Books: Love at Arms

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There she stopped; again the blood suffused her cheeks as she bethought
her of how fast she talked, and of how bold her words might sound. She
turned slightly from him, and leant now upon the parapet, gazing out into
the night. And as she stood thus, a very ardent voice it was that
whispered in her ear:

"Valentina, by my soul, I love you!" And there that whisper, which
filled her with an ecstasy that was almost painful in its poignancy,
ended sharply as if throttled. Again his hand sought hers, which was
yielded to him as she would have yielded her whole life at his sweet
bidding, and now his voice came less passionately.

"Why delude ourselves with cruel hopes, my Valentina?" he was saying.
"There is the future. There is the time when this siege shall be done
with, and when, Gian Maria having got him home, you will be free to
depart. Whither will you go?"

She looked at him as if she did not understand the question, and her eyes
were troubled, although in such light as there was he could scarce see
this.

"I will go whither you bid me. Where else have I to go?" she added, with
a note of bitterness.

He started. Her answer was so far from what he had expected.

"But your uncle----?"

"What duty do I owe to him? Oh, I have thought of it, and until--until
this morning, it seemed that a convent must be my ultimate refuge. I
have spent most of my young life at Santa Sofia, and the little that I
have seen of the world at my uncle's court scarce invites me to see more
of it. The Mother Abbess loved me a little. She would take me back,
unless----"

She broke off and looked at him, and before that look of absolute and
sweet surrender his senses swam. That she was niece to the Duke of
Urbino he remembered no more than that he was Count of Aquila, well-born,
but of none too rich estate, and certainly no more a match for her in
Guidobaldo's eyes than if he had been the simple knight-errant that he
seemed.

He moved closer to her, his hands--as if obeying a bidding greater than
his will, the bidding of that glance of hers, perhaps--took her by the
shoulders, whilst his whole soul looked at her from his eyes. Then, with
a stifled cry, he caught her to him. For a moment she lay, palpitant,
within his arms, her tall, bronze head on a level with his chin, her
heart beating against his heart. Stooping suddenly, he kissed her on the
lips. She suffered it with an unresistance that invited. But when it
was done, she gently put him from her; and he, obedient to her slightest
wish, curbed the wild ardour of his mood, and set her free.

"Anima mia!" he cried rapturously. "You are mine now, betide what may.
Not Gian Maria nor all the dukes in Christendom shall take you from me."

She set her hand upon his lips to silence him, and he kissed the palm, so
that laughing she drew back again. And now from laughter she passed to a
great solemnity, and with arm outstretched towards the ducal camp: "Win
me a way through those lines," said she, "and bear me away from Urbino--
far away where Guidobaldo's power and the vengeance of Gian Maria may not
follow us--and you shall have won me for your own. But until then, let
there be a truce to--to this, between us. Here is a man's work to be
done, and if I am weak as to-night, I may weaken you, and then we should
both be undone. It is upon your strength I count, Franceschino mio, my
true knight."

He would have answered her. He had much to tell her--who and what he
was. But she pointed to the head of the steps, where a man's figure
loomed.

"Yonder comes the sentinel," she said. "Leave me now, dear Francesco.
Go. It is growing late."

He bowed low before her, obedient ever, like the true knight he was, and
took his leave of her, his soul on fire.

Valentina watched his retreating figure until it had vanished round the
angle of the wall. Then with a profound sigh, that was as a prayer of
thanksgiving for this great good that had come into her life, she leaned
upon the parapet and looked out into the darkness, her cheeks flushed,
her heart still beating high. She laughed softly to herself out of the
pure happiness of her mood. The camp of Gian Maria became a subject for
her scorn. What should his might avail whilst she had such a champion to
defend her now and hereafter?

There was an irony in that siege on which her fancy fastened. By coming
thus in arms against her Gian Maria sought to win her for his wife; yet
all that he had accomplished was to place her in the arms of the one man
whom she had learnt to love by virtue of this very siege. The mellow
warmth of the night, the ambient perfume of the fields were well-sorted
to her mood, and the faint breeze that breathed caressingly upon her
cheek seemed to re-echo the melodies her heart was giving forth. In that
hour those old grey walls of Roccaleone seemed to enclose for her a very
paradise, and the snatch of an old love song stole softly from her parted
lips. But like a paradise--alas!--it had its snake that crept up unheard
behind her, and was presently hissing in her ear. And its voice was the
voice of Romeo Gonzaga.

"It comforts me, Madonna, that there is one, at least, in Roccaleone has
the heart to sing."

Startled out of her happy pensiveness by that smooth and now unutterably
sinister voice, she turned to face its owner.

She saw the white gleam of his face and something of the anger that
smouldered in his eye, and despite herself a thrill of alarm ran through
her like a shudder. She looked beyond him to a spot where lately she had
seen the sentry. There was no one there nor anywhere upon that wall.
They were alone, and Messer Gonzaga looked singularly evil.

For a moment there was a tense silence, broken only by the tumbling
waters of the torrent-moat and the hoarse challenge of a sentry's "Chi va
là?" in Gian Maria's camp. Then she turned nervously, wondering how much
he might have heard of what had passed between herself and Francesco, how
much have seen.

"And yet, Gonzaga," she answered him, "I left you singing below when I
came away."

"--To wanton it here in the moonlight with that damned swashbuckler, that
brigand, that kennel-bred beast of a sbirro!"

"Gonzaga! You would dare!"

"Dare?" he mocked her, beside himself with passion. "Is it you who speak
of daring--you, the niece of Guidobaldo da Montefeltro, a lady of the
noble and illustrious house of Rovere, who cast yourself into the arms of
a low-born vassal such as that, a masnadiero, a bandit, a bravo? And can
you yet speak of daring, and take that tone with me, when shame should
strike you either dead or dumb?"

"Gonzaga," she answered him, her face as white as his own, but her voice
steady and hard with anger, "leave me now--upon the instant, or I will
have you flogged--flogged to the bone."

A moment he stared at her like a man dazed. Then he tossed his arms to
Heaven, and letting them fall heavily to his sides, he shrugged his
shoulders and laughed evilly. But of going he made no shift.

"Call your men," he answered her, in a choking voice. "Do your will on
me. Flog me to the bone or to the death--let that be the reward of all
that I have done, all that I have risked, all that I have sacrificed to
serve you. It were of a piece with your other actions."

Her eyes sought his in the gloom, her bosom heaving wildly in her
endeavours to master herself before she spoke.

"Messer Gonzaga," said she at last, "I'll not deny that you served me
faithfully in the matter of my escape from Urbino----"

"Why speak of it?" he sneered. "It was a service of which you but avail
yourself until another offered on whom you might bestow your favour and
the supreme command of your fortress. Why speak of it?"

"To show you that the service you allude to is now paid," she riposted
sternly. "By reproaching me you have taken payment, and by insulting me
you have stamped out my gratitude."

"A most convenient logic yours," he mocked. "I am cast aside like an
outworn garment, and the garment is accounted paid for because through
much hard usage it has come to look a little threadbare."

And now it entered her mind that perhaps there was some justice in what
he said. Perhaps she had used him a little hardly.

"Do you think, Gonzaga," she said, and her tone was now a shade more
gentle, "that because you have served me you may affront me, and that
knight who has served me, also, and----"

"In what can such service as his compare with mine? What has he done
that I have not done more?"

"Why, when the men rebelled here----"

"Bah! Cite me not that. Body of God! it is his trade to lead such
swine. He is one of themselves. But for the rest, what has such a man
as this to lose by his share in your rebellion, compared with such a loss
as mine must be?"

"Why, if things go ill, I take it he may lose his life," she answered, in
a low voice. "Can you lose more?"

He made a gesture of impatience.

"If things go ill--yes. It may cost him dearly. But if they go well,
and this siege is raised, he has nothing more to fear. Mine is a parlous
case. However ends this siege, for me there will be no escape from the
vengeance of Gian Maria and Guidobaldo. They know my share in it. They
know that your action was helped by me, and that without me you could
never have equipped yourself for such resistance. Whatever may betide
you and this Ser Franceseo, for me there will be no escape."

She drew a deep breath, then set him the obvious question:

"Did you not consider it--did you not weigh these chances--before you
embarked upon this business, before you, yourself, urged me to this
step?"

"Aye, did I," he answered sullenly.

"Then, why these complaints now?"

He was singularly, madly frank with her in his reply. He told her that
he had done it because he loved her, because she had given him signs that
his love was not in vain.

"I gave you signs?" she interrupted him. "Mother in Heaven! Recite
these signs that I may know them."

"Were you not ever kind to me?" he demanded. "Did you not ever manifest
a liking for my company? Were you not ever pleased that I should sing to
you the songs that in your honour I had made? Was it not to me you
turned in the hour of your need?"

"See now how poor a thing you are, Gonzaga?" she answered witheringly.
"A woman may not smile on you, may not give you a kind word, may not
suffer you to sing to her, but you must conclude she is enamoured of you.
And if I turned to you in my hour of need, as you remind me, needs that
be a sign of my infatuation? Does every cavalier so think when a
helpless woman turns to him in her distress? But even so," she
continued, "how should all that diminish the peril you now talk of? Even
were your suit with me to prosper, would that make you any the less Romeo
Gonzaga, the butt of the anger of my uncle and Gian Maria? Rather do I
think that it should make you more."

But he disillusioned her. He did not scruple, in his angry mood, to lay
before her his reasonings that as her husband he would be screened.

She laughed aloud at that.

"And so it is by such sophistries as these that your presumption came to
life?"

That stung him. Quivering with the passion that obsessed him, he stepped
close up to her.

"Tell me, Madonna--why shall we account presumption in Romeo Gonzaga a
suit that in a nameless adventurer we encourage?" he asked, his voice
thick and tremulous.

"Have a care," she bade him.

"A care of what?" he flashed back. "Answer me, Monna Valentina. Am I so
base a man that by the very thought of love for you I must presume,
whilst you can give yourself into the arms of this swashbuckling bravo,
and take his kisses? Your reasoning sorts ill with your deeds."

"Craven!" she answered him. "Dog that you are!" And before the blaze of
passion in her eyes he recoiled, his courage faltering. She cropped her
anger in mid-career, and in a dangerously calm voice she bade him see to
it that by morning he was no longer in Roccaleone. "Profit by the
night," she counselled him, "and escape the vigilance of Gian Maria as
best you can. Here you shall not stay."

At that a great fear took possession of him, putting to flight the last
remnant of his anger. Nor fear alone was it, to do him full justice. It
was also the realisation that if he would take payment from her for this
treatment of him, if he would slake his vengeance, he must stay. One
plan had failed him. But his mind was fertile, and he might devise
another that might succeed and place Gian Maria in Roccaleone. Thus
should he be amply venged. She was turning away, having pronounced his
banishment, but he sprang after her, and upon his knees he now besought
her piteously to hear him yet awhile.

And she, regretting her already of her harshness, and thinking that
perhaps in his jealousy he had been scarce responsible for what he had
said, stood still to hear him.

"Not that, not that, Madonna," he wailed, his tone suggesting the
imminence of tears. "Do not send me away. If die I must, let me die
here at Roccaleone, helping the defence to my last breath. But do not
cast me out to fall into the hands of Gian Maria. He will hang me for my
share in this business. Do not requite me thus, Madonna. You owe me a
little, surely, and if I was mad when I talked to you just now, it was
love of you that drove me--love of you and suspicion of that man of whom
none of us know anything. Madonna, be pitiful a little. Suffer me to
remain."

She looked down at him, her mind swayed between pity and contempt. Then
pity won the day in the wayward but ever gentle heart of Valentina. She
bade him rise.

"And go, Gonzaga. Get you to bed, and sleep you into a saner frame of
mind. We will forget all this that you have said, so that you never
speak of it again--nor of this love you say you bear me."

The hypocrite caught the hem of her cloak, and bore it to his lips.

"May God keep your heart ever as pure and noble and forgiving," he
murmured brokenly. "I know how little I am deserving of your clemency.
But I shall repay you, Madonna," he protested--and truly meant it, though
not in the sense it seemed.

CHAPTER XXI

THE PENITENT

A week passed peacefully at Roccaleone; so peacefully that it was
difficult to conceive that out there in the plain sat Gian Maria with his
five-score men besieging them.

This inaction fretted the Count of Aquila, as did the lack of news from
Fanfulla; and he wondered vaguely what might be taking place at Babbiano
that Gian Maria should be content to sit idly before them, as though he
had months at his disposal in which to starve them into yielding. The
mystery would have been dispelled had he known that he had Gonzaga to
thank for this singular patience of Gian Maria's. For the courtier had
found occasion to send another letter-carrying shaft into the Duke's
camp, informing him of how and why the last plot had failed, and urging
Gian Maria to wait and trust in him to devise a better scheme for
delivering the castle into his power. He had promised boldly and
confidently enough, and Gian Maria--facts showed--had trusted to that
promise of his, and awaited its fulfilment. But tax his mind though he
did incessantly, no inspiration came to him, no scheme suggested itself
by which he might accomplish his treacherous purpose.

He employed the time cunningly to win back Valentina's favour and
confidence. On the morning after his stormy interview with Guidobaldo's
niece, he had confessed himself to Fra Domenico, and approached the
Sacrament. Every morning thereafter he appeared at Mass, and by the
piety and fervour of his devotions became an example to all the others.
Now this was not lost on Valentina, who was convent-bred, and in a
measure devout. She read in this singular alteration of his ways the
undoubtable indication of an altered character. That he had approached
the Sacrament on the morning after his wild words to her, she took to
mean that he repented him the viciousness of the animosity he had
entertained that he continued so extremely devout thereafter she
construed into meaning that his repentance was sincere and persistent.

And so she came to ask herself whether, indeed, he had not been as much
sinned against as sinning, and she ended by assuring herself that in a
measure the fault was hers. Seeing him so penitent, and concluding from
it that he was not likely to transgress again, she readmitted him to her
favour, and, little by little, the old friendly state was re-established
and was the sounder, perhaps, by virtue of her confidence that after what
had passed he would not again misunderstand her.

He did not, nor did he again allow his optimism and ever-ready vanity to
cozen him with false hopes. He read her with exact precision, and whilst
the reading but served to embitter him the more and render him more
steadfast in his vengeful purpose, it, nevertheless, made him smile the
more sweetly and fawn the more obsequiously.

And not content with this, he did not limit his sycophancy to Valentina,
but sought also by a smiling persistence to ingratiate himself with
Francesco. No voice in Roccaleone--not even that of the bully Ercole--
was raised more often or more enthusiastically to praise and glorify
their Provost. Valentina, observing this, and accepting it as another
sign of his contrition for the past and purpose of amendment for the
future, grew yet more cordial towards him. He was not lacking in
astuteness, this pretty Ser Romeo, nor in knowledge of a woman's heart,
and the apprehension of the fact that there is no flattery she prefers to
that which has for object the man she loves.

Thus did Gonzaga conquer the confidence and esteem of all during that
peaceful week. He seemed a changed man, and all save Peppe saw in this
change a matter for increased trust and friendship towards him. But the
astute fool looked on and pondered. Such transformations as these were
not effected in a night. He was no believer in any human chrysalis that
shall make of the grub of yesterday the butterfly of to-day. And so, in
this fawning, smiling, subservient Gonzaga, he saw nothing but an object
of mistrust, a fellow to be watched with the utmost vigilance. To this
vigilance the hunchback applied himself with a zeal born of his cordial
detestation of the courtier. But Gonzaga, aware of the fool's mistrust
and watchfulness, contrived for once to elude him, and to get a letter to
Gian Maria setting forth the ingenious plan he had hatched.

The notion had come to him that Sunday at Mass. On all sanctified days
it was Monna Valentina's way to insist that the entire garrison, with the
exception of one single sentinel--and this only at Francesco's very
earnest urging--should attend the morning service. Like an inspiration
it came to him that such a half-hour as that would be a most opportune
season in which to throw open the gates of Roccaleone to the besiegers.
The following Wednesday was the feast of Corpus Christi. Then would be
his opportunity.

Kneeling there, with head bent in ecstatic devotion, he matured his
treacherous plan. The single sentry he could suborn, or else--if bribery
failed--poniard. He realised that single-handed he might not lower the
cumbrous drawbridge, nor would it be wise, even if possible, for the
noise of it might give the alarm. But there was the postern. Gian Maria
must construct him a light, portable bridge, and have it in readiness to
span the moat and silently pour his soldiers into the castle through that
little gate.

And so, the plot matured and every detail clear, he got him to his
chamber and penned the letter that was to rejoice the heart of Gian
Maria. He chose a favourable moment to despatch it, as he had despatched
the former ones, tied about the quarrel of an arbalest, and he saw Gian
Maria's signal--for which the letter had provided--that the plan would be
adopted. Humming a gay measure, jubilant at the prospect of seeing
himself so amply avenged, Gonzaga passed down and out into the castle
gardens to join the ladies in their merry-making over a game of hoodman
blind.

Now, however much the Duke of Babbiano may have congratulated himself
upon the ally he possessed in Gonzaga, and the cunning scheme the latter
had devised for placing him in possession of Roccaleone, there came news
to him on the morrow that caused him to rejoice a hundredfold more
fervently. His subjects of Babbiano were in a condition approaching open
rebellion, resulting from the disquieting rumours that Caesar Borgia was
arming at Rome for a decent upon the Duchy, and the continued absence of
Gian Maria in such a season, upon a wooing that they deemed ill-timed. A
strong party had been formed, and the leaders had nailed upon the Palace
gates a proclamation that, unless Gian Maria returned within three days
to organise the defence of Babbiano, they would depose him and repair to
Aquila to invite his cousin, Francesco del Falco--whose patriotism and
military skill were known to all--to assume the crown of Babbiano and
protect them.

At the news, and upon reading the proclamation, which Alvari had brought
with him, Gian Maria flew into one of those fits of rage that made his
name a byword in Babbiano. Presently, however, he cooled. There was
Gonzaga yonder, who had promised to admit him to Roccaleone on Wednesday.
That left him time to first possess himself of his reluctant bride, and
then ride hard to Babbiano, to arrive there before the expiry of the
three days' grace his subjects gave him.

He conferred with Guidobaldo, and urged that a priest should be in
waiting to wed them so soon as he should have brought her out of the
fortress. Upon that detail they were within an ace of quarrelling.
Guidobaldo would not at first agree to such hasty nuptials; they were
unfitting the dignity and the station of his niece, and if Gian Maria
would wed her he must come to Urbino and let the ceremony be performed by
a cardinal. Well was it then for Gian Maria that he mastered his wonted
hastiness and curbed the hot, defiant retort that rose to his lips. Had
he done so, an enduring rupture between them would probably have ensued;
for Guidobaldo was not one to permit himself to be hectored, and, after
all, he amply realised that Gian Maria had more need of him than he of
Gian Maria. And this in that moment the Duke of Babbiano realised too,
and realising it he set himself to plead where otherwise he might have
demanded, to beg as a favour that which otherwise he might have commanded
with a threat. And so he won Guidobaldo--although reluctant--to his
wishes in the matter, and in his good-nature the Duke of Urbino consented
to pocket the dignity that prompted him to see the ceremony performed
with princely pomp.

This being settled, Gian Maria blessed Gonzaga who rendered it all
possible, and came most opportunely to his aid where without him he
should have been forced to resort to cannon and bloodshed.

With Gonzaga the only shadow of doubt that remained to mar the perfect
certainty of his success lay in his appreciation of Francesco's daring
character and resourceful mind, and now as if the gods were eager to
favour him to the very last degree--a strange weapon to combat this was
unexpectedly thrust into his hand.

It happened that Alvari was not the only messenger who travelled that day
to Roccaleone. There followed him by some hours, the Count of Aquila's
servant, Zaccaria, who rode hard and reached the approaches of the castle
by sunset. His destination being the fortress itself, he was forced to
wait in the woods until night had fallen, and even then his mission was
fraught with peril.

It befell that somewhere near the second hour of night, the moon being
overcast at the time--for there were threats of a storm in the sky--the
sentinel on the eastern wall heard a sound of splashing in the moat
below, accompanied by the stertorous breathing of a swimmer whose mouth
is not well above water. He challenged the sound, but receiving no reply
he turned to go and give the alarm, and ran into the arms of Gonzaga, who
had come up to take the air.

"Illustrious," he exclaimed, "there is someone swimming the moat."

"Eh?" cried Gonzaga, a hundred suspicions of Gian Maria running through
his mind. "Treachery?"

"It is what I thought."

Gonzaga took the man by the sleeve of his doublet, and drew him back to
the parapet. They peered over, and from out of the blackness they were
hailed by a faint "Olá!"

"Who goes there?" demanded Romeo.

"A friend," came the answer softly. "A messenger from Babbiano with
letters for the Lord Count of Aquila. Throw me a rope, friends, before I
drown in this trough."

"You rave, fool!" answered him Gonzaga. "We have no counts at
Roccaleone."

"Surely, sir sentinel," replied the voice, "my master, Messer Francesco
del Falco, is here. Throw me a rope, I say."

"Messer Fran----" began Gonzaga. Then he made a noise like a man
choking. It was as if a sudden light of revelation had flooded his
brain. "Get a rope," he harshly bade the sentry. "In the armoury yard.
Despatch, fool!" he added sharply, now fearing interruption.

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