His thoughts were with Valentine Visconti, Gian's unhappy sister, whom he had been told to watch; from her they travelled to the German Count, who, five days ago, had left the palace.

'I wonder if she loved him,' he mused. 'I do not think she did. Dear God, she did not need to wait to love a man, her life was not such that she could pick and choose her way of escaping from it. Conrad offered one and she was ready to take it—now—five days ago! Yes—Count Conrad is dead, and she will marry the Duke of Orleans! Ah, well! The German was a fool, he deserved no better fate than a fool! I do not think she'll break her heart if she can find some other way'

He returned to his papers, pausing now and then to glance toward the door, as if to keep himself on the alert for the Duke's noiseless entry.

But Gian had bent his steps elsewhere. Plainly dressed, he passed almost unnoticed across an inner courtyard to a dark angle of a wall where a secret door anew admitted him. The whole Visconti palace was a sombre and gloomy place; men crept about it on their tiptoe, glancing fearfully around them, afraid of their own shadows. Visconti smiled to himself at sight of fear; he loved to be feared, to hold lives in the hollow of his hand, and play with them and death.

The door let him into a long narrow passage flagged with stone, and lit by diamond-shaped holes left in the walls; the air was damp and chill, and Visconti drew his cloak around him. Unlocking a second door, he ascended a flight of stone steps, pitch dark, from which he emerged into a large circular chamber with a thick pillar in the middle from which the groined ceiling sprang. Save table and high-backed chair of blackened wood, there was no furniture. This chamber was the outer guard-room of the prison wing, and a gloomy-faced man leaned against the pillar, his eyes fixed upon the opening door. It could be no other than the Visconti entering thus, and he crouched almost to the ground.

What is thy guard?' said Visconti.

'Twenty men in each guard-room, my lord, and each one picked for size and trustworthiness, and I myself keep watch upon the door. Escape is impossible.'

By so much the more that thy head will answer for it.'

As he spoke, Visconti flung wide one of a ring of doors opening from the chamber, and stepped into a posse of soldiers. No one spoke. Glancing keenly to the right and left, Visconti passed through their ranks into the room beyond—a small apartment, dim lit and hung with arras. An old woman sat at a tapestry frame with her back to the door, but at Visconti's entrance she rose, as at something expected, and sank in a deep obeisance.

Gian Maria closed the door behind him.

'How is she?' he said. 'How, does she bear her change of prison?'

The old woman glanced toward an inner door, massive and iron-clamped.

'When I am with her, my lord, she sits in silence, her eyes for ever on her missal; indeed she has not spoken since we brought her here; but when she is alone, she weeps, I have heard her through the door; she weeps passionately, and calls wildly upon her husband to save her.'

'I would I had him, to stand him gagged against the door to hear her,' said the Duke.

'By the look of her she will die of it,' continued the old woman. 'But if I know anything of prisoners, and I have seen a few, thou wilt never break her spirit, my lord.'

'She must be more humbled now,' he said to himself. 'She must turn and implore me for pity.'

The huge door creaked and swung on its hinges, and he stood at the top of two low stone steps, looking down into Isotta's prison. It was little better than a dungeon of stone, lofty but dark, with one window deep set, high out of reach, and thickly barred. The walls were hung with faded tapestry, the gloomy, sad-looking folds drooping like torn, captured standards. A huge chest of sombre blackness leaned against the wall; above it hung a horn lantern, which after dark gave all the light that was obtained. For the rest, a few high-backed chairs stood stiffly about the room. In his black dress Visconti, pausing at the head of the steps, seemed part of its gloom. His wide-open grey eyes looked straight across at the solitary occupant.

Isotta sat in one of the huge black chairs, her delicate hands resting on the faded crimson velvet of the arms, her feet on a wooden footstool. She was of a fair and noble appearance, but her face was marred by sorrow and her eyes red from many tears. Her pale yellow hair was drawn under a white veil. Her long grey dress clung close about her slender figure. On her knee rested a little book, and on this she kept her eyes. Not by so much as a flutter of her hand did she show she knew of the Visconti's presence.

He waited, raging inwardly, but words would not come easily to break that silence. At last he slowly descended into the room, his eyes still on her face.

She never stirred, nor raised her own.