And he held out his hand.
In silence Conrad drew the weapon.
Mastino took it, broke it, threw it on the floor.
'And now go,' he said.
At last Conrad found his voice.
'Lord!' he cried, 'let me stay.'
'Go,' said Mastino.
'I will stay,' faltered Conrad, 'and amend my fault.' But della Scala turned his back on him.
'Go to Visconti,' he flashed. 'Tisio plays chess almost as well as Vincenzo.'
The taunt made speech come more easily. 'No man can ask more than another's humiliation, that other suing humbly for pardon—'
'I did not ask so much,' said Mastino, his back still to him. 'You are unhurt.'
And the Count glanced at della Scala's face, and saw a little of what he had done; that speech was useless.
He moved to go, murmuring something with bent head; at the door he turned again. 'Della Scala,' he began, 'I—'
'I will never willingly see your face again,' interrupted Mastino. 'Go and join my other allies—in Milan.'
Conrad drew himself up.
'God helping me, I will go to Milan,' he said. 'I will further your cause in Milan itself—even though I leave with you my sword.'
Still Mastino stood motionless, and slowly Conrad passed through the door, and down the stairs, through the soldiery that turned their backs—cast out. As the door clashed to behind the Count, Mastino turned passionately and strode into the inner room, not knowing what he did, so great the agony of his helpless fury and despair.
A gloomy window gave a view upon the open country.
Della Scala strode to it; little he heeded the gloomy couch and the stained floor. He saw only the green plain of Lombardy, and his own diminished tents, lessened by the better half. He struck his hand against the window-frame violently—Visconti had triumphed!
This evening had he meant to seize Milan—the evening of this very day; and, behold, now it was all to be done again, the weary, weary waiting, the watching, the planning, the soothing his allies, the making good Carrara's treachery; and meanwhile—Isotta!
Della Scala dropped his head into his hands with a cry wrung from his heart. 'Isotta! Isotta!'
The sunlight fell too on the crumpled parchment on the floor, and Mastino, raising his head, saw it lying there and ground it beneath his heel.
'Am I to be for ever laughed at and betrayed?' he cried. 'Ever served by traitors and leagued with fools? Shall I never learn I trust too much?' He looked around the chamber, and thought, with a bitterness beyond expression, that only a few hours before Visconti had passed through it.
Della Scala leaned against the wall; the very sunlight seemed black, the very sky hopeless. Yet his spirit rose against his fate.
He drew out and kissed the little locket he wore around his neck, the pearl locket that always hung there. Then suddenly rousing himself and walking blindly forward, opening one door in mistake for another, he found himself at the top of two steps, looking down into a chapel. For a moment, his brain reeling and sick, he stepped back, bewildered, doubting what he saw.
The place was high and dome-shaped, with plain stone walls, lit by two windows facing each other, but shrouded in dark hangings that admitted only a faint, cold light.
The air was damp and vault-like, and the room itself bare of any furniture or adornment save a purple hassock, and two lamps of rusty gold that hung by long, blackened chains from the ceiling. Opposite the entrance hung against the stone wall a purple curtain, and before it a large crucifix, crudely painted. The dim light just struck its dismal colouring, and to Mastino's fevered fancy the dead Christ seemed to twist and writhe along His contorted body.
The lamps were out, and the trace of incense in the air faint. Della Scala entered softly, catching his breath painfully, the terror of religion strong within him.
On the purple hassock he knelt, with clasped hands, before the disfigured Christ, his heart rising to his lips in passionate prayer.
'Lord, thou understandest! Because I cannot deck thy altars with the gold of victory, thou wilt not forsake me, thou wilt have mercy on me and on her!'
And he stretched out his arms to the figure in an exaltation of trust and hope. 'Even as I spare those who betray, so wilt thou spare her, O Christ!' He flung himself from his knees, face downward on the stones, in a tumult of hope and trust. Around the folds of Mastino's cloak lay the leaves of some dead roses that had fluttered at his movement, from forgotten wreaths, hanging brown against the wall.
Mastino rose, eager for some answer—some assent. But the dead Christ was silent. Mastino could see the cracking paint on the ribs, the tawdry gold of the halo, and he came still nearer in a strange desperation.
Half-hidden in shadow, two faces looked down on him—expressionless, stone, the angels on the wall.
Mastino looked from them to the crucifix, and his fervent faith sank, chilled.
'Stone,' he murmured in his heart. 'Stone and paint,' and he noticed the empty lamps that should be blazing with eternal fire, and he cried aloud in bitterness. 'Men keep those alight, and without them the eternal fire dies! Stone angels and a painted God! What help in them?' And he dropped again upon the floor. 'The lamps burn bright on Visconti's altars, and his saints smile—for the painter limned them so.'
He turned from the dismantled chapel and rushed up the two steps, half distraught.
In the outer chamber the sunlight dropped strong and golden, and Mastino shut the door of the dark and gloomy chapel behind him with a shudder.
'Lord!' cried an eager voice. 'Lord!'
It was Tomaso and his father.
'Did ye fear for me, Ligozzi?' said della Scala kindly. 'I have been praying for a patient heart.' And the two who loved him looked at him awhile and could say nothing.
'My lord,' began Tomaso again with a timid eagerness, 'there is news—'
Tomaso,' said his father, 'thy news can wait.'
Mastino picked up his gauntlet from the deep window-seat where he laid it down, and fastening it on, looked at Ligozzi.
'What hast thou to say, Ligozzi? Have any of the men returned?'
Ligozzi stood fidgeting with his cap, looking uneasily at the ground.
'Come,' and Mastino smiled sadly, 'I am used to bad news, Ligozzi.'
'Some few men have indeed returned from Giacomo's army, my lord, some four score—'
'Some four score!' repeated della Scala. 'Are there so many as four score that will not serve Visconti?'
'They have strange tales, my lord. They say Carrara himself is dead.'
'Carrara dead!' cried Mastino with a sudden fierceness, savage as a bite. 'Now, I had promised myself to kill Carrara. Who has forestalled me?'
'It is said—Visconti himself—they do not know.'
'And the traitor dead,' broke in della Scala, 'was there not one—not one to lead the men back to me again? Visconti, single-handed and unarmed, was allowed to take an army into Milan?'
'Alas, my lord, not only Carrara, his captains too, as it appears have all been bought'
'Tell me no more,' cried Mastino. 'I am alone to blame. I cannot learn to deal with traitors.'
'As for Count von Schulembourg, the wretched German,' continued Ligozzi, 'he has left the camp.' As he spoke, Ligozzi glanced through the window at the tents. 'He took no one with him, but, ordering his Germans to fight as one man to the death for you, he rode along the road to Milan.'
'Oh cried Mastino, with a great cry wrung from his soul. He rested his hand a moment on Ligozzi's shoulder. 'I am well-nigh sick, Ligozzi,' he said. 'The empty-headed and the villain prosper, and I—and mine—go to the wall.'
Tomaso stole forward. Della Scala noticed him and turned kindly.
'Something to tell me, sayest thou?' he asked.
Tomaso's eyes were full of tears. For some moments he could not find his voice.
'He hath discovered some secret passage; useless, I fear me,' said his father.
'Nay, Father, I tel
l thee it leadeth to the city! Today, lord, as I explored it, I found stored there some rolls of silk, new and clean; together with some earths such as I have heard say painters use.'
Della Scala started. He found the news not so unimportant as Ligozzi had.
'Go on, Tomaso,' he said, and kept his half-closed eyes upon the ground.
'Indeed, my lord, it must be some old subway into Milan. 'Tis wide enough to admit six abreast, and recently used, as it opens some mile and a half outside the city. I have not yet penetrated to the extremity. Lord, think of it—it must open into Milan!'
Della Scala's worn face flushed involuntarily, his eyes turned to the closed door of the chapel. Had he belied the stone angels—the extinguished lamps?
'This seems great news, Tomaso,' he said slowly. 'I will see into it.' He moved as he spoke. 'My other gauntlet, Ligozzi?'
'I cannot see it, lord.'
'Ah!' said Mastino suddenly. 'I left it in the chapel!'
Tomaso had already departed for the gauntlet, Mastino, following to the door, saw him stoop and lift it from the ground. Tomaso handed him the ponderous glove, and, as Mastino took it, he stifled the cry on his lips, and turned away to clasp it to his heart.
For inside his glove, almost hidden in the velvet lining, lay a soft white rose: a sign from heaven.
* * *
* * *
Chapter 20. — In the Duke's Absence
'My chance has come,' said Valentine.
A day had passed since Visconti had ridden so wildly to the western gate, and as yet he had not returned.
The soldiers, weary and wounded, had reeled that night into the palace courtyards, de Lana at their head, expecting to find Visconti there before them. They had missed him in the wild fray—the Germans had been driven back from the walls without their prisoners—had not the Duke returned?
Neither then nor as yet, near a day after the sortie. Doubtless he, victorious as ever, was reconnoitring some stronghold of the enemy, or their encampments outside Milan.
Still, in the palace some were getting anxious; there was no word, no message. Who, in the Duke's absence, ruled Milan?
The question suggested itself among others to Valentine Visconti.
She put it to herself.
'I rule Milan, and I will give myself my freedom by it, whether Gian be alive or dead, returning now or never.'
It was late afternoon, and Valentine had formed her plan; with courage and skill she made no doubt of success. To enter her brother's private room was the first step.
All day Valentine had plotted some means of accomplishing this.
The rooms were locked, and Gian wore the key around his neck.
The Visconti palace was part old, part new; the great circular tower in which Isotta was confined, the low heavy stone buildings that surrounded it were the only remaining portions of the ancient gothic castle.
The new building, bright in yellow and pink tiles, was supported on low, horse-shoe arches, and gave straightly on the courtyard in front and the gardens at the rear—the whole encircled by a great wall.
Detached from the palace, standing alone in the grounds, was a high, square brick tower, the highest building in Milan, and from the summit there floated night and day the banner of the Viper.
Along the second storey of the palace ran the open arcade of corridor, a wide and pleasant walk, paved with black and white stone, looking on the garden through the clustered columns that supported it, richly ornate with carvings.
A private entrance to Visconti's rooms opened on to this corridor.
The banqueting hall gave upon it also, and to Valentine Visconti, standing between the arches looking from the fair garden back to the closed doors, a thought occurred.
In her wild intention to escape, she had only one ally, Adrian, her page, feeble and powerless at best, but devoted to her with an utter devotion that might be worth much.
Valentine had confided in him, since she must have help, if only the help of speech; and now, of a sudden, his use appeared.
She had withdrawn from the observation of her women and the court, in pretence of praying for her brother's safety, and no one was with her.
'Adrian!' she called softly, 'Adrian!' She had privately bidden him follow her, and well she knew he was not far away. The boy came forward eagerly.
'Hush!' said Valentine. 'Do not speak—listen—I have need of thee; wilt thou serve me even to the death, for it may be that?'
'You know I do not heed death, lady,' replied the page with glad pride. 'Anything that may serve you will make me for ever happy.'
'Follow me,' said Valentine, and stepped on to the balcony. 'Now walk behind, and as if I were not speaking to thee. There may be sharp eyes upon us in the garden.'
The sun, late as it was, fall between the pillars in strong bars of gold, and Valentine raised her ivory fan as if to shield her from the heat, but in reality to conceal the movement of her lips, in case there might be watchers.
'I must procure an entrance to my brother's rooms,' she said, speaking low over her shoulder: 'They are locked. No key will fit them. I cannot force the entrance in the palace. Still I must enter. You are listening, Adrian?'
'With all my soul, lady!'
Valentine kept her eyes upon the garden; there was no one there to see. The tower was not as yet finished, and so uninhabited; the garden itself was empty; still Valentine kept her gaze before her and spoke without turning her head.
'At any moment the Duke may return; or, if he does not, there will be sore confusion I cannot cope with; it must be done.'
They had traversed almost the whole length of the corridor, and Valentine suddenly stopped.
'There, this door,' said Valentine, 'into the Duke's rooms, Adrian,' and she rested her hand against it as she spoke.
It was a folding door, opening in the middle, firmly bolted from the inside, and appeared as hopeless as the great entrance to the suite within the palace, though unguarded.
Either side of it were deep-set, circular windows, ringed round and round with carving and ornamentation, placed too high to reach and too small to gain admission by.
The door itself was of wood, as firm and heavy as iron, clamped with gilded metal, and immovable to the touch. 'Does it look hopeless?' whispered Valentine.
Adrian would not have said so for his life.
'You would force it?' he asked eagerly.
'Yes, hush!' Valentine leaned through the low arch and looked into the garden; as before, all was quiet; the life and bustle of the palace came through the front today, awaiting news of the absent Duke.
She turned again with glistening eyes.
'Yes, I would force it—and I will show you how, Adrian.' Half-way up the door, deep set in the thin anti delicate foliage of the carving, were two circular windows, one in each panel.
'Can you reach them?' asked Valentine. 'I am a hand too short.'
By means of standing on the base of one of the side pillars of the door, Adrian could easily touch the whole span of the glass.
'Now, do I break it?' whispered the page.
'Yes,' returned Visconti's sister. 'But wait, there may be some soldier on hidden guard.'
She looked around cautiously.
'I see no one,' she continued. 'Now, only through this one arch canst thou be noticed from the garden, and there I will stand, with my open fan; now quick—thy dagger handle.'
She turned her back to him and raised her hand against the stonework of the arch, her mantle so falling over her arm that anyone, looking thither, could have seen nothing save her figure.
Adrian leaned forward and struck the glass a violent blow with the handle of his dagger; it was hard, and resisted, but at a second blow shivered. The page tore away the metal framework, and slipping his arm through, thrust back the first bolt. But it was fastened in three places, and the other two were not so easy. Straining up to his full height, the page forced half his body through the broken window and succeeded in slipping back t
he second bolt; the third was almost at the bottom of the tall door, nor was the opening he had forced large enough for him to do more than admit his arm and shoulder through. He still held his dagger in his hand, and grasping it at the end of the blade, struck violently downward at the bolt head with the handle. It did not move the first time, nor the second, nor the-third; but at the fourth blow it suddenly shot back and the door was open. Adrian struggled through the window, backward, on to his feet, his hand and arm torn in several places, dizzy with the strain.
Valentine turned with a glad cry.
'Now stand thou in the archway,' she said; 'and close the door behind me and keep watch; our one need is haste!'
The page pushed the despoiled door open and Valentine sped through, closing it carefully after her; the broken window would not be noticed from the garden, but an open door might. The space she entered seemed so dark after the bright glare outside that at first she could see nothing.
But soon the light sufficed to show Valentine this was not the room she wanted.
It was gorgeously decorated, frescoes covered the walls, the ceiling was richly gilt and painted, the floor glass mosaic, the furniture florid and ornate.
Valentine glanced around hurriedly: at one end was a door, and trying it, she found it opened easily, leading into another splendid apartment—still not containing what she sought.
Hastening on through a door, not only unlocked, but standing ajar, she found herself in a small, sombre room, hung with purple and gold; its principal furniture the secretary's table, Visconti's chair, and the imposing black carved bureau.
This was the room she wanted; and on the bureau, flung down in haste, a bunch of keys.
Valentine seized them with trembling hands; they were the keys of the drawers, and one by one she flung them open, so possessed with excitement she could hardly stand. Gian was not in the palace, yet she seemed to feel his eyes upon her; to hear his step; catch his low whisper of her name; feel his touch upon her shoulder.
In one drawer were the parchment passports, some of them, for convenience, already signed with Visconti's name. Hastily Valentine thrust three into the bosom of her dress. But where were the palace keys?
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