“Eh?” There was nothing Ercole relished less than to be laughed at. He pondered a moment, and it occurred to him that perhaps he was making much of nothing. Then:
“You, Aventano,” he called, “take your partisan, and patrol the eastern rampart. There, Messer Gonzaga, I have obeyed your wishes; but Messer Francesco shall hear of it when he comes his rounds.”
Gonzaga left him. Francesco would not make his rounds for another hour, and by then it would not matter what Fortemani told him. In one way or another he would be able to account for his action.
He crossed the courtyard, and mounted the steps leading to his own chamber. Once there, he closed and barred the door. He kindled a light, and flinging the letter on the table, he sat and contemplated its exterior and the great red seal that gleamed in the yellow light of his taper.
So! This knight-errant, this man whom he had accounted a low-born hind, was none other than the famous Count of Aquila, the well-beloved of the people of Babbiano, the beau-ideal of all military folk from Sicily to the Alps. And he had never suspected it! Dull-witted did he now account himself. Enough descriptions had he heard of that famous condottiero, that mirror of Italian chivalry. He might have known that there did not live two men of such commanding ways as he had seen instanced at Roccaleone. What was his object there? Was it love of Valentina, or was it —— ? He paused, as in his mind he made a swift review of the politics of Babbiano. A sudden possibility occurred to him that made his eyes sparkle and his hands tremble with eagerness. Was this but a political scheme to undermine his cousin’s throne, to which Gonzaga had heard it rumoured that Francesco del Falco was an aspirant? If it were so, what a vengeance would be his to unmask him! How it must humble Valentina! The letter lay before him. Within it the true facts would be disclosed. What did his friend Fanfulla write him?
He took the letter up and made a close inspection of the seal. Then softly, quietly, slowly he drew his dagger. If his suspicions were unfounded, his dagger heated in the taper should afford him the means to conceal the fact that he had tampered with that missive. He slipped his blade under the seal, and worked it cautiously until it came up and set the letter open. He unfolded it, and as he read his eyes dilated. He seemed to crouch on his chair, and the hand that held the paper shook. He drew the candle nearer, and shading his eyes he read it again, word for word:
“MY DEAR LORD COUNT, — I have delayed writing until the time when the signs I observed should have become more definite, as they have now done, so that I may delay no longer. This, then, goes by the hand of Zaccaria, to tell you that to-day has word been sent Gian Maria giving him three days in which to return to Babbiano, or to abandon all hope of his crown, of which the people will send the offer then to you at Aquila, where you are believed to be. So now, my dear lord, you have the tyrant at your mercy, tossed between Scylla and Charybdis. Yours it is to resolve how you will act; but I rejoice in being the one to send you word that your presence at Roccaleone and your stubborn defence of the fortress has not been vain, and that presently you are to reap the well-earned reward of it. The people have been stirred to this extreme action by the confusion prevailing here.
“News has reached us that Caesar Borgia is arming, at Rome, a condotta to invade Babbiano, and the people are exasperated at Gian Maria’s continued absence in such a season. They are short-sighted in this, for they overlook the results that must attend the alliance with Urbino. May God protect and prosper your Excellency, whose most devoted servant is
“FANFULLA DEGLI AROIPRETI.”
CHAPTER XXII. A REVELATION
“Francesco,” said Valentina, and the name came from her lips as if it were an endearment, “why that frowning, careworn look?”
They were in the dining-room alone, where the others had left them, and they were still seated at the table at which they had supped. Francesco raised his dark, thoughtful eyes, and as they lighted now on Valentina the thoughtfulness that was in them gave place to tenderness.
“I am fretted by this lack of news,” he acknowledged. “I would I knew what is being done in Babbiano. I had thought that ere now Caesar Borgia had stirred Gian Maria’s subjects into some manner of action. I would I knew!”
She rose, and coming close to him, she stood with one hand resting upon his shoulder, her eyes smiling down upon his upturned face.
“And shall such a trifle fret you — you who professed a week ago that you would this siege might last for ever?”
“Account me not fickle, anima mia,” he answered her, and he kissed the ivory fingers that rested on his shoulder. “For that was before the world changed for me at the magic of your bidding. And so,” he repeated, “I would I knew what is toward at Babbiano!”
“But why sigh over a wish so idle?” she exclaimed. “By what means can news reach you here of the happenings of the world without?”
He pondered a moment, seeking words in which to answer her. A score of times during that week had he been on the point of disclosing himself, of telling her who and what he was. Yet ever had he hesitated, putting off that disclosure until the season should appear more fitting. This he now considered the present. She trusted him, and there was no reason to remain silent longer. Perhaps already he had delayed too long, and so he was about to speak when she started from his side, and crossed hastily to the window, alarmed by the sound of approaching steps. A second later the door opened, and Gonzaga appeared.
A moment he hesitated in the doorway, looking from one to the other, and Francesco, lazily regarding him in his turn, noted that his cheeks were pale and that his eyes glittered like those of a man with the fever. Then he stepped forward, and, leaving the door open behind him, he advanced into the room.
“Monna Valentina, I have something to communicate to you.” His voice shook slightly. “Messer — Francesco, will you give us leave?” And his feverish eyes moved to the open door with an eloquence that asked no words.
Francesco rose slowly, endeavouring to repress his surprise and glanced across at Valentina, as if awaiting her confirmation or refusal of this request that he should leave them.
“A communication for me?” she marvelled, a slight frown drawing her brows together. “Of what nature, sir?”
“Of a nature as important as it is private.”
She raised her chin, and with a patient smile she seemed to beg of Francesco that he would suffer her to humour this mood of Gonzaga’s. In quick obedience Francesco inclined his head.
“I shall be in my chamber until the hour of my rounds, Madonna,” he announced, and with that took his departure.
Gonzaga attended him to the door, which he closed after him, and composing his features to an expression of sorrowing indignation, he came back and stood facing Valentina across the table.
“Madonna,” he said, “I would to Heaven this communication I have to make to you came from other lips. In the light of what has passed — here at Roccaleone — through my folly — you — you may think my mission charged with vindictiveness.”
Perplexity stared at him from her eyes.
“You fill me with alarm, my good Gonzaga,” she answered him, though smiling.
“Alas it has fallen to my unfortunate lot to do more than that. I have made the discovery of as foul a piece of treachery here in your fortress as ever traitor hatched.”
She looked at him more seriously now. The vehemence of his tone, and the suggestion of sorrow that ran through it and gave it so frank an accent, commanded her attention.
“Treachery!” she echoed, in a low voice, her eyes dilating. “And from whom?”
He hesitated a moment, then waving his hand:
“Will you not sit, Madonna?” he suggested nervously.
Mechanically she seated herself at the table, her eyes ever on his face, alarm spreading in her heart, born of suspense.
“Be seated too,” she bade him, “and tell me.”
He drew up a chair, sat down opposite to her, and taking a deep breath: “Heard you ever of the C
ount of Aquila?” he inquired.
“It were odd if I had not. The most valiant knight in Italy, fame dubs him.”
His eyes were intently on her face, and what he saw there satisfied him.
“You know how he stands with the people of Babbiano?”
“I know that he is beloved of them.”
“And do you know that he is a pretender to the throne of Babbiano? You will remember that he is cousin to Gian Maria?”
“His relationship to Gian Maria I know. That he pretends to the throne of Babbiano I was not aware. But whither are we straying?”
“We are not straying, Madonna,” answered Gonzaga, “we are making a straight line for the very heart and soul of this treachery I spoke of. Would you believe me if I told you that here, in Roccaleone, we have an agent of the Count of Aquila one who in the Count’s interest is protracting this siege with the pretended aim of driving Gian Maria off.”
“Gonzaga — —” she began, more than half guessing the drift of his explanation. But he interrupted her with unusual brusqueness.
“Wait, Madonna,” he cried, his eyes upon her face, his hand imperiously raised. “Hear me out in patience. I am not talking idly. Of what I tell you I am armed with proof and witness. Such an agent of — of the Count’s interests we have among us, and his true object in protracting this siege, and encouraging and aiding you in your resistance, is to outwear the patience of the people of Babbiano with Gian Maria, and drive them in the hour of their approaching peril from Caesar Borgia’s armies to bestow the throne on Aquila.”
“Where learnt you this foul lie?” she asked him, her cheeks crimson, her eyes on fire.
“Madonna,” he said, in a patient voice, “this that you call a lie is already an accomplished fact. I am not laying before you the fruits of idle speculation. I have upon me the most positive proof that such a result as was hoped for has already been reached. Gian Maria has received from his subjects a notification that unless he is in his capital within three days from this, they will invest the Lord of Aquila with the ducal crown.”
She rose, her anger well controlled, her voice calm.
“Where is this proof? No, no; I don’t need to see it. Whatever it is, what shall it prove to me? That your words, in so far as the politics of Babbiano are concerned, may be true; our resistance of Gian Maria may indeed be losing him his throne and doing good service to the cause of the Count of Aquila; but how shall all this prove that lie of yours, that Messer Francesco — for it is clearly of him you speak — that Messer Francesco should be this agent of the Count’s? It is a lie, Gonzaga, for which you shall be punished as you deserve.”
She ceased, and stood awaiting his reply, and as she watched him his calm demeanour struck a chill into her heart. He was so confident, so full of assurance; and that, in Gonzaga, she had learnt to know meant a strong bulwark ‘twixt himself and danger. He sighed profoundly.
“Madonna, these cruel words of yours do not wound me, since they are no more than I expected. But it will wound me — and sorely — if when you shall have learnt the rest you do not humbly acknowledge how you have wronged me, how grossly you have misjudged me. You think I come to you with evil in my heart, urged by a spirit of vindictiveness against Messer Francesco. Instead, I come to you with nothing but a profound sorrow that mine must be the voice to disillusion you, and a deep indignation against him that has so foully used you to his own ends. Wait, Madonna! In a measure you are right. It was not strictly true to say that this Messer Francesco is the agent of the Count of Aquila.”
“Ah! You are recanting already?”
“Only a little — an insignificant little. He is no agent because — —” He hesitated, and glanced swiftly up. Then he sighed, lowered his voice, and with consummately simulated sorrow, he concluded “Because he is, himself, Francesco del Falco. Count of Aquila.”
She swayed a moment, and the colour died from her cheeks, leaving them ivory pale. She leaned heavily against the table, and turned over in her mind what she had heard. And then, as suddenly as it had gone, the blood rushed back into her face, mounting to her very temples.
“It’s a lie!” she blazed at him; “a lie for which you shall be whipped.”
He shrugged his shoulders, and cast Francesco’s letter on to the table.
“There, Madonna, is something that will prove all that I have said.”
She eyed the paper coldly. Her first impulse was to call Fortemani and carry out her threat of having Gonzaga whipped, refusing so much as to see this thing that he so confidently termed a proof; but it may be that his confidence wrought upon her, touching a chord of feminine curiosity. That he was wrong she never doubted; but that he believed himself right she was also assured, and she wondered what this thing might be that had so convinced him. Still she did not touch it, but asked in an indifferent voice:
“What is it?”
“A letter that was brought hither to-night by a man who swam the moat, and whom I have ordered to be detained in the armoury tower. It is from Fanfulla degli Arcipreti to the Count of Aquila. If your memory will bear you back to a certain day at Acquasparta, you may recall that Fanfulla was the name of a very gallant cavalier who addressed this Messer Francesco with marked respect.”
She took that backward mental glance he bade her, and remembered. Then she remembered, too, how that very evening Francesco had said that he was fretting for news of Babbiano, and that when she had asked how he hoped that news could reach him at Roccaleone, Gonzaga had entered before he answered her. Indeed, he had seemed to hesitate upon that answer. A sudden chill encompassed her at that reflection. Oh, it was impossible, absurd! And yet she took the letter from the table. With knit brows she read it, whilst Gonzaga watched her, scarce able to keep the satisfaction from gleaming in his eyes.
She read it slowly, and as she read her face grew deathly pale. When she had finished she stood silent for a long minute, her eyes upon the signature and her mind harking back to what Gonzaga had said, and drawing comparison between that and such things as had been done and uttered, and nowhere did she find the slightest gleam of that discrepancy which so ardently she sought.
It was as if a hand were crushing the heart in her bosom. This man whom she had trusted, this peerless champion of her cause, to be nothing but a self-seeker, an intriguer, who, to advance his own ends, had made a pawn of her. She thought of how for a moment he had held her in his arms and kissed her, and at that her whole soul revolted against the notion that here was no more than treachery.
“It’s all a plot against him!” she cried, her cheeks scarlet again. “It’s an infamous thing of your devising, Messer Gonzaga, an odious lie!”
“Madonna, the man that brought the letter is still detained. Confront him with Messer Francesco; or apply the question to him, and learn his master’s true name and station. As for the rest, if that letter is insufficient proof for you, I beg that you will look back at facts. Why should he lie to you? and say that his name was Francesco Franceschi? Why should he have urged you — against all reason — to remain here, when he brought you news that Gian Maria was advancing? Surely had he but sought to serve you he had better accomplished this by placing his own castle of Aquila at your disposal, and leaving here an empty nest for Gian Maria, as I urged.”
She sank to a chair, a fever in her mind.
“I tell you, Madonna, there is no mistake. What I have said is true. Another three days would he have held Gian Maria here, whilst if you gave him that letter, it is odds he would slip away in the night of to-morrow, that he might be in Babbiano on the third day to take the throne his cousin treats so lightly. Sainted God!” he cried out. “I think this is the most diabolically treacherous plot that ever mind of man conceived and human heartlessness executed.”
“But — but — —” she faltered, “all this is presupposing that Messer Francesco is indeed the Count of Aquila. May there — may it not be that this letter was meant for some other destination?”
“Will you con
front this messenger with the Count?”
“With the Count?” she inquired dully. “With Messer Francesco, you mean?” She shuddered, and with strange inconsistence: “No,” she said, in a choking voice, her lip twisting oddly at the corner. “I do not wish to see his face again.”
A light gleamed in Gonzaga’s eye, and was extinguished on the instant.
“Best make certain,” he suggested, rising. “I have ordered Fortemani to bring Lanciotto here. He will be waiting now, without. Shall I admit them?”
She nodded without speaking, and Gonzaga opened the door, and called Fortemani. A voice answered him from the gloom of the banqueting-hall.
“Bring Lanciotto here,” he commanded.
When Francesco’s servant entered, a look of surprise on his face at these mysterious proceedings, it was Valentina who questioned him, and that in a voice as cold as though the issue concerned her no whit.
“Tell me, sirrah,” she said, “and as you value your neck, see that you answer me truly — what is your master’s name?”
Lanciotto looked from her to Gonzaga, who stood by, a cynical curl on his sensual lips.
“Answer Monna Valentina,” the courtier urged him. “State your master’s true name and station.”
“But, lady,” began Lanciotto, bewildered.
“Answer me!” she stormed, her small clenched hands beating the table in harsh impatience. And Lanciotto, seeing no help for it, answered:
“Messer Francesco del Falco, Count of Aquila.”
Something that began in a sob and ended in a laugh burst from the lips of Valentina. Ercole’s eyes were wide at the news, and he might have gone the length of interposing a question, when Gonzaga curtly bade him go to the armoury tower, and bring thence the soldier and the man Gonzaga had left in his care.
Collected Works of Rafael Sabatini Page 107