Your absence is causing surprise.'

Two horsemen passed, and Ambrogio drew his mantle closer around him.

'No one has seen thee Waiting here?' he asked.

'No, my lord, I am too careful'

''Tis well,' said the other. 'Lead on toward the palace, Giannotto. I will follow.'

 

Chapter 13. — Valentine Visconti's Toast

The Visconti palace was brilliant with lights and gay with the hum of voices.

Splendidly attired, in all that wealth or taste could desire, the French guests seemed to diffuse some of their own light-hearted gaiety over the sombre abode of the Visconti.

The entrance stairs of fine white marble were spread with a purple silk carpet, the golden balustrades intertwined with roses emitting their fragrance, and the long gallery opening from the stairway and lit by wide windows, deep set in the stone, showed the long, low balcony smothered in myrtles, lemons, citrons, oranges, and gorgeous flowers, scented and abundant, filling the corridors with the sense of summer and mingling their slender trails with the stiff folds of the rare and costly tapestries that covered the walls and were laid upon the floor.

At intervals stood statues, masterpieces of ancient art, faintly lit by the golden glimmer of the swinging lamps.

And all the stairs and corridors and gallery were alive and brilliant with the magnificent guests of the Visconti—lords and ladies, the finest the dismantled court of France could boast. Yet, used to splendours as they were, coming from the most refined court of Europe, the costly display made by an Italian usurper impressed them with wonder, almost with awe.

Tisio Visconti, most richly dressed and adorned with all his favourite jewels, mingled in the throng, gay and happy, forgetful of everything save the lights and the colours, the kindly respectful tones in which he was addressed, unheeding the silent page that followed him.

The wide, usually so sombre, entrance of the palace stood open upon the street, and the red flare of torches, the gleam of richly-caparisoned horses, the bustle of pages and men-at-arms, were visible to the courtiers within, and blended city and palace in one splendour.

'I would the French were always here,' cried Tisio, excitedly. 'I love the palace to be light and gay.'

The gay flutter of silk and satin, the elegant grace of the strangers, pleased him, and he smiled like a contented child. But suddenly all the light was struck out of his face.

'Gian,' he said dully.

'The Duke!' the courtiers behind him took up the word, and the tattle of voices ceased.

Gian Visconti was approaching down the gallery, followed by several pages in the Viper's silver and green livery.

He passed between the rows of bowing courtiers carelessly; there were many there of the proud nobility of France who found it hard to stand silent and respectful before this man, whose crimes alone were his passport to sovereignty.

To them this marriage was a humiliation, a disgrace to the French crown, but to Visconti it was a triumph, the successful crowning of ambition. He was in a genial mood, and as he passed Tisio stopped and smiled, telling him for tonight he might go where he pleased.

It was not too much to spare to the brother whose possessions he enjoyed.

And as Visconti passed on, more than one Frenchman raised his eyebrows and shrugged his shoulders expressively as the sweep of his scarlet train disappeared.

Among the throng the ever-ready secretary waited for Visconti's eye to fall on him, and the Duke, dismissing the pages, beckoned him forward.

'No news from Verona, or Mantua?' he asked.

'None, my lord.'

'None? The messengers are late. But after all why should they haste?' said Visconti. 'Della Scala will hardly be in the field yet,' he added with a smile.

'If ever, my lord,' replied the secretary smoothly.

The two had withdrawn in the embrasure of one of the great open windows, and Visconti, glancing through it, turned his gaze there where, clear in the blue summer night, rose the outline of an abutting building, grim and dark and silent: Isotta's prison.

'See the guards be doubled there,' he said. The secretary bowed.

'As to the Lady Valentine, my lord,' he said insinuatingly, 'she is safe and well, and at her prayers with her women. I have kept guard upon her slightest motion.'

Visconti drew a ring from his finger. He was in a generous mood tonight, a rare one enough, as Giannotto thought with bitterness.

'Take this for thy pains,' he said. 'And now I will relieve thee 'of thy watch; she can hardly escape under my very eyes and with her bridegroom waiting. Let the guests know I bring the bride, Giannotto.'

Visconti withdrew the length of one of the corridors, and paused there at a door before which stood two soldiers, the guard of his sister's apartments. At his soft approach they stood back, and, opening the folding doors, Visconti passed through, and quickly threaded the deserted anterooms until he reached the chapel that the lady used.

The place was dim, lit by red lamps that cast more shadow than light, and with high, stained windows, now scarcely showing colour. And seated on the floor under one of them, her head against a carved wall, her hands listless in her lap, was Valentine.

She wore a dress of flame-coloured satin, and her hair was elaborately dressed with rubies and pearls. She made no movement at her brother's entrance.

The air was heavy with incense and the perfume of some white roses that faded across the altar steps.

'We wait for thee, Valentine,' said Visconti.

A couple of her women moved forward from the shadows, and whispered to the Duke they could do nothing with her. He motioned to them to withdraw.

'Valentine, come! Think of the splendid life that opens before thee from today' Visconti's tone had the gentleness of one who has gained his point. 'Thou mayst be Queen of France.' But Valentine Visconti had too much of her brother's spirit, too much of the ungovernable pride of will, not to hate this yielding to the force of power. She hated her brother's tyranny. She hated this marriage. What would life be for her, with an indifferent husband, in an idle, impoverished court, among foreigners, strangers, far from her own land? She would not be forced to it. She rose to her feet, desperate.

Visconti watched her keenly, standing waiting.

'Come,' he repeated, 'the Duke of Orleans. waits. The feast is ready.'

For one moment a mad hate of him overmastered her, a wild desire to refuse to stir, to cling to the altar, dash herself against the floor, anything rather than obey. She knew his parricide; he was not the elder. She would not obey.

Words of defiance were on her lips, but glancing at his face, the words died away, and a sense of the useless folly of resistance, the useless humiliation of refusal, surged over her. She was in his power. When she spoke, it was humbly, in a faltering voice, with tears.

'Gian,' she whispered.