Books: Love at Arms

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"But, Madonna----" began Fortemani, paling under the tan of his rugged
countenance.

Gonzaga silenced him.

"Your words are vain. You have been insubordinate, and for
insubordination there is but one penalty."

The bully hung his head, deeming himself lost, and lacking the wit to
retort as Francesco unexpectedly retorted for him.

"Madonna, there your adviser is at fault. The charge against the man is
wrong. There has been no insubordination."

"How?" she questioned, turning to the Count. "None, say you?"

"A Solomon is arisen," sneered Gonzaga. Then peevishly; "Waste not words
with him, Madonna," he pursued. "Our business is with Fortemani."

"But stay, my good Gonzaga. He may be right."

"Your heart is over-tender," answered Romeo impatiently. But she had
turned from him now, and was begging Francesco to make his meaning
clearer.

"Had he raised his hand against you, Madonna, or even against Messer
Gonzaga, or had he disobeyed an order given him by either of you, then,
and then only, could there be question of insubordination. But he has
done none of these things. He is guilty of grossly misusing my servant,
it is true, but there is no insubordination in that, since he was under
no promise of loyalty to Lanciotto."

They stared at him as though his words were words of recondite wisdom
instead of the simple statement of a plain case. Gonzaga crestfallen,
Fortemani with a light of hope and wonder shining in his eyes, and
Madonna with a faint nodding of the head that argued agreement. They
wrangled a while yet, Gonzaga bitter and vindictive and rashly scornful
of both Francesco and Fortemani. But the Count so resolutely held the
ground he had taken that in the end Valentina shrugged her shoulders,
acknowledged herself convinced, and bade Francesco deliver judgment.

"You are in earnest, Madonna?" quoth Francesco in surprise, whilst a
black scowl disfigured the serenity of Gonzaga's brow.

"I am indeed, Deal with him as you account best and most just, and it
shall fare with him precisely as you ordain."

Francesco turned to the men-at-arms. "Unbind him, one of you," he said
shortly.

"I believe that you are mad," cried Gonzaga, in a frenzy, but his mood
sprang rather from the chagrin of seeing his interloper prevail where he
had failed. "Madonna, do not heed him."

"I pray you let be, my good Gonzaga," she answered soothingly, and
Gonzaga, ready to faint from spite, obeyed her.

"Leave him there, and go," was Paolo's next order to the men, and they
departed, leaving the astonished Fortemani standing alone, unbound and
sheepish.

"Now mark me well, Messer Fortemani," Francesco admonished him. "You did
a cowardly thing, unworthy of the soldier that you would have men believe
you. And for that, I think, the punishment you received at my hands has
been sufficient, in that the indignity to which I submitted you has
shaken your standing with your followers. Go back to them now and
retrieve what you have lost, and see that in the future you are worthier.
Let this be a lesson to you, Messer Fortemani. You have gone perilously
near hanging, and you have had it proved to you that in moments of peril
your men are ready to raise their hands against you. Why is that?
Because you have not sought their respect. You have been too much a
fellow of theirs in their drinking and their brawling, instead of holding
yourself aloof with dignity."

"Lord, I have learnt my lesson!" answered the cowed bully.

"Then act upon it. Resume your command, and discipline your men to a
better order. Madonna, here, and Messer Gonzaga will forget this thing.
Is it not so, Madonna? Is it not so, Messer Gonzaga?"

Swayed by his will and by an intuition that told her that to whatever end
he might be working, he was working wisely, Valentina gave Fortemani the
assurance Francesco begged, and Gonzaga was forced grudgingly to follow
her example.

Fortemani bowed low, his face pale and his limbs trembling as not even
fear had made them tremble. He advanced towards Valentina, and sinking
on one knee, he humbly kissed the hem of her gown.

"Your clemency, Madonna, shall give you no regret. I will serve you to
the death, lady, and you, lord." At the last words he raised his eyes to
Francesco's calm face. Then, without so much as a glance at the
disappointed Gonzaga, he rose, and bowing again--a very courtier--he
withdrew.

The closing of the door was to Gonzaga a signal to break out in a torrent
of bitter reproofs against Francesco, reproofs that were stemmed midway
by Valentina.

"You are beside yourself, Gonzaga," she exclaimed. "What has been done,
has been done with my sanction. I do not doubt the wisdom of it."

"Do you not? God send you never may! But that man will know no peace
until he is avenged on us."

"Messer Gonzaga," returned Francesco, with an incomparable politeness, "I
am an older man than are you, and maybe that I have seen more warring and
more of such men. There is a certain valour lurks in that bully for all
his blustering boastfulness and swagger, and there is, too, a certain
sense of justice. Mercy he has had to-day, and time will show how right
I am in having pardoned him in Madonna's name. I tell you, sir, that
nowhere has Monna Valentina a more faithful servant than he is now likely
to become."

"I believe you, Messer Francesco. Indeed, I am sure your act was wisdom
itself."

Gonzaga gnawed his lip.

"I may be wrong," said he, in grudging acquiescence. "I hope, indeed, I
may be."

CHAPTER XVI

GONZAGA UNMASKS

The four great outer walls of Roccaleone stood ranged into a mighty
square, of which the castle proper occupied but half. The other half,
running from north to south, was a stretch of garden, broken into three
terraces. The highest of these was no more than a narrow alley under the
southern wall, roofed from end to end by a trellis of vines on beams
blackened with age, supported by uprights of granite, square and roughly
hewn.

A steep flight of granite steps, weedy in the interstices of the old
stone, and terminating in a pair of couchant lions at the base, led down
to the middle terrace, which was called the upper garden. This was split
in twain by a very gallery of gigantic box trees running down towards the
lower terrace, and bearing eloquent witness to the age of that old
garden. Into this gallery no sun ever penetrated by more than a furtive
ray, and on the hottest day in summer a grateful cool dwelt in its green
gloom. Rose gardens spread on either side of it, but neglect of late had
left them rank with weeds.

The third and lowest of these terraces, which was longer and broader than
either of those above, was no more than a smooth stretch of lawn,
bordered by acacias and plane trees, from the extreme corner of which
sprang a winding, iron-railed staircase of stone, leading to an eerie
which corresponded diagonally with the Lion's Tower, where the Count of
Aquila was lodged.

On this green lawn Valentina's ladies and a page beguiled the eventide in
a game of bowls, their clumsiness at the unwonted pastime provoking the
good-humoured banter of Peppe, who looked on, and their own still better-
humoured laughter.

Fortemani, too, was there, brazening out the morning's affair, which it
almost seemed he must have forgotten, so self-possessed and mightily at
his ease was he. He was of the kind with whom shame strikes never very
deeply, and he ruffled it gaily there, among the women, rolling his
fierce eyes to ogle them seductively, tossing his gaudy new cloak with a
high-born disdain--gloriously conscious that it would not rend in the
tossing, like the cloaks to which grim Circumstance had lately accustomed
him--and strutting it like any cock upon a dunghill.

But the lesson he had learnt was not likely to share the same
forgetfulness. Indeed, its fruits were to be observed already in the
more orderly conduct of his men, four of whom, partisan on shoulder, were
doing duty on the walls of the castle. They had greeted his return
amongst them with sneers and derisive allusions to his immersion, but
with a few choicely-aimed blows he had cuffed the noisiest into silence
and a more subservient humour. He had spoken to them in a rasping,
truculent tone, issuing orders that he meant should be obeyed, unless the
disobeyer were eager for a reckoning with him.

Indeed, he was an altered man, and when that night his followers, having
drunk what he accounted enough for their good, and disregarding his
orders that they should desist and get them to bed, he went in quest of
Monna Valentina. He found her in conversation with Francesco and
Gonzaga, seated in the loggia of the dining-room. They had been there
since supper, discussing the wisdom of going or remaining, of fleeing or
standing firm to receive Gian Maria. Their conference was interrupted
now by Ercole with his complaint.

She despatched Gonzaga to quell the men, a course that Fortemani treated
to a covert sneer. The fop went rejoicing at this proof that her
estimate of his commanding qualities had nowise suffered by contrast with
those of that swashbuckling Francesco. But his pride rode him to a
bitter fall.

They made a mock of his remonstrances, and when he emulated Francesco's
methods, addressing them with sharp ferocity, and dubbing them beasts and
swine, they caught the false ring of his fierceness, which was as unlike
the true as the ring of lead is unlike that of silver. They jeered him
insults, they mimicked his tenor voice, which excitement had rendered
shrill, and they bade him go thrum a lute for his lady's delectation, and
leave men's work to men.

His anger rose, and they lost patience; and from showing their teeth in
laughter, they began to show them in snarls. At this his ferocity
deserted him. Brushing past Fortemani, who stood cold and contemptuous
by the doorway, watching the failure he had expected, he returned with
burning cheeks and bitter words to Madonna Valentina.

She was dismayed at the tale he bore her, magnified to cover his own
shame. Francesco sat quietly drumming on the sill, his eyes upon the
moonlit garden below, and never by word or sign suggesting that he might
succeed where Romeo had failed. At last she turned to him.

"Could you----?" she began, and stopped, her eyes wandering back to
Gonzaga, loath to further wound a pride that was very sore already. On
the instant Francesco rose.

"I might try, Madonna," he said quietly, "although Messer Gonzaga's
failure gives me little hope. And yet, it may be that he has taken the
keen edge from their assurance, and that, thus, an easier task awaits me.
I will try, Madonna." And with that he went.

"He will succeed, Gonzaga," she said, after he had gone. "He is a man of
war, and knows the words to which these fellows have no answer."

"I wish him well of his errand," sneered Gonzaga, his pretty face white
now with sullenness. "And I'll wager you he fails."

But Valentina disdained the offer whose rashness was more than proven
when, at the end of some ten minutes, Francesco re-entered, as
imperturbable as when he went.

"They are quiet now, Madonna," he announced.

She looked at him questioningly. "How did you accomplish it?" she
inquired.

"I had a little difficulty," he said, "yet not over-much." His eye roved
to Gonzaga, and he smiled. "Messer Gonzaga is too gentle with them. Too
true a courtier to avail himself of the brutality that is necessary when
we deal with brutes. You should not disdain to use your hands upon
them," he admonished the fop in all seriousness, and without a trace of
irony. Nor did Gonzaga suspect any.

"I, soil my hands on that vermin?" he cried, in a voice of horror. "I
would die sooner."

"Or else soon after," squeaked Peppe, who had entered unobserved.
"Patrona mia, you should have seen this paladin," he continued, coming
forward. "Why, Orlando was never half so furious as he when he stood
there telling them what manner of dirt they were, and bidding them to bed
ere he drove them with a broomstick."

"And they went?" she asked.

"Not at first," said the fool. "They had drunk enough to make them very
brave, and one who was very drunk was so brave as to assault him. But
Ser Francesco fells him with his hands, and calling Fortemani he bids him
have the man dropped in a dungeon to grow sober. Then, without waiting
so much as to see his orders carried out, he stalks away, assured that no
more was needed. Nor was it. They rose up, muttering a curse or two,
maybe--yet not so loud that it might reach the ears of Fortemani--and got
themselves to bed."

She looked again at Francesco with admiring eyes, and spoke of his
audacity in commending terms. This he belittled; but she persisted.

"You have seen much warring, sir," she half-asked, halfasserted.

"Why, yes, Madonna."

And here the writhing Gonzaga espied his opportunity.

"I do not call to mind your name, good sir," he purred.

Francesco half-turned towards him, and for all that his mind was working
with a lightning quickness, his face was indolently calm. To disclose
his true identity he deemed unwise, for all connected with the Sforza
brood must earn mistrust at the hands of Valentina. It was known that
the Count of Aquila stood high in the favour of Gian Maria, and the news
of his sudden fall and banishment could not have reached Guidobaldo's
niece, who had fled before the knowedge of it was in Urbino. His name
would awaken suspicion, and any story of disgrace and banishment might be
accounted the very mask to fit a spy. There was this sleek, venomous
Gonzaga, whom she trusted and relied on, to whisper insidiously into her
ear.

"My name," he said serenely, "is, as I have told you. Francesco."

"But you have another?" quoth Valentina, interest prompting the question.

"Why, yes, but so closely allied to the first as to be scarce worth
reciting. I am Francesco Franceschi, a wandering knight."

"And a true one, as I know." She smiled at him so sweetly that Gonzaga
was enraged.

"I have not heard the name before," he murmured, adding:

"Your father was----?"

"A gentleman of Tuscany."

"But not at Court?" suggested Romeo.

"Why, yes, at Court."

Then with a sly insolence that brought the blood to Francesco's cheeks,
though to the chaste mind of Valentina's it meant nothing--"Ah!" he
rejoined. "But then, your mother----?"

"Was more discriminating, sir, than yours," came the sharp answer, and
from the shadows the fool's smothered burst of laughter added gall to it.

Gonzaga rose heavily, drawing a sharp breath, and the two men stabbed
each other with their eyes. Valentina, uncomprehending, looked from one
to the other.

"Sirs, sirs, what have you said?" she cried. "Why all this war of
looks?"

"He is over-quick to take offence, Madonna, for an honest man," was
Gonzaga's answer. "Like the snake in the grass, he is very ready with
his sting when we seek to disclose him."

"For shame, Gonzaga," she cried, now rising too. "What are you saying?
Are you turned witless? Come, sirs, since you are both my friends, be
friends each with the other."

"Most perfect syllogism!" murmured the fool, unheeded.

"And you, Messer Francesco, forget his words. He means them not. He is
very hot of fancy, but sweet at heart, this good Gonzaga."

On the instant the cloud lifted from Francesco's brow.

"Why, since you ask me," he answered, inclining his head, "if he'll but
say he meant no malice by his words, I will confess as much for mine."

Gonzaga, cooling, saw that haply he had gone too fast, and was the
readier to make amends. Yet in his bosom he nursed an added store of
poison, a breath of which escaped him as he was leaving Valentina, and
after Francesco had already gone:

"Madonna," he muttered, "I mistrust that man."

"Mistrust him? Why?" she asked, frowning despite her faith in the
magnificent Romeo.

"I know not why; but it is here. I feel it." And with his hand he
touched the region of his heart. "Say that he is no spy, and call me a
fool."

"Why, I'll do both," she laughed. Then more sternly, added: "Get you to
bed, Gonzaga. Your wits play you false. Peppino, call my ladies."

In the moment that they were left alone he stepped close up to her,
spurred to madness by the jealous pangs he had that day endured. His
face gleamed white in the candlelight, and in his eyes there was a
lurking fierceness that gave her pause.

"Have your way, Madonna," he said, in a concentrated voice; "but to-
morrow, whether we go hence, or whether we stay, he remains not with us."

She drew herself up to the full of her slender, graceful height, her eyes
on a level with Gonzaga's own.

"That," she answered, "is as shall be decreed by me or him."

He breathed sharply, and his voice hardened beyond belief in one usually
so gentle of tone and manner.

"Be warned, Madonna," he muttered, coming so close that with the
slightest swaying she must touch him, "that if this nameless sbirro shall
ever dare to stand 'twixt you and me, by God and His saints, I'll kill
him! Be warned, I say."

And the door re-opening at that moment, he fell back, bowed, and brushing
past the entering ladies, gained the threshold. Here someone tugged at
the prodigious foliated sleeves that spread beside him on the air like
the wings of a bird. He turned, and saw Peppino motioning him to lower
his head.

"A word in your ear, Magnificent. There was a man once went out for wool
that came back shorn."

Angrily cuffing the fool aside, he was gone.

Valentina sank down upon her window-seat, in a turmoil of mingled anger
and amazement that paled her cheek and set her bosom heaving. It was the
first hint of his aims respecting her that Gonzaga had ever dared let
fall, and the condition in which it left her boded ill for his ultimate
success. Her anger he could have borne, had he beheld it, for he would
have laid it to the score of the tone he had taken with her. But her
incredulity that he could indeed have dared to mean that which her senses
told her he had meant, would have shown him how hopeless was his case and
how affronted, how outraged in soul she had been left by this moment of
passionate self-revealing. He would have understood then that in her
eyes he never had been, was never like to be, aught but a servant--and
one, hereafter, that, deeming presumptuous, she would keep at greater
distance.

But he, dreaming little of this as he paced his chamber, smiled at his
thoughts, which flowed with ready optimism. He had been a fool to give
way so soon, perhaps. The season was not yet; the fruit was not ripe
enough for plucking; still, what should it signify that he had given the
tree a slight premonitory shake? A little premature, perhaps, but it
would predispose the fruit to fall. He bethought him of her never-
varying kindness to him, her fond gentleness, and he lacked the wit to
see that this was no more than the natural sweetness that flowed from her
as freely as flows the perfume from the flower--because Nature has so
fashioned it, and not because Messer Gonzaga likes the smell. Lacking
that wit, he went in blissful confidence to bed, and smiled himself
softly to his sleep.

Away in the room under the Lion's Tower, the Count of Aquila, too, paced
his chamber ere he sought his couch, and in his pacing caught sight of
something that arrested his attention, and provoked a smile. In a
corner, among his harness which Lanciotto had piled there, his shield
threw back the light, displaying the Sforza lion quartered with the
Aquila eagle.

"Did my sweet Gonzaga get a glimpse of that he would have no further need
to pry into my parentage," he mused. And dragging the escutcheon from
amongst that heap of armour, he softly opened his window and flung it far
out, so that it dropped with a splash into the moat. That done, he went
to bed, and he, too, fell asleep with a smile upon his lips, and in his
mind a floating vision of Valentina. She needed a strong and ready hand
to guide her in this rebellion against the love-at-arms of Gian Maria,
and that hand he swore should be his, unless she scorned the offer of it.
And so, murmuring her name with a lingering fervour, of whose true
significance he was all-nescient, he sank to sleep, nor waked again until
a thundering at his door aroused him. And to his still dormant senses
came the voice of Lanciotto, laden with hurry and alarm.

"Awake, lord! Up, afoot! We are beset."

CHAPTER XVII

THE ENEMY

The Count leapt from his bed, and hastened to throw wide the door to
admit his servant, who with excited face and voice bore him the news that
Gian Maria had reached Roccaleone in the night, and was now encamped in
the plain before the castle.

He was still at his tale when a page came with the message that Monna
Valentina besought Messer Francesco's presence in the great hall. He
dressed in all haste, and then, with Lanciotto at his heels, he descended
to answer her summons. As he crossed the second courtyard he beheld
Valentina's ladies grouped upon the chapel-steps in excited discussion of
this happening with Fra Domenico, who, in full canonicals, was waiting to
say the morning's Mass. He gave them a courteous "Good morrow," and
passed on to the banqueting-hall, leaving Lanciotto without.

Here he found Valentina in conference with Fortemani. She was pacing the
great room as she talked; but, beyond that, there was no sign of
excitement in her bearing, and if any fear of the issue touched her heart
now that the moment for action was at hand, it was wondrously well-
suppressed. At sight of Francesco, a look that was partly dismay and
partly pleasure lighted her face. She greeted him with such a smile as
she would bestow in that hour upon none but a trusted friend. Then, with
a look of regret:

"I am beyond measure grieved, sir, that you should thus stand committed
to my fortunes. They will have told you that already we are besieged,
and so you will see how your fate is now bound up with ours. For I fear
me there is no road hence for you until Gian Maria raises this siege.
The choice of going or remaining is no longer mine. We must remain, and
fight this battle out."

"At least, lady," he answered readily, gaily almost, "I cannot share your
regrets for me. The act of yours may be a madness, Madonna, but it is
the bravest, sweetest madness that ever was, and I shall be proud to play
my part if you'll assign me one."

"But, sir, I have no claim upon you!"

"The claim that every beset lady has upon a true knight," he assured her.
"I could ask no better employment for these arms of mine than in your
defence against the Duke of Babbiano. I am at your service, and with a
glad heart, Monna Valentina. I have seem something of war, and you may
find me useful."

"Make him Provost of Roccaleone, Madonna," urged Fortemani, whose
gratitude to the man who had saved his life was blent with an admiring
appreciation of his powers, of which the bully had had such practical
experience.

"You hear what Ercole says?" she cried, turning to Francesco with a
sudden eagerness that showed how welcome that suggestion was.

"It were too great an honour," he answered solemnly. "Yet, if you were
to place in my hands that trust, I would defend it to my last breath."

And then, before she could answer him, Gonzaga entered by the side-door,
and frowned to see Francesco there before him. He was a trifle pale, he
carried his cloak on the right shoulder, instead of the left, and in
general his apparel was less meticulous than usual, and showed signs of
hasty donning. With a curt nod to the Count, and an utter ignoring of
Fortemani--who was scowling upon him in memory of yesterday--he bowed low
before Valentina.

"I am distraught, Madonna----" he began, when she cut him short.

"You have little cause to be. Have things fallen out other than we
expected?"

"Perhaps not. Yet I had hoped that Gian Maria would not allow his humour
to carry him so far."

"You had hoped that--after the message Messer Francesco brought us?" And
she looked him over with an eye of sudden understanding. "Yet you
expressed no such hope when you advised this flight to Roccaleone. You
were all for fighting then. A martial ardour consumed you. Whence this
change? Is it the imminence of danger that gives it a reality too grim
for your appetite?"

There was a scorn in her words that wounded him as she meant it should.
His last night's rashness had shown her the need to leave him in no false
opinion of the extent of her esteem, and, in addition, those last words
of his had shown him revealed in a new light, and she liked him the less
by it.

He inclined his head slightly, shame blazing red in his cheeks, that he
should be thus reproved before Fortemani and that upstart Francesco.
That Francesco was an upstart was no longer a matter of surmise with him.
His soul assured him of it.

"Madonna," he said, with some show of dignity, ignoring her gibes, "I
came to bear you news that a herald from Gian Maria craves a hearing.
Shall I hold parley with him for you?"

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