking out at the desolate white landscape, for there had been a heavyfall of snow in the night, which reminded me--as snow ever did--of myfirst meeting with Madonna Paola. 

I rose upon the instant, and my fears rose with me. But I kept a boldfront as I went down into the hall, where Ramiro and the blackguards ofhis Court were sitting, with three or four men-at-arms at attention bythe door. Close to the pulleys appertaining to the torture of the cordstood two leather-clad ruffians--Ramiro's executioners. 

At the head of the board, which was still strewn with fragments offood-for they had but dined--sat Ramiro del' Orca. With him were halfa dozen of his officers, whose villainous appearance pronounced themworthy of their brutal leader. The air was heavy with the pungent odourof viands. I looked round for Mariani, and I took some comfort from thefact that he was absent. Might heaven please that he was even then onhis way to Faenza. 

Ramiro watched my advance with a smile in which mockery was blent withsatisfaction, for all that of the resumption of my proper raiment heseemed to take no heed. No doubt he had dined well, and he was nowdisposing himself to be amused. 

"Messer Bocadaro, " said he, when I had come to a standstill, "there waslast night a matter that was not cleared up between us and concerningwhich I expressed an intention of questioning you to-day. I shouldproceed to do so at once, were it not that there is yet another matteron which I am, if possible, still more desirous you should tell us allyou know. Once already have you evaded my questions with answers whichat the time I half believed. Even now I do not say that I utterlydisbelieve them, but I wish to assure myself that you told the truth;for if you lied, why then we may still be assisted by such informationthe cord shall squeeze from you. I am referring to the mysteriousdisappearance of Madonna Paola di Santafior--a disappearance of whichyou have assured me that you knew nothing, being even in ignorance ofthe fact that the lady was not really dead. I had confidently expectedthat the party searching for Madonna Paola would have succeeded ere thisin finding her. But this morning my hopes suffered disappointment. Mymen have returned empty-handed once more. "

"For which mercy may Heaven be praised!" I burst out. 

He scowled at me; then he laughed evilly. 

"My men have returned--all save three. Captain Lucagnolo with two ofhis followers, has undertaken to go beyond the area I appointed for thesearch, and to proceed to the village of Cattolica. While he is pursuinghis inquiries there, I have resolved to pursue my own here. I nowcall upon you, Boccadoro, to tell us what you know of Madonna Paola'swhereabouts. "

"I know nothing, " I answered stoutly. "I am prepared to take oath that Iknow nothing of her whereabouts. "

"Tell me, then, at least, " said he, "where you bestowed her. "

I shook my head, pressing my lips tight. 

"Do you think that I would tell you if I had the knowledge?" was thescornful question with which I answered him. "You may pursue yourinquiries as you will and where you will, but I pray God they may allprove as futile as must those that you would pursue here and upon my ownperson. "

This was how I fenced with him, this was the manner in which I followedMariani's sound advice that I should temporise! Oh! I know that my wordswere the words of a fool, yet no fear that Ramiro would inspire me couldhave restrained them. 

There was a murmur at the table, and his fellows turned their eyes onRamiro to see how he would receive this bearding. He smiled quietly, andraising his hand he made a sign to the executioners. 

Rude hands seized me from behind, and the doublet was torn from my backby fingers that never paused to untruss my points. 

They turned me about, and hurried me along until I stood under thepulleys of the torture, and one of the men held me securely whilstthe other passed the cords about my wrists. Then both the executionersstepped back, to be ready to hoist me at the Governor's signal. 

He delayed it, much as an epicure delays the consumption of a delectablemorsel, heightening by suspense the keen desire of his palate. Hewatched me closely, and had my lips quivered or my eyelids fluttered, hewould have hailed with joy such signs of weakness. But I take pride intruthfully writing that I stood bold and impassively before him, and ifI was pale I thank Heaven that pallor was the habit of my countenance, so that from that he could gather no satisfaction. And standing there, Igave him back look for look, and waited. 

"For the last time, Boccadoro, " he said slowly, attempting by wordsto shake a demeanour that was proof against the impending facts ofthe cord, "I ask you to remember what must be the consequences of thisstubbornness. If not at the first hoist, why then at the second or thethird, the torture will compel you to disclose what you may know. Wouldyou not be better advised to speak at once, while your limbs are soundlyplanted in their sockets, rather than let yourself be maimed, perhapsfor life, ere you will do so?"

There was a stir of hoofs without. They thundered on the planks of thedrawbridge and clattered on the stones of the courtyard. The thought ofCesare Borgia rose to my mind. But never did drowning man clutch ata more illusory straw. Cold reason quenched my hope at once. If thegreatest imaginable success attended Mariani's journey, the Duke couldnot reach Cesena before midnight, and to that it wanted some ten hoursat least. Moreover, the company that came was small to judge by thesound--a half-dozen horses at the most. 

But Ramiro's attention had been diverted from me by the noise. Half-turning in his chair, he called to one of the men-at-arms toascertain who came. Before the fellow could do his bidding, the door wasthrust open and Lucagnolo appeared on the threshold, jaded and worn withhard riding. 

A certain excitement arose in me at sight of him, despite my confidencethat he must be returning empty-handed. 

Ramiro rose, pushed back his chair and advanced towards the new-comer. 

"Well?" he demanded. "What news?"

"Excellency, the girl is here. "

That answer seemed to turn me into stone, so great was the shock of thissudden shattering of the confidence that had sustained me. 

"My search in the country failing, " pursued the captain, as he cameforward, "I made bold to exceed your orders by pushing my inquiries asfar as the village of Cattolica. There I found her after some littlelabour. "

Surely I dreamt. Surely, I told myself, this was not possible. There wassome mistake. Lucagnolo had drought some wench whom he believed to beMadonna Paola. 

But even as I was assuring myself of this, the door opened again, andbetween two men-at-arms, white as death, her garments stained with mudand all but reduced to rags, and her eyes wild with a great fear, camemy beloved Paola. 

With a sound that was as a grunt of satisfaction, Ramiro strode forwardto meet her. But her eyes travelled past him and rested upon me, standing there between the leather-clad executioners with the cords ofthe torture pinioning my wrists, and I saw the anguish deepen in theirblue depths. 

CHAPTER XIX. DOOMED

Across the length of that hall our eyes met--hers and mine--and heldeach other's glances. To me the room and all within it formed anindistinct and misty picture, from out of which there clearly gleamed myPaola's sweet, white face. 

All at the table had risen with Ramiro, and now, copying their leader, they bared their heads in outward token of such respect as certainlywould have been felt by any men less abandoned than were they before somuch saintly beauty and distress. 

Lucagnolo had stepped aside, and Ramiro was now bowing low andceremoniously before Madonna. His face I could not see, since his backwas towards me, but his tones, as they floated across the hall to whereI stood, came laden with subservience. 

"Madonna, I give praise and thanks to Heaven for this, " said he. "I wasafflicted by the gravest misgivings for your safety, and I am more thanthankful to behold you safe and sound. "

There was a hypocritical flavour of courtliness about his words, anda mincing of his tones that suggested the efforts of a bull-calf toimitate the warbling of a throstle. 

Madonna paid him no heed; indeed, she appeared not to have heard him, for her eyes continued to look past him and at me. At last her lipsparted, and although she scarcely seemed to raise her voice above awhisper, the word uttered reached my ears across the stillness of thegreat room, and the word was "Lazzaro!"

At mention of my name, and at the tone in which it was uttered--a tonethat betrayed same measure of what was in her heart--Ramiro wheeledsharply in my direction, his brows wrinkling. A certain craftiness hehad, for all that I ever accounted him the dullest-witted clod that everrose to his degree of honour. He must have realised how expedient it wasthat in all he did he should present himself to Madonna in a favouritelight. 

"Release him, " he bade the executioners that held me, and in an instantI was set free. The order given, he turned again to Madonna. 

"You have been torturing him, " she cried, and her words were hard andfierce, her eyes blazing. "You shall repent it, Ser Ramiro. The LordCesare Borgia shall hear of it. "

Her anger betrayed her more and more, and however hidden it may havebeen to her, to me it was exceeding clear that she was encompassing mydestruction. Ramiro laughed easily. 

"Madonna, you are at fault. We have not been torturing him, though Iconfess that we were on the point of putting him to the question. Butyour timely arrival has saved his limbs, for the question we were askinghim concerned your whereabouts!"

I would have shouted to her to be wary how she answered him, for somepremonition how he was about to trick her entered my mind. But realisingthe futility of such a course, I held my peace and waited agonisedly. 

"You had tortured him in vain then, " she answered scornfully. "ForLazzaro Biancomonte would never have betrayed me. Nor could he havebetrayed me if he would, for after your men had searched the hut inwhich I was hidden, I walked to Cattolica thinking foolishly that Ishould be safer there. "

Lackaday! She had told him the very thing he had sought to know. Yet tomake doubly sure he pursued the scent a little farther. 

"Indeed it seems to me that had I tortured him I had given him nomore than he deserved for having abandoned you in that hut. Madonna, Itremble to think of the harm that might have come to you through thatknave's desertion. " And he scowled across at me, much as the Phariseemight have scowled upon the publican. 

"He is no knave, " she answered, and I could have groaned to hear herworking my undoing, though not by so much as a sign might I inspire herwith caution, for that sign must have been seen by others. "Nor did heabandon me. He left me only to go in quest of the necessaries for ourjourney. If harm has come to me the blame of it must not rest on him. "

"Of what harm do you speak, Madonna?" he cried, in a voice laden withconcern. 

"Of what harm, " she echoed, eyeing him with a scorn that would haveslain him had he any manhood left. "Of what harm? Mother of Mercy, defend me! Do you ask the question? What greater harm could have cometo me than to have fallen into the hands of Ramiro del' Orca and hisbrigands?"

He stood looking at her, and I doubt not that his face was a verypicture of simulated consternation. 

"Surely, Madonna, you do not understand that we are your friends, thatyou can so abuse us. But you will be faint, Madonna, " he cried, witha fresh and deep solicitude. "A cup of wine. " And he waved his handtowards the table. 

"It would poison me, I think, " she answered coldly. 

"You are cruel, and--alas!--mistrustful, " said he. "Can you guessnothing of the anxiety that has been mine these two days, of the fearsthat have haunted me as I thought of you and your wanderings?"

Her lip curled, and her face took on some slight vestige of colour. Herspirit was a thing for which I might then have come to love her had itnot been that already I loved her to distraction. 

"Yes, " said she, "I can guess something of your dismay when you foundyour schemes frustrated; when you found that you had come too late toSan Domenico. "

"Will you not forgive me that shift to which my adoration drove me?" heimplored, in a honeyed voice--and a more fearful thing than Ramiro thebutcher was Ramiro the lover. 

At that scarcely covert avowal of his passion she recoiled a step as shemight before a thing unclean. The little colour faded from her cheek, the scorn departed from her lip, and a sickly, deadly fear overspreadher lovely face. God! that I should stand there and witness this insultto the woman I adored and worshipped with a fervour that the Churchseeks to instil into us for those about the throne of Heaven. It mightnot be. A blind access of fury took me. Of the consequences I thoughtnothing. Reason left me utterly, and the slight hope that might lie intemporising was disregarded. 

Before those about me could guess my purpose, or those others, tooengrossed in the scene at the far end of the hall, could intervene, Ihad sprung from between the executioners and dashed across the spacethat separated me from the Governor of Cesena. One well-aimed blow, andthere should be an end to Messer Ramiro. That was the only thought thatfound room in my disordered mind. 

One or two there were who cried out as I sped past them, swift as thehound when it speeds after the fleeing hare. But I was upon Ramiro ereany could have sufficiently mastered his surprise to interfere. 

By the nape of his great neck I caught him from behind, and setting myknee at his spine I wrenched him backward, and so flung him over onthe floor. Down I went with him, my hand reaching for the dagger at hisjewelled girdle, and I had found and drawn it in that swift action ofmine ere he had bethought him of his hands. Up it flashed and down. Isank it through the crimson velvet of his rich doublets straight at thespot where his heart should be--if he were so human as to have a heart. The next instant I turned cold and sick. My desperate effort had beenall for nothing. In my hand I was left with the bronze hilt of his greatponiard; the blade had broken off against the mesh of steel the cowardwore beneath his finery. 

There was a rush of feet about us, a piercing scream from Madonna Paola, and it was to her that I owed my life in that grim moment. A dozenblades were naked and would have transfixed me as I lay, but that shecovered my body with her own and bade them strike at me through her. 

A moment later and the powerful hands of the Governor of Cesena were atmy throat. I was lifted and tossed aside, as though I had been a houndand he the bull I had beset. And as he swung me over and crushed meto the ground, he knelt above me and grinned horribly into my purplingface. 

A second we stayed so, and I thought indeed that my hour was come, whensuddenly I felt the blood in my head released once more. He had takenhis hands from my throat. He seized me now by the collar and dragged merudely to my feet. 

"Take this knave and lock him in his chamber, " he bade a couple of hisbravi. "I may have need of him ere he dies. "

"Messer Ramiro, " came the interceding voice of Madonna Paola, "what hedid, he did for me. You will not let him die for it?"

There was a pause during which he looked at her, whilst the men wereroughly dragging me across the hall. 

"Who knows, Madonna?" he said, with a bow and an infernal smile. "If youwere to beg his life, it might even come to pass that I might spare it. "

He did not wait for her answer, but stepping after me he called to themen that led me. In obedience they halted, and he came forward. We werenow at the foot of the staircase. 

"Boccadoro, " said he, planting himself before me, and eyeing me witheyes that were very full of malice, "you will recall the punishment Ipromised you if I came to discover it was you had thwarted me in Pesaro. It is the second time you have fooled Ramiro del' Orca. There does notlive the man who can boast that he did it thrice, nor will I risk itthat you be that man. Make your peace with Heaven, for at sunset--inan hour's time--you hang. There is one little thing that might save youeven yet, and if you find life sweet, you would do well to pray thatthat little thing may come to pass. "

I answered him nothing, but I bowed my head in token that I had heardand he signed to the men to proceed with me, whilst turning on his heelhe stepped down the hall again to where Madonna Paola, overcome withweakness, had sunk upon a stool. 

As I was leaving the gallery I had a last glimpse of her, sitting therewith drawn face and haggard eyes that followed me as I passed from hersight, whilst Ramiro del' Orca stood beside her murmuring words that didnot reach me. His so-called courtiers and his men-at-arms were troopingout of the room, no doubt in obedience to his dismissal. 

CHAPTER XX. THE SUNSET

I have heard tell of the calm that comes upon brave men when hope isdead and their doom has been pronounced. Uncertainty may have torturedand made cowards of them; but once that uncertainty is dissolved andsuspense is at an end, resignation enters their soul, and, possessingit, gives to their bearing a noble and dignified peace. By the mercy ofHeaven they are made, maybe, to see how poor and evanescent a thing islife; and they come to realise that since to die is a necessity there isno avoiding, as well might it betide to-day as ten years hence. 

Such a mood, however, came not to soothe that last hour of mine, and yetI account myself no coward. It was an hour of such torture and anguishas never before I had experienced--much though I had undergone--and thesource of all my suffering lay in the fact that Madonna Paola was inthe hands of the ogre of Cesena. Had it not been for that most untowardcircumstance I almost believe that while I waited for the sun to set onthat December afternoon, my mood had not only been calm but even in somemeasure joyous, for it must have comforted my last moments to reflectthat for all that Messer Ramiro was about to hang me, yet had I sown theseeds of his own destruction ere he had brought me to this pass. 

I did, indeed, reflect upon it, and it may even be that, in spite ofall, I culled some grain of comfort from the reflection. But let thatbe. My narrative would drag wearily were I to digress that I might tellyou at length the ugly course of my thoughts whilst the sands of my lasthour were running swiftly out. For, after all, my concern and yours iswith the story of Lazzaro Biancomonte, sometime known as Boccadoro theFool, and not with his philosophies--philosophies so unprofitable thatit can benefit no man that I should set them down. 

My windows faced west, and so I was able to watch the fall of the sun, and measure by its shortening distance from the horizon the ebbing ofmy poor life. At last the nether rim of that round, fiery orb was onthe point of touching the line of distant hills, and it was casting acrimson glow along the white, snow-sheeted landscape that was singularlysuggestive of a tide of blood--a very fitting tide to flow and ebb aboutthe walls of the Castle of Cesena. 

One little thing there was might save me, Ramiro had said. But I hadshut the thought out of my mind to keep me from utter distraction. Theonly little thing in which I held that my salvation could lie would bein the miraculous arrival of Cesare Borgia, and of that not the faintesthope existed. If the greatest luck attended Mariani's errand and thegreatest speed were made by the Duke once he received the letter, hecould not reach Cesena in less than another eight hours. And anothereight minutes, to reckon by the swift sinking of the sun would see thetime appointed for my hanging. I thought of Joshua in that grim hour, and in a mood that approached the whimsical I envied him his gift. If Icould have stayed the setting of the sun, and held it where it was tillmidnight, all might yet be well if Mariani had been diligent and Cesareswift. 

The key grating in the lock put an end to my vague musings, and remindedme of the fact that I had neglected to employ that last hour as wouldhave become a good son of Mother Church. For an instant I believe thatmy heart turned me to thoughts of God, and sent up a prayer for mercyfor my poor sinful soul. Then the door swung wide. Two halberdiers anda carnifex in his odious leathern apron stood before me. Clearly Ramirosought to be exact, and to have me hanging the instant the sun shouldvanish. 

"It is time, " said one of the soldiers, whilst the executioner, steppinginto my chamber, pinioned my wrists behind me, and retaining hold of thecord bade me march. He followed, holding that slender cord, and so, likea beast to the shambles, went I. 

Once more they led me into the hall, where the shadows were lengtheningin dark contrast to the splashes of sunlight that lingered on the floor, and whose blood-red hue was deepened by the gules of the windows throughwhich it was filtered. 

Ramiro was waiting for me, and six of his officers were in attendance. But, for once, there were no men-at-arms at hand. On a chair, the oneusually occupied by Ramiro, himself, sat Madonna Paola, still in hertorn and bedraggled raiment, her face white, her eyes wild as they hadbeen when first she had been haled into Ramiro's presence, some twohours ago, and her features so rigidly composed that it told the tale ofthe awful self-control she must be exerting--a self-control that mightend with a sudden snap that would plunge her into madness. 

A wild rage possessed me at sight of her. Let Ramiro be ruthless andcruel where men were concerned; that was a thing for which forgivenessmight be found him. But that he should submit a lady, delicatelynurtured as was Madonna, to such horrors as she had undergone since shehad awakened from his sleeping-potion in the Church of San Domenico, wassomething for which no Hell could punish him condignly. 

Ramiro met me with a countenance through the assumed gravity of which Icould espy his wicked, infernal mockery peeping forth. 

"I deplore your end, Lazzaro Biancomonte, " said he slowly, "for you area brave man, and brave men are rare. You were worthy of better things, but you chose to cross swords with Ramiro del' Orca, and you have gotyour death-blow. May God have mercy on your soul. "

"I am praying, " said I, "for just so much mercy as you shall havejustice. If my prayer is heard, I should be well-content. "

He changed countenance a little. So, too, I thought, did Madonna Paola. My firmness may have yielded her some grain of comfort. Ramiro set hishands on his hips, and eyed me squarely. 

"You are a dauntless rogue, " he confessed. 

I laughed for answer, and in that moment it entered my mind that I mightyet enjoy some measure of revenge in this life. More than that, I mightbenefit Madonna. For were the seed I was about to sow to take root inthe craven heart of Ramiro del' Orca, it would so fully occupy his mindthat he would have little time to bestow on Paola in the few hours thatwere left him. But before I could bethink me of words, he was speakingagain. 

"I held out to you a slender hope, " said he. "I told you that therewas one little thing might save you. That hope has borne no fruit; thelittle thing, I spoke of has not come to pass. It rested with MadonnaPaola, here. She had it in her hands to effect your salvation, but shehas refused. Your blood rests on her head. "

She shuddered at the words, and a low moan escaped her. She covered herface with her hands. A moment I stood looking at her; then I shifted myglance to Ramiro. 

"Will it please you, Illustrious, to allow me a few moments'conversation with Madonna Paola di Santafior?"

I invested my tones with a weight of meaning that did not escape him. His face suddenly lightened; whilst one of his officers--a fellow veryfitly named Lupone--laughed outright. 

"Your hero seems none so heroic after all, " he said derisively to theGovernor. "The imminence of death makes him amenable. "

Ramiro scowled on him for answer. Then, turning to me--"Do you think youcould bend her stubbornness?" quoth he. 

"I might attempt it, " answered I. 

His eyes flashed with evil hope; his lips parted in a smile. He shota glance at Madonna, who had withdrawn her hands from her face andwas regarding me now with a strange expression of horror andincredulity--marvelling, no doubt, to find me such a craven as I musthave seemed. 

Ramiro looked at the diminishing sunlight on the floor. 

"In some five minutes the sun will have completely set, " said he. "Thosefive minutes you shall have to seek to enlist Madonna's aid on yourbehalf. If you succeed--and she may tell you on what terms you are tohave your life--you shall depart from Cesena to-night a free man. "

He paused a moment, and his eyes, lighted by an odious smile, restedonce more on Madonna Paula. Then he bade all withdraw, and went withthem into an adjoining chamber, fondly nurturing the hopes that werebegotten of his belief that Lazzaro Biancomonte was a villain. 

When we were alone, she and I, I stood a moment where they had left me, my hands pinioned behind me, and the cord which the executioner hadheld trailing the ground like a lambent tail. Then I went slowly forwarduntil I stood close before her. Her eyes were on my face, still withthat same look of unbelief. 

"Madonna mia, " said I, "do not for an instant think that it is mypurpose to ask of you any sacrifice that might save my worthlesslife. Rather was my purpose in seeking these few moments with you, tostrengthen and encourage you by such news as it is mine to bring. "

She looked now as if she scarcely understood. 

"If I will wed him to-night, he has promised that you shall go free, "she said in a whisper. "He says that he can bring a priest from theneighbourhood at a moment's notice. "

"Do not heed him, " I cried sternly. 

"I do not heed him, " said she, more composedly. "If he seeks to forceme, I shall find a way of setting myself free. Dear Mother of Heaven!death were a sweet and restful thing after all that I have suffered inthese days. "

Then she fell suddenly to weeping. 

"Think me not an utter coward, Lazzaro. Willingly would I do this thingto save so noble a life as yours, did I not think that you must hateme for it. I was stout and firm in my refusal, confident that you wouldhave had me so. Was I not right, my poor, poor Lazzaro?"

"Madonna, you were right, " I answered firmly and calmly. 

"And you are to die, amor mio, " she murmured passionately. "You are todie when the promise of happiness seemed held out to us. And yet, wereyou to live at the price at which life is offered you, would your lifebe endurable? Tell me the truth, Lazzaro; swear it to me. For if life isthe dearer thing to you, why then, you shall have your life. "

"Need you ask me, Paola?" questioned I. "Does not your heart tellyou how much easier is death than would be such life as I must leadhereafter, even if we could trust Ramiro, which we cannot. Be brave, Madonna, and help me to be brave and to bear thyself with a becomingfortitude. Now listen to what I have to tell you. Ramiro del' Orca is atraitor who is plotting the death of his overlord. Proofs of it are bynow in the hands of Cesare Borgia, and in some seven or eight hours theDuke himself should be here to put this monster to the question touchingthese matters. I will say a word in his ear ere I depart that will fillhis mind with a very wholesome fear, and you will find that duringthe few hours left him he will have little leisure to think of you andafflict you with his odious wooing. Be strong, then, for a little while, for Cesare is coming to set you free. "

She looked at me now with eyes that were wide open. Suddenly--

"Could we not gain time?" she cried, and in her eagerness she rose andset her hands upon my shoulders. "Could I not pretend to acquiesce tohis wishes, and so delay your end?"

"I have thought of it, " I answered gloomily, "but the thought hasbrought me no hope. Ramiro is not to be trusted. He might tell youthat he sets me free, but he dare not do so; he fears that I may haveknowledge of his dealings with Vitelli, and assuredly he would breakfaith with us. Again the coming of the Duke might be delayed. Alas!"I ended in despair, "there is nothing to be done but to let things runtheir course. "

There was even more in my mind than I expressed. My mistrust of Ramirowent further than I had explained, and concerning Madonna more closelythan it did me. 

"Nay, Lazzaro mine, " she still protested, "I will attempt it. It is, atleast, well worth the risk. 

"You forget, " said I, "that even when Cesare comes we cannot say how hewill bear himself towards you. You were to have been betrothed to hiscousin, Ignacio. It is a matter upon which he may insist. "

She looked at me for a moment with anguish in her eyes that turned mymisery into torture. 

"Lazzaro, " she moaned, "was ever woman so beset! I think that Heavenmust have laid some curse upon me. "

Her face was close to mine. I stooped forward and kissed her on herbrow. 

"May God have you in His keeping, Madonna mia, " I murmured. "The sun isgone. "

"Lazzaro!" It was the cry of a breaking heart. Her arms went round myneck, and in a passion of grief her kisses burned on my lips. 

Then the door of the anteroom opened--and I thanked God for the mercyof that interruption. I whispered a word to her, and in obedience shesprang back, and sank limp and broken on the chair once again. 

Ramiro entered, his men behind him, his face alit with eagerness. Thereand then I swamped his hopes. 

"The sun is gone, Magnificent, " said I. "You had best get me hanged. "

His brow darkened, for there was a note of mockery and triumph in myvoice. 

"You have fooled me, animal, " he cried. His jaw set, and his eyescontinued to regard me with an evil glow. Then he laughed terribly, shrugged his shoulders, and spoke again. "After all, it shall avail youlittle. " He turned to the carnifex. "Federigo, do your work, " saidhe, whereupon the fellow stepped behind me, and the halberdiers rangedthemselves one on either side of me again. 

"A word ere I go, Messer del' Orca, " I demanded insolently. 

He looked at me sharply, wondering, maybe, at the fresh tone I took. 

"Say it and begone, " he sullenly permitted me. 

I paused a moment to choose fitting words for that portentous death-songof mine. At length--

"You boasted to me a little while ago, " said I, smiling grimly, "thatthe man did not live who had thrice fooled you. That man does live, forthat man am I. "

"Bah!" he returned contemptuously, thinking, no doubt, that I referredto my interview with Madonna Paola. "You may take what pride you willfrom such a thought. You are upon the threshold of death. "

"True, but the thought is one that affords me more comfort and joy thanpride. As much comfort and joy as you shall take horror when I tell youin what manner I have fooled you. " I paused to heighten the sensation ofmy words. 

"To such good purpose have I used my wits that ere another sun shallrise and set you will have followed me along the black road that I amnow treading--the road whose bourne is the gallows. Bethink you of thecharred paper that last night you brushed from this table when you awoketo find a candle fallen on the treacherous letter Vitellozzo Vitellisent you in the lining of a hat. "

His jaw fell, his face flamed redder than ever for a second, then itwent grey as ashes. 

"Of what do you prate, fool?" he questioned huskily, seeking to blusterit before the startled glances of his officers. 

"I speak, " said I, "of that charred paper. It was I who laid the candleacross it; but it was a virgin sheet I burned. Vitelli's letter I hadfirst abstracted. "

"You lie!" he almost screamed. 

"To prove that I do not, I will tell you what it contained. It heldproof that bribed by the Tyrant of Citta di Castello you had undertakento pose an arbalister to slay the Duke on the occasion of his comingvisit to Cesena. "

He glared at me a moment in furious amazement. Then he turned to hisofficers. 

"Do not heed him, " he bade them. "The dog lies to sow doubts in yourminds ere he goes out to hang. It is a puerile revenge. "

I laughed with amused confidence. There was one among them had heardLampugnani's words touching the messenger's hat--words that had costthe fellow his life. But my concern was little with the effect my wordsmight produce upon his followers. 

"By to-morrow you will know whether I have lied or not. Nay, before thenshall you know it, for by midnight Cesare Borgia should be at Cesena. Vitellozzo Vitelli's letter is in his hands by now. "

At that Ramiro burst into a laugh. So convinced was he of theimpossibility of my having got the letter to the Duke, even if what Ihad said of its abstraction were true, that he gathered assurance fromwhat seemed to him so monstrous an exaggeration. 

"By your own words are you confounded, " said he. "Out of your own mouthhave you proven your lies. Assuming that all you say were true, howcould you, who since last night have been a prisoner, have got amessenger to bear anything from you to Cesare Borgia?"

I looked at him with a contemptuous amusement that daunted him. 

"Where is Mariani?" I asked quietly. "Where is the father of the lad youso brutally and wantonly slew yesternight? Seek him throughout Cesena, and when you find him not, perhaps you will realise that one who hadseen his own son suffer such an outrageous and cruel death at yourbrigand's hands would be a willing and ready instrument in an act thatshould avenge him. "

Vergine santa! What a consternation was his. He must have missed Marianiearly in the day, for he took no measure, asked no questions that mightconfirm or refute the thing I announced. His face grew livid, and hisknees loosened. He sank on to a chair and mopped the cold sweat from hisbrow with his great brown hand. No thought had he now for the eyes ofhis officers or their opinions. Fear, icy and horrid, such fear as inhis time he had inspired in a thousand hearts was now possessed of his. Sweet indeed was the flavour of my vengeance. 

His officers instinctively drew away from him before the guilt soclearly written on his face, and their eyes were full of doubt as tohow they should proceed and of some fear--for it must have been passingthrough their minds that they stood, themselves, in danger of beinginvolved with him in the Duke's punishment of his disloyalty. 

This was more than had ever entered into my calculations or found roomin my hopes. By a brisk appeal to them, it almost seemed that I mightwork my salvation in this eleventh hour. 

Madonna watched the scene with eyes that suggested to me that the samehope had arisen in her own mind. My halberdiers and the carnifex alonestood stolidly indifferent. Ramiro was to them the man that hired them;with his intriguing they had no concern. 

For a moment or two there was a silence, and Ramiro sat staring beforehim, his white face glistening with the sweat of fear. A very coward atheart was this overbearing ogre of Cesena, who for years had been theterror and scourge of the countryside. At last he mastered his emotionand sprang to his feet. 

"You have had the laugh of me, " he snarled, fury now ringing in hisvoice. "But ere you die you may regret it that you mocked me. "

He turned to the executioner. 

"Strip him, " he commanded fiercely. "He shall not hang as I intended--atleast not before we have torn every bone of his body from its socket. To the cord with him!" And he pointed to the torture at the end of thehall. 

The executioner made shift to obey him when suddenly Madonna Paolaleapt to her feet, her cheeks flushed and her eyes bright with a newexcitement. 

"Is there none here, " he cried, appealing to Ramiro's officers, "thatwill draw his sword in the service of his overlord, the Duca Valentino?There stands a traitor, and there one who has proven his loyalty toCesare Borgia. The Duke is likely to demand a heavy price for thelife of that faithful one to whose warning he owes his escape ofassassination. Will none of you side now with the right that anon youmay stand well with Cesare Borgia when he comes? Or, by idly allowingthis traitor to have his way, will you participate in the punishmentthat must be his?"

It was the very spur they needed. And scarce was that final question ofhers flung at those knaves, when the answer came from one of them. Itwas that same sturdy Lupone. 

"I, for one, am for the Duke, " said he, and his sword leapt from itsscabbard. "I draw my iron for Valentino. Let every loyal man do likewiseand seize this traitor. " And with his sword he pointed at Ramiro. 

In an instant three others bared their weapons and ranged themselvesbeside him. The remaining two--of whom was Lucagnolo--folded theirhands, manifesting by that impassivity that they were minded to takeneither one side nor the other. 

The carnifex paused in his labours of undressing me, and the affairpromised to grow interesting. But Ramiro did not stand his ground. Furyswelling his veins and crimsoning his huge face, he sprang to the doorand bellowed to his guards. Six men trooped in almost at once, andreinforced by the halberdiers that had been guarding me, they made shortwork of the resistance of those four officers. In as little time as ittakes me to record it, they were disarmed and ranged against the wallbehind those guards and others that had come to their support--to bedealt with by Ramiro after he had dealt with me. 

His fear of Cesare's coming was put by for the moment in his fiercelust to be avenged upon me who had betrayed him and the officers whohad turned against him. Madonna sank back once more in her despair. Thelittle spark that she had so bravely fanned to life had been quenchedalmost as soon as it had shown itself. 

"Now, Federigo, " said Ramiro grimly, "I am waiting. "

The executioner resumed his work, and in an instant I stood stripped ofmy brigandine. As the fellow led me, unresisting, to the torture--forwhat resistance could have availed me now?--I tried to pray for strengthto endure what was to come. I was done with life; for some portion ofan hour I must go through the cruellest of agonies; and then, when itpleased God in His mercy that I should swoon, it would be to wake nomore in this world. For they would bear out my unconscious body, andhang it by the neck from that black beam they called Ramiro del' Orca'sflagstaff. 

I cast a last glance at Madonna. She had fallen on her knees, and withfolded hands was praying intently, none heeding her. 

Federigo halted me beneath the pulleys, and his horrid hands grew busyadjusting the ropes to my wrists. 

And then, when the last ray of hope had faded, but before theexecutioner had completed his hideous task, a trumpet-blast, winding achallenge to the gates of the Castle of Cesena, suddenly rang out uponthe evening air, and startled us all by its sudden and imperious note. 

CHAPTER XXI. AVE CAESAR!

For just an instant I allowed myself to be tortured by the hope that amiracle had happened, and here was Cesare Borgia come a good eight hoursbefore it was possible for Mariani to have fetched him from Faenza. Thesame doubt may have crossed Ramiro's mind, for he changed colour andsprang to the door to bawl an order forbidding his men to lower thebridge. 

But he was too late. Before he was answered by his followers, we heardthe creaking of the hinges and the rattle of the running chains, endingin a thud that told us the drawbridge had dropped across the moat. Then came the loud continuous thunder of many hoofs upon its timbers. Paralysed by fear Ramiro stood where he had halted, turning his eyeswildly in this direction and in that, but never moving one way or theother. 

It must be Cesare, I swore to myself. Who else could ride to Cessna withsuch numbers? But then, if it was Cesare, it could not be that he hadseen Mariani, for he could not have ridden from Faenza. Madonna hadrisen too, and with a white face and straining eyes she was lookingtowards the door. 

And then our doubts were at last ended. There was a jangle of spurs andthe fall of feet, and through the open door stepped a straight, martialfigure in a doublet of deep crimson velvet, trimmed with costly lynxfurs and slashed with satin in the sleeves and shoulder-puffs; jewelsgleamed in the massive chain across his breast and at the marroquingirdle that carried his bronze-hilted sword; his hose was of red silk, and his great black boots were armed with golden spurs. But to crown allthis very regal splendour was the beautiful, pale, cold face of CesareBorgia, from out of which two black eyes flashed and played likesword-points on the company. 

Behind him surged a press of mercenaries, in steel, their weapons nakedin their hands, so that no doubt was left of the character of thisvisit. 

Collecting himself, and bethinking him that after all, he had bestdissemble a good countenance; Ramiro advanced respectfully to meet hisoverlord. But ere he had taken three steps the Duke stayed him. 

"Stand where you are, traitor, " was the imperious command. "I'll trustyou no nearer to my person. " And to emphasise his words he raised hisgloved left hand, which had been resting on his sword-hilt, and in whichI now observed that he held a paper. 

Whether Ramiro recognised it, or whether it was that the mere sight ofa paper reminded him of the letter which on my testimony should be inCesare's keeping, or whether again the word "traitor" with which Cesarebranded him drove the iron deeper into his soul, I cannot say; but tothis I can testify: that he turned a livid green, and stood there beforehis formidable master in an attitude so stricken as to have aroused pityfor any man less a villain than was he. 

And now Cesare's eye, travelling round, alighted on Madonna Paola, standing back in the shadows to which she had instinctively withdrawn athis coming. At sight of her he recoiled a pace, deeming, no doubt, thatit was an apparition stood before him. Then he looked again, and being aman whose mind was above puerile superstitions, he assured himself thatby what miracle the thing was wrought, the figure before him was theliving body of Madonna Paola Sforza di Santafior. He swept the velvetcap with its jewelled plume from off his auburn locks, and bowed lowbefore her. 

"In God's name, Madonna, how are you come to life again, and how do Ifind you here of all places?"

She made no ado about enlightening him. 

"That villain, " said she, and her finger pointed straight and firmlyat Ramiro, "put a sleeping-potion in my wine on the last night he dinedwith us at Pesaro, and when all thought me dead he came to the Church ofSan Domenico with his men to carry off my sleeping body. He would havesucceeded in his fell design but that Lazzaro Biancomonte there, whomyou have stayed him in the act of torturing to death, was beforehandand saved me from his clutches for a time. This morning at Cattolica hissearching sbirri discovered me and brought me hither, where I have beenfor the past three hours, and where, but for your Excellency's timelyarrival, I shudder to think of the indignities I might have suffered. "

"I thank you, Madonna, for this clear succinctness, " answered Cesarecoldly, as was his habit. They say he was a passionate man, and suchindeed I do believe him to have been; but even in the hottest frenzy ofrage, outwardly he was ever the same--icily cold and tranquil. And this, no doubt, was the thing that made him terrible. 

"Presently, Madonna, " he pursued, "I shall ask you to tell me how itchanced that, having saved you, Messer Biancomonte did not bear youto your brother's house. But first I have business with my Governor ofCesena--a score which is rendered, if possible, heavier than it alreadystood by this thing that you have told me. "

"My lord, " cried out Ramiro, finding his tongue at last, "Madonna hasmisinformed you. I know nothing of who administered the sleeping-potion. Certainly it was not I. I heard a rumour that her body had been stolen, and--"

"Silence!" Cesare commanded sternly. "Did I question you, dog?"

His beautiful, terrible eyes fastened upon Ramiro in a glance thatdefied the man to answer him. Cowed, like a hound at sight of the whip, Ramiro whimpered into silence. 

Cesare waved his hand in his direction, half-turning to the men-at-armsbehind him. 

"Take and disarm him, " was his passionless command. And while they weredoing his bidding, he turned to me and ordered the executioner beside meto unbind my hands and set me at liberty. 

"I owe you a heavy debt, Messer Biancomonte, " he said, without anywarmth, even now that his voice was laden with a message of gratitude. "It shall be discharged. It is thanks to your daring and resource thatthe seneschal Mariani was able to bring me this letter, this piece ofculminating proof against Ramiro del' Orca. It is fortunate for you thatMariani was not put to it to ride to Faenza to find me, or else I amafraid we had not reached Cesena in time to save your life. I met himsome leagues this side of Faenza, as I was on my way to Sinigaglia. "

He turned abruptly to Ramiro. 

"In this letter which Vitelli wrote you, " said he, "it is suggested thatthere are others in the conspiracy. Tell me now, who are those others?See that you answer me with truth, for I shall compel proofs from you ofsuch accusations as you may make. "

Ramiro looked at him with eyes rendered dull by agony. He moistened hislips with his tongue, and turning his head towards his men--

"Wine, " he gasped, from very force of habit. "A cup of wine!"

"Let it be supplied him, " said Cesare coldly, and we all stood waitingwhile a servant filled him a cup. Ramiro gulped the wine avidly, neverpausing until the goblet was empty. 

"Now, " said Cesare, who had been watching him, "will it please you toanswer my question?"

"My lord, " said Ramiro, revived and strengthened in spirit by thedraught, "I must ask your Excellency to be a little plainer with me. To what conspiracy is it that you refer? I know of none. What is thisletter which you say Vitelli wrote me? I take it you refer to the Lordof Citta di Castello. But I can recall no letters passing between us. Myacquaintance with him is of the slightest. "

Cesare looked at him a second. 

"Approach, " he curtly bade him, and Ramiro came forward, one of theBorgia halberdiers on either side of him, each holding him by an arm. The Duke thrust the letter under his eyes. "Have you never seen thatbefore?"

Ramiro looked at it a moment, and his attempt at dissemblingbewilderment was a ludicrous thing to witness. 

"Never, " he said brazenly at last. 

Cesare folded the letter and slipped it into the breast of his doublet. From his girdle he took a second paper. He turned from Ramiro. 

"Don Miguel, " he called. 

From behind his men-at-arms a tall man, all dressed in black, stoodforward. It was Cesare's Spanish captain, one whose name was as wellknown and as well-dreaded in Italy as Cesare's own. The Duke held out tohim the paper that he had produced. 

"You heard the question that I asked Messer del' Orca?" he inquired. 

"I heard, Illustrious, " answered Miguel, with a bow. 

"See that you obtain me an answer to it, as well as an account ofthe other matters that I have noted on this list--concerning themisappropriation of stores, the retention of taxes illicitly levied, andthe wanton cruelty towards my good citizens of Cesena. Put him to thequestion without delay, and record me his replies. The implements areyonder. "

And with the same calm indifference which characterised his every wordand action Cesare pointed to the torture, and turned to Madonna Paola, as though he gave the matter of Ramiro del' Orca and his misdeeds notanother thought. 

"Mercy, my lord, " rang now the voice of Ramiro, laden with horrid fear. "I will speak. "

"Then do so--to Don Miguel. He will question you in my name. " Again heturned to Madonna. "Madonna Paola, may I conduct you hence? Things mayperhaps occur which it is not seemly your gentle eyes should witness. Messer Biancomonte, attend us. "

Now, in spite of all that Ramiro had made me suffer, I should have beenloath to have remained and witnessed his examination. That they wouldtorture him was now inevitable. His chance of answering freely wasgone. Even if he returned meek replies to Don Miguel's questions, that gentleman would, no doubt, still submit him to the cord by way ofassuring himself that such replies were true ones. 

Gladly, then, did I turn to follow the Duke and Madonna Paola into theadjoining chamber to which Cesare led the way, even as Don Miguel'svoice was raised to command his men to clear the hall, to the end thathe might conduct his examination in private. 

The three of us stood in the anteroom. A servant had lighted the tapersand closed the doors, and the Duke turned to me. 

"First, Messer Biancomonte, to discharge my debt. You are, if I am notmisinformed, the lord by right of birth of certain lands that bearyour name, which suffered sequestration during the reign of the lateCostanzo, Tyrant of Pesaro, whose son Giovanni upheld that confiscation. Am I right?"

"Your Excellency is very well informed. The Lord of Pesaro did make metardy restitution--so tardy, indeed, that the lands which he restored tome had already virtually passed from his possession. "

Cesare smiled. 

"In recompense for the service you have rendered me this day, " said he, and my heart thrilled at the words and at the thought of the joy whichI was about to bear to my old mother, "I reinvest you in your landsof Biancomonte for so long as you are content to recognise in me youroverlord, and to be loyal, true and faithful to my rule. "

I bowed, murmuring something of the joy I felt and the devotion I shouldentertain. 

"Then that is done with. You shall have the deed from my hand bymorning. And now, Madonna, will you grant me some explanation of yourconduct in leaving Pesaro in this man's company, instead of repairing toyour brother's house, when you awakened from the effects of thepotion Ramiro gave you, or must I seek the explanation from MesserBiancomonte?"

Her eyes fell before the scrutiny of his, and when they were raisedagain it was to meet my glance, and if Cesare could not, for himself, read the message of those eyes, why then, his penetration was by nomeans what the world accounted it. 

"My lord, " I cried, "let me explain. I love Madonna Paola. It was loveof her that led me to the church and kept me there that night. It waslove of her and the overmastering passion of my grief at her so suddendeath that led me, in a madness, to desire once more to look upon herface ere they delivered it to earth's keeping. Thus was it that I cameto discover that she lived; thus was it that I anticipated Ramiro del'Orca. He came upon us almost before I had raised her from the coffin, yet love lent me strength and craft to delude him. We hid awhile in thesacristy, and it was there, after Madonna had revived, that the pent-uppassion of years burst the bond with which reason had bidden me restrainit. "

"By the Host!" cried Cesare, his brows drawn down in a frown. "You are abold man to tell me this. And you, Madonna, " he cried, turning suddenlyto her, "what have you to say?"

"Only, my lord, that I have suffered more I think in these past few daysthan has ever fallen to the life-time's share of another woman. I think, my lord, that I have suffered enough to have earned me a little peaceand a little happiness for the remainder of my days. All my life havemen plagued me with marriages that were hateful to me, and this hasculminated in the brutal act of Ramiro del' Orca. Do you not think thatI have endured enough?"

He stared at her for a moment. 

"Then you love this fellow?" he gasped. "You, Madonna Paola Sforza diSantafior, one of the noblest ladies in all Italy, confess to love thislordling of a few barren acres?"

"I loved him, Illustrious, when he was less, much less, than that. I loved him when he was little better than the Fool of the Court ofPesaro, and not even the shame of the motley that disgraced him couldstay the impulse of my affections. "

He laughed curiously. 

"By my faith, " said he, "I have gone through life complaining of thewant of frankness in the men and women I have met. But you two seemto deal in it liberally enough to satisfy the most ardent seeker aftertruth. I would that Pontius Pilate could have known you. " Then he grewsterner. "But what account of this evening's adventure am I to bear tomy cousin Ignacio?"

She hung her head in silence, whilst my own spirit trembled. Thensuddenly I spoke. 

"My lord, " said I, "if you take her back to Pesaro, you may keep thedeed of Biancomonte. For unless Madonna Paola goes thither with me, yourgift is a barren one, your reward of no account or value to me. "

"I would not have it so, " said he, his head on one side and his fingerstoying with his auburn beard. "You saved my life, and you must berewarded fittingly. "

"Then, Illustrious, in payment for my preservation of your life, do yourender happy mine, and we shall thus be quits. "

"My lord, " cried Paola, putting forth her hands in supplication, "if youhave ever loved, befriend us now. "

A shadow darkened his face for an instant, then it was gone, and hisexpression was as inscrutable as ever. Yet he took her hands in his andlooked down into her eyes. 

"They say that I am hard, bloodthirsty and unfeeling, " he said in tonesthat were almost of complaint. "But I am not proof against so muchappeal. Ignacio must find him a bride in Spain; and if he is wise andwould taste the sweets of life, he will see to it that he finds him awilling one. "

"As for you two, Cesare Borgia shalt stand your friend. He owes you noless. I will be godfather to your nuptials. Thus shall the blame andconsequences rest on me. Paola Sforza di Santafior is dead, men think. We will leave them thinking it. Filippo must know the truth. But you cantrust me to make your brother take a reasonable view of what has cometo pass. After all, there may be a disparity in your ranks. But it ispurely adventitious, for noble though you may be, Madonna Paola, you arewedding one who seems no less noble at heart, whatever the parts he mayhave played in life. " He smiled inscrutably, as he added: "I have inmind that you once sought service with me Messer Biancomonte, and if amartial life allures you still, I'll make you lord of something betterfar than Biancomonte. "

I thanked him, and Madonna joined me in that expression of gratitude--anexpression that fell very short of all that was in our hearts. Buttouching that offer of his that I should follow his fortunes, I beggedhim not to insist. 

"The possession of Biancomonte has from my cradle been the goal of allmy hopes. It is patrimony enough for me, and there, with MadonnaPaola, I'll take a long farewell of ambition, which is but the seed ofdiscontent. "

"Why, as you will, " he sighed. And then, before more could be said, there came from the adjoining room a piercing scream. 

Cesare raised his head, and his lips parted in the faintest vestige of asmile. 

"They are exacting the truth from the Governor of Cesena, " said he. "Ithink, Madonna, that we had better move a little farther off. Ramiro'svoice makes indifferent music for a lady's ear. "

She was white as death at the horrid noise and all the things of whichit may have reminded her, and so we passed from the antechamber andsought the more distant places of the castle. 

Here let me pause. We were married on the morrow which was Christmaseve, and in the grey dawn of the Christmas morning we set out forBiancomonte with the escort which Cesare Borgia placed at our disposal. 

As we rode out from the Citadel of Cesena, we saw the last of Ramirodel' Orca. Beyond the gates, in the centre of the public square, a blockstood planted in the snow. On the side nearer the castle there was adark mass over which a rich mantle had been thrown; it was of purplecolour, and in the uncertain light it was not easy to tell where thecloak ended, and the stain that embrued the snow began. On the otherside of the block a decapitated head stood mounted on an upright pike, and the sightless eyes of Ramiro del' Orca looked from his grinning faceupon the town of Cesena, which he had so wantonly misruled. 

Madonna shuddered and turned her head aside as we rode past that dreademblem of the Borgia justice. 

To efface from her mind the memory of such a thing on such a day, Italked to her, as we cantered out into the country, of the life to come, of the mother that waited to welcome us, and of the glad tidings withwhich we were to rejoice her on that Christmas day. 

There is no moral to my story. I may not end with one of those gracefuladmonitions beloved of Messer Boccacci to whom in my jester's daysI owed so much. Not mine is it to say with him "Wherefore, gentleladies"--or "noble sirs--beware of this, avoid that other thing. "

Mine is a plain tale, written in the belief that some account ofthose old happenings that befell me may offer you some measure ofentertainment, and written, too, in the support of certain truths whichmy contemporaries have been shamefully inclined and simoniacally inducedto suppress. Many chroniclers set forth how the Lord Vitellozzo Vitelliand his associates were barbarously strangled by Cesare's orders atSinigaglia, and wilfully--for I cannot believe that it results fromignorance--are they silent touching the reason, leaving you to imaginethat it was done in obedience to a ruthlessness of character beyondparallel, so that you may come to consider Cesare Borgia as black asthey were paid to paint him. 

To confute them do I set down these facts of which my knowledge cannotbe called in question, and also that you may know the true story ofPaola di Santafior--and more particularly that part of it which liesbeyond the death she did not die. 

The sun of that Christmas day was setting as we drew near to Biancomonteand the humble dwelling of my old mother. We fell into talk of her oncemore. Suddenly Paola turned in her saddle to confront me. 

"Tell me, Lord of Biancomonte, will she love me a little, think you?"she asked, to plague me. 

"Who would not love you, Lady of Biancomonte?" counter-questioned I.