by Max Brand
Over the level, the returning strength of Melrose enabled him to walk with less and less resistance, but as they struggled up the stairs again he was almost a dead weight on his son. Too furious a hurry would melt the strength out of Tizzo as a hot fire burns wax. He had to take a pace and hold to it, stubbornly; and yet, beneath him, he began to hear the echoes of a wild outcry.
Anger has a sound like despair when it comes shouting from many throats. Those men of della Penna, their master at their head, had reached the torture chamber far beneath by this time, and their yelling was from purest rage, of course. Yet it seemed to Tizzo like the lamenting of the eternally damned.
Now for one blast of the great new giant — gunpowder — to crumble together the walls of the prison and drop headlong masses of stone on the heads of all those manhunters!
MELROSE, panting, struggling, nevertheless still whispered his prayer, “Almighty God, I do not ask for the power to swing a sword. Let me only have the strength to draw a dagger and use it. A single blow — one gesture of glory is all that I ask for — one drop out of the infinite sea of Your mercy!”
They had, in fact, reached the highest level of the cellar, and before them there was a straight way towards the outer door; but Melrose was almost too exhausted by pain and the frightful effort of moving his witless limbs to stand erect any longer. Both he and Tizzo reeled from side to side as they moved down the hallway.
And still the prayer, in a new form, was issuing from the lips of Melrose. “Glorious God, I ask not to strike with any weapon, but with my bare hands let me grasp one villain by the throat before the steel is struck into me from every side. Let them hew me to pieces — or let them keep and burn me inch by inch afterwards. But let me strike one blow before I die—”
That panting, broken whisper continued, drowned from the hearing of Tizzo because the rout of the pursuers was spreading back again through the upper stairways.
He could hear the wild voice of della Penna screaming, “They are here! Two grown men cannot hide in a rat-hole — but look in every corner. If we lose them, I shall go mad — mad — mad! If you fail to take them — every man of you look to himself. Swiftly, swiftly! Be everywhere with wide eyes. Your swords ready. Take them alive if you can, but even dead they will be beautiful pictures to me!”
That screeching voice of rage sent small shudders down the back of Tizzo as he worked his way down the hall. Then he heard running feet approaching from the rear.
They were coming very quickly. But here, thank God, was the outer door. One warder remained there at his post with the same partizan which Tizzo had seen in the grasp of the jailer before.
The approaching rush of many feet had put the jailer on his guard. He stood now with the great weapon held at the ready, that is, slung sidelong across his body, the head gleaming above his left shoulder. It was an engine designed to strike down horse and man. It made the infantryman the peer of the mounted warrior. And now, into the view of the sentry there came the vision of the great, staggering, wavering gray-headed man, and beside him the tense, lithe figure of Tizzo.
He stared and elevated his halberd for the stroke when Tizzo, with a cry, ran straight in on him, his smaller and more active ax poised to strike.
It was not for nothing that he had crossed blades with the best of the swaggering young blades of the town, and that he had performed such feats with the ax that every clod in Perugia knew of the strokes of Tizzo. The halberdier, the moment his eyes made sure of Tizzo, the moment he saw that famous ax at a balance in his hands, cried out: “Mercy, in the name of God!” and fled slinking along the wall with his halberd flung down upon the ground.
Tizzo let him go. He was no lover of bloodshed even in the midst of battle. The game was the thing, not the slaughter which delighted some. A moment later he was throwing back the bolt of the portal, thrusting the door wide.
BUT when he looked back he could see Melrose staggering, almost pitching to the floor with every short forward step he took, and behind him danger came pouring up the corridor like the shout of battle up a throat. He saw them coming, the glitter of the weapons in the tossing lantern light, then the wild faces; and always the shouting roared louder and louder.
He leaped to Melrose and supported him outside the door. To be in the open was at least some comfort. The taste of the sweet night air was a blessing and a mercy. And a changing wind had knocked the rain-clouds out of the sky and blown up over the black towers of the city the golden beauty of a summer moon.
“Open air — the moon — the bright face of the Almighty God!” gasped the Englishman. “Now I can die content. Tizzo — for the last time, go — save yourself!”
As he spoke, it became impossible for Tizzo to save himself. Out of the portal of the cellar rooms, like a great smoke from a small mouth, came sweeping the men of della Penna — half-dressed servants who had been called up in the middle of the night unexpectedly, and the men-at-arms who had been on duty. Others in greater numbers were running from the interior of the house. The whole garrison was pouring through towards the street, but in the first whirling batch there were a dozen assailants who hurled themselves upon Tizzo.
His father, staggering back from this attack, had been brought to a pause by a sharp angle of the wall which protected their backs against assault but which also would make it more difficult for them to escape in any direction except straight to the front.
And straight in front lay the thronging swords of the enemy.
Tizzo, flashing back and forth in front of Melrose, like a panther in defense of some old lion, made the swinging arcs of the ax gleam with incredible lightness, incredible force. The cleaving power of that weapon was far greater than that of any sword. Where it struck solidly, it left more hideous wounds, also; and in the cunning grasp of Tizzo it did not possess the usual disadvantage of being a weapon of offense only. The dance of it in his hands swept aside the striking of many swords: his light advances staggered the crowded ranks of the enemy.
A MAN in full armor, the young nephew of the master, Marco della Penna by name, was directing that attack. He had in fact been in charge of the guarding of the house of his uncle during the emergency of this time of danger. He, now, seeing before him two of the greatest enemies of his house and above all the notorious red head of Tizzo, came striding through the crowd of his men like a giant with the plume blown high on his helmet and the great two-handed sword poised for a blow.
He shouted out to the others to join him, and the battle would be ended in an instant. But the rest held back an instant to see their mail-clad champion dispose of this dancing wisp of a Tizzo. And Tizzo, as he flashed back and forth in front of his father, panted forth a wild sort of laughter that was half a song. When that lofty champion came striding, Tizzo sprang a step to meet him, turned the sword-stroke with an incredibly deft counter, and then hit right upwards with the reverse of the swing of his ax. Under the arm, where the steel joints of the armor were multiplied and the steel itself was thin, Tizzo struck; and the ax crunched through the iron as through brittle wood, clove the flesh, crushed through the shoulder bone. A stroke incredible, considering that it was struck with the upward sway of the ax.
Marco della Penna, feeling himself so struck, so maimed and ruined for life that he never again could wield a weapon, dropped his sword and tried to break in with his dagger at Tizzo. But a hammer stroke from the back of the ax stopped his frightful screaming and laid him senseless.
Here there was a mere instant of pause, partly because a man of such importance had fallen, and partly because reinforcements were certainly coming at once out of the house. There was no occasion, it seemed, for men to put themselves in further danger from that uncanny, blue-bladed ax. Besides, Baron Henry of Melrose had leaned, weak as he was, and picked up the great fallen sword of della Penna. This he now managed to poise above his head, given strength and control of his body by the battle heat that was in him.
“Melrose! Melrose!” he thundered, and made the m
en of della Penna shrink a step farther back.
At the same instant there came a most astonishing change. For the battle cry of the Englishman was echoed by a shrill cry, “Melrose! Melrose! A rescue! Melrose!”
And over the paved street rattled the hoofs of several horses. Right at the crowd came a single rider, young, slender, shouting the battle-cry of the baron; and Tizzo recognized the voice of the Lady Beatrice. Her horse, and those she led, were trained battle chargers. They did not hesitate to strike into the crowd, rearing, smashing out with their hoofs, and the della Penna men did not abide that charge.
Most of them, perhaps, felt that it was forefront of a massed attack. Hardly any of them, probably, were aware that there were only four horses and that only a single saddle was filled of all the four.
Straight in to the baron pushed the girl. He grappled at the horn of a saddle with his hands; the strength of Tizzo heaved him up until he was suddenly straddling the back of a horse, grasping at the familiar reins. Effort that should have killed another man in his condition seemed merely to have warmed his blood and brain.
“A Melrose! Melrose!” he shouted again, and vainly tried to sway the big two-handed sword again.
There was no need for more fighting. The men of della Penna had a chance to see, now, the slightness of the rescue party and they were running back to the attack, but the street was open and the three rushed away up it, leaving only yells of furious despair behind; and through that outcry, Tizzo recognized the voice of Jeronimo della Penna himself.
Disappointed malice would surely burn the heart of the man to a cinder.
CHAPTER XII.
TIZZO PAYS A VISIT.
ON THE PAINTED walls of two sides of the room were magnificent murals. Th other two walls of the room were so broken by doors and windows that no large frescoes could be painted on them, but still they glowed with the color of smaller compositions. The bed, built up like a separate house, was curtained with green tapestry that showed a hawking scene, the hunt flowing through the midst of the beautiful Umbrian hills.
Tizzo, looking over this luxury of beauty with the eye of a connoisseur, made a few paces back and forth through the room. The dimness of the night lamp concealed half the splendor of the colors and made them thin as a reflection in wavering water. However, for a moment he took breath after the climb he had just made. And the scenes of the della Penna house grew distant and unimportant.
At last he stepped to the bed and drew the curtain.
Antonio Bardi slept there in the midst of a troubled dream, one clenched hand thrown above his head. He had changed since the night when he joined the traitors at the Great Betrayal which had slain so many of the Baglioni. He looked older. His face was thin and even in sleep expressed a settled unhappiness.
“Antonio!” murmured Tizzo.
Young Bardi was wakened suddenly even by that quiet voice. He sat up with a start, snatching a dagger from under the sheet.
“Wait for me, comrades—” he called out.
Then, recovering from his dream, he stared at Tizzo. The dagger dropped from his grip — slowly he stretched out both his hands.
“Tizzo, it has been my prayer that you would come to me, ever since the news came that you, madman that you are, had entered the city.”
He rose, flinging a thin robe about him, thrusting his feet into slippers. Joy made him young again, as he saw his friend. He ran to the doors of the room and bolted them.
“How is it with you, brother?” he asked Tizzo, but then he answered his own question, saying: “But I see that you are well and I know that you are happy. You are in the enemy’s country. Every breath you take is drawn in danger. Every minute may be your last. And therefore you are happier than kings.”
“And you, Antonio?” asked Tizzo.
Bardi sighed. “Do you remember how you found me in this house not so many weeks ago?” he asked. “Do you remember that I was dying of the plague, Tizzo, and that a casket of the family jewels had been spilled out half on the table and half on the floor? Wealth would not help me, then, because famine and the plague were eating me like two wolves. And then you came to save me — you, a stranger, when no man of my own blood dared to enter the house on account of the poison in the air. Well, Tizzo, there is a poison in the air now. It kills me as surely as the plague. It is the poison of treason. And I am the traitor!” He threw up his clenched fists.
“But the cold-blooded devil, della Penna, knows that my heart is not with him. He watches me day and night. He fears that at any moment I may gather all the wealth I can carry and with it slip away to join the army of Giovan Paolo.”
“No, brother,” said Tizzo. “You have a harder part than that. You must stay inside the city.”
“I? Why do you say that, Tizzo? I tell you, I could make my peace with Giovan Paolo for all the troubles that have passed between us.”
“You could,” said Tizzo, “but if you try to escape, you’ll find it a hard thing to take away even your own body, to say nothing of anything else. Besides, you can help Giovan Paolo more by remaining inside the town. Have you heard from one or two people this same night?”
“Why do you ask?” said Bardi. He peered with a worn and anxious face at his friend.
“A great lady, for one,” said Tizzo.
BARDI, starting, seemed about to check himself and then answered frankly: “I have seen her, Tizzo.”
“And a man with her, perhaps — a man who has been very close to me?”
“Luigi Falcone. Yes. I have seen them both. Was your hand behind that, also?”
“This is the point: Can I return to Giovan Paolo and tell him that he has strong friends inside the city?”
“It would be truer to say that his strong friends in the city wish that they were outside, and riding in his ranks.”
“You must see, Antonio, that one friend inside the city could be worth more than five hundred men-at-arms in his ranks. He has not strength enough to storm Perugia. It stands on its hill like an iron fist raised. There are more armed men inside it than Giovan Paolo can collect. And Jeronimo della Penna is watching over the town like a cat over a dish of milk. The chains are fastened across the streets every night. The walls are manned. The gates are guarded. Della Penna handles everything as though Perugia were besieged by a great army. And how can we break in against such precautions? Only through friends inside the town. We have those friends — you, Falcone, the Lady Atlanta. Working together, you can win some control over one of the gates. By bribery or by personal influence you may seduce some of the guards. Then, from the top of your house, fly a flag of some sort. Several flags, if you wish. But a red one among the rest. The direction towards which it points will indicate to us which of the city gates you have mastered. And when you fly the flag, we shall know that on that same night you expect us.”
“Aye,” said Antonio Bardi. “It is dangerous work, but it could be done. I am suspected; so is Falcone. All who have been your friends are hated now like so many poisoned wells inside Perugia. But we — and the Lady, who has the courage of a man — may be able to do these things.”
“You must, Antonio.”
“We shall, then,” said Bardi.
A rumor of noise broke upwards through the house; there was a sudden tapping at the door of Bardi’s room.
“Hide, Tizzo!” breathed Antonio Bardi. “There is no servant I can trust. They are all in the pay of the devil, della Penna!”
Tizzo, casting one glance at the window through which he had entered, nevertheless stepped back behind the high tapestries which draped the bed. He heard the bolts of the door slide, then a breathless voice exclaiming: “Signore, they have come! The men of—”
The tramping of armored men followed; then the voice of Mateo Marozzo was sounding through the room.
“I greet you, Bardi, in the name of Jeronimo della Penna, to know where you have hidden away the traitor, Tizzo!”
The flesh of Tizzo congealed as he listened.
Th
en he heard Bardi answering, calmly: “Since the night when the Baglioni were expelled, you should know that there is no friendship between Tizzo and me. He is a sword in the hand of Giovan Paolo, and that sword is pointed at my throat, along with all the rest of the danger which the Baglioni are gathering, for the attack on the city. What sort of nonsense is this, Marozzo, to come with armed men into my house at night and ask for Tizzo? Even if he were a hawk, he would not dare to fly over the walls of Perugia!”
THEN he added: “What’s happened? Where has there been fighting? Or has a horse kicked you in the face, Marozzo?”
“The damned villain, the murdering Tizzo has been at me by treachery and trickery!” exclaimed Marozzo. “But the end of him has come. He will never leave Perugia alive! They are doubling the guard on the walls, and he is caught like a bird in a net. He and the English Melrose!”
“Melrose lies in the dungeon of della Penna,” said Bardi. “Do you have to man the walls to keep him from escaping? Aren’t there irons to load him with?”
“He was loaded with iron,” said Marozzo, “but the fiend, the wizard Tizzo entered the prison and cut the irons from the body of Melrose.”
“Impossible!” cried young Bardi.
“You say impossible — I say impossible — but the thing is done! Melrose has been taken from the torture chamber at the bottom of the prison. Taken away by one man, even though his great bulk was so wrenched by the rack that he had hardly the strength to stand up. Carried away by that lean ferret, that Tizzo — God, I go mad when I think of it! They are gone! They are gone! Bardi, if you give them shelter your head will fall the next day.”
“I know Melrose,” said Bardi. “Not even a giant could have dragged his helpless bulk up the long stairs of della Penna’s cellars.”
“Not a giant, but a Tizzo could manage the thing. It has been done. And the work is signed by the true signature of Tizzo. With his shoulder shorn almost from his body, young della Penna lies under the care of the doctors, ruined for life. He must exist with one arm all his days.”