Zanetto fled to obey, fearing terrible things at parting.
What actually happened was in a sense more terrible even than he feared.
“We have accounts to settle, Zanetto. There are wages due you,” said Ottavio.
Zanetto deemed it probable that he would be flung into the canal.
“M-my lord—” he stammered.
Ottavio tossed a purse to him. “Pay yourself with this.”
Zanetto caught it, and was almost scared by its weight: through the loose meshes of it he saw its contents were gold.
“Excellency!” was all he could say.
Messer Ottavio was smiling quizzically.
“He who deals in magic can afford to return good for evil, particularly since the evil you sought to do me was turned to good. You should have reflected, Zanetto, that it is not easy to injure a magician.”
With that Messer Ottavio stepped into the gondola and started upon the journey to Mestre.
THE END
THE WORD OF BORGIA
I
MISTRUSTING the object of this gathering to which so secretly he had been bidden, Messer Graziani ambushed a half-score of his men about the street below, with orders to force their way into the house should he smash one of the windows as a signal.
Therefore it was with a mind comparatively at ease that he entered the long, low-ceilinged room where the conspirators awaited him. Situated in the mezzanine, this room ran the entire width of that palace of the Lord Ranieri, near the Bridge of Augustus, in Rimini, and overlooked the street at one end and the River Marecchia at the other.
It had an air of gloomy splendor; the walls were hung with gloomy tapestries, the carpet was of darkest purple, and amid the sparse furniture there was a deal of ebony, looking the more funereal for its ivory inlays. It was lighted by an alabaster-globed lamp on the ponderous overmantel, and by two silver candle-branches on the long table in mid-apartment. An enormous fire was roaring on the hearth, for it was a bitterly cold night of January, and the snow lay thick upon the city.
Graziani was cordially received by the Lord Ranieri — a portly, florid patrician of middle age — and conducted by him to the table about which the five remaining conspirators were seated. One of these rose instantly to add to Ranieri’s his own welcome of the condottiere. He was a tall and very stately gentleman, with a long, swarthy face that was rendered longer by a brown, pointed beard. He was dressed in black, but with a superlative elegance, and a medallion of brilliants blazed upon his breast. He was the Prince Sinibaldi; a nobleman of Venice sent as an envoy by the Most Serene Republic to felicitate Cesare Borgia, Duke of Valentinois and Romagna, upon the recent conquest of Rimini.
Now this ambassador it was — and not Ranieri — who had bidden Graziani to that meeting. And it was this circumstance that had had awakened the suspicions of the Borgian soldier, ever mistrustful of all that came from Venice.
Of the others — whose eight eyes were intent now upon Graziani’s face — three were gentlemen of Rimini, men of little account to the condottiere; but the fourth — a slight untidy fellow with a ghastly, hollow-cheeked face and lank hair that was faded to the color of ashes — he knew for a Roman named Gino d’Agnolo, and his presence went to swell the soldier’s mistrust.
The fellow had but one hand — his left — which was as gnarled and yellow as a hen’s foot. The other he had left in Rome together with his tongue, having been deprived of both by order of Cesare Borgia, whom he had defamed. His hatred of the Borgias and his virulence had been terrific; and they remained unabated by his punishment, though their expression was temporarily curtailed.
His fierce eyes glared mistrustfully at Graziani as the officer took the seat that was offered him; he opened his empty mouth to make a horrid, croaking sound, accompanying it by gestures to the Venetian.
* * *
THE Lord Ranieri resumed his seat at the table’s foot; at its head Prince Sinibaldi remained standing, and from the breast of his doublet, where two buttons were unfastened, he drew now a small ebony and ivory crucifix.
“When we shall have made known to you the reason for which we sought your presence here to-night, Messer Graziani,” said he, “it shall be yours to determine whether you will lend us your aid in the undertaking that is afoot. Should you refuse, it shall be yours to depart as you have come. But first we must engage you by solemn oath that neither by word nor deed shall you divulge what may be revealed to you of our designs.”
The Prince paused. Graziani reared his young head and looked slowly round the board. All eyes were upon him intently, alive with a mistrust and enmity that naught could efface but the oath required of him.
Sinibaldi gently pushed the crucifix down the table toward him.
“First, upon that sacred Symbol of our Redeemer—” he was beginning, when Graziani pushed back his chair and rose.
He knew enough. Here was for certain a conspiracy against the State or against the life of his lord the Duke of Valentinois. It needed no more words to tell him that; and he was no fool to bind himself by oath to a silence that must make him a party to the treason.
“Sirs,” said he, “it is not my way to thrust myself blindly into any business and make oath upon matters that are unknown to me. Suffer me, therefore, to take my leave at once.”
He stepped back from the table, clearly intent upon departure; and instantly all six were upon their feet and looking to their weapons.
Graziani turned to the Lord Ranieri, who had flung himself between the soldier and the door.
“My lord,” said he, “I came hither in friendliness, bidden to your house with no knowledge of what awaited me. I trust to your honor, my lord, to see that I depart in like case — in friendliness and with no knowledge of what is here toward. I would urge—”
A stealthy sound behind him made him turn, and Agnolo — who had crept up — leapt upon him, fierce as a rat, his dagger raised. The blade descended, and snapped upon the links of the shirt of mail the soldier wore beneath his quilted doublet.
The next instant Graziani had caught up that wretched wisp of humanity by the breast, and had dashed him across the room. The mute hurtled into one of the conspirators who stood midway between the table and the window, and threw the latter off his balance, so that in his turn he staggered against an ebony pedestal, and sent the marble Cupid that had occupied it crashing through the casement into the street below.
It was more than Graziani had intended, but no more than he could have desired. He observed the effect, smiled grimly, whipped out his blade, swung his cloak upon his left arm, and attempted to reach the door backward. But his enemies closed about him to cut him down, and when one sword had been shivered against his armored body, the remaining sought to reach his head.
He defended himself desperately, intent upon gaining time. If he could but hold out for a few moments, his men would be there in answer to the signal of the broken window. With that intent he backed before them until his shoulders touched the tapestried wall. There they pressed him hard, three swords at once, and he had no chance of further breaking ground, no chance of lessening the number of his opponents, no chance of doing more than parry their blows until relief should come, and little chance of that.
* * *
SUDDENLY Sinibaldi’s blade licked in and out again with lightning quickness in a feint, and was swung round to a cutting stroke at Graziani’s head. Dazzled Graziani was slow to the parry. He threw up his blade, but too late to do more than break the force of the blow as it descended. The edge, though somewhat deflected, sheared through his bonnet and laid his scalp open.
He dropped his sword, slithered gently down the wall and sat huddled at the foot of it, insensible, the blood streaming down his face. Sinibaldi was for putting a dagger through the soldier’s windpipe, and thus making quite sure of him, but he was suddenly checked by the horrible, vehement outcry of the mute who had remained by the window, and simultaneously by blows upon thee door below.
For a
long moment the conspirators stood at gaze, smitten with sudden terror, whilst the blows upon the door were repeated and loud voices summoned them to open.
Ranieri swore thickly and horribly.
“We are trapped! Betrayed!”
Uproar followed, until the mute showed the way out. He had crossed the room at a run, and, nimble as a cat, he had leaped upon a table under the window that overlooked the river, from which the house rose sheer. He never stayed to open. The acquaintance he had already made with Borgia justice quickened his terrors to the point of frenzy. He hurled himself bodily through, shivering the window and going down in a shower of broken glass to the black, icy waters below.
Like sheep they followed him. One after another they took the leap. Fortunately for them the tide was flowing, and it bore them up toward the Bridge of Augustus, where they could effect a landing — all save Agnolo, the mute, who was drowned, and Sinibaldi, who remained behind. Like Graziani, the Venetian, too, had come to that meeting with a shirt of mail under his doublet; and he had bethought him that this armor must sink him. So he had paused to doff it, vainly calling upon the others to wait for him.
Ranieri had answered him, standing upon the table, ready for the leap.
“Wait?” he had echoed. “Are you mad? Is this time to wait? Now more than ever must the thing be done, or we are all dead men — and it must be done to-night, as was planned. Your men are at their post. Come on, then!”
And he went through the window, and into the water with a thudding splash. Like an echo of it came a crash from below to announce that the door had given way. Heavy steps thundered up the stairs.
* * *
SINIBALDI, tearing still at the buttons of his doublet, sprang desperately for the window and wondered a moment whether he should risk drowning. Then he remembered that after all as the envoy of Venice he was inviolable, a man upon whom no finger was to be laid without provoking the resentment of the Republic. He had nothing to fear, where nothing could be proved against him. Not even Graziani could have said enough to imperil the sacred person of an envoy; and Graziani, he was assured, would never say anything again.
So he sheathed his sword and composed himself.
The door burst open and Graziani’s men swarmed in, all ten of them, so furiously that they bore the Prince backward and all but trampled on him. A grizzled ancient, heading them, checked in mid-chamber and looked round, bewildered until he espied his fallen captain huddled at the wall’s foot. He roared his anger at the sight, what time his men closed about the saturnine Venetian.
With as great dignity as was possible to a man so circumstanced, Sinibaldi sought to hold them off.
“You touch me at your peril,” he warned them. “I am Prince Sinibaldi, the Envoy of Venice.”
Over his shoulder the ancient answered him:
“Were you Prince Lucifer, Envoy of Topset, you should still account for what was doing here and how my Captain came by his hurt. Make him fast!”
Vainly did the Venetian storm, threaten and plead. They disarmed him, bound his wrists behind his back, and thrust him from the room, down the stairs and out into the snow-spread street.
Four remained above with the ancient who, on his knees, was looking to his Captain. And Graziani began to show signs of life. With one hand he smeared away some of the blood from his face, and opened his eyes dully to survey his ancient.
“You were no more than in time, Barbo,” said he, his voice hoarse and feeble. “Get you to my lord Duke. Tell him that here was some treason plotting — something that is to be done to-night by those who escaped. Bid His Magnificence beware. Haste man, I—”
“Their names! Their names, Captain!” cried the ancient urgently.
But it was as if by sheer will Graziani had kept a grip of his senses until he could utter his warning. That done he relinquished the painful hold and slipped back into the peace and shadows of unconsciousness.
II
IN THE Communal palace of Rimini a great banquet was spread in honor of Cesare Borgia, the conqueror — the “Minister Divinae Justitiae” — who had delivered the State from the thraldom of Pandolfaccio, the hated Malatesta. Gathered there was a great number of repatriated fuorusciti — the nobles whom Pandolfaccio had exiled from his dominions that he might strip them of their possessions.
Jubilant, assured that Borgia justice would right the wrongs that had been done, these patricians gave free expression to their high spirits. Present too were the ambassadors and envoys of several powers, sent to congratulate the Duke upon his latest conquest. But it was in vain that Cesare turned his beautiful hazel eyes this way and that in quest of Sinibaldi, the princely Envoy of Venice.
The Orator of the Most Serene Republic, the smug and portly Capello, was in attendance, seated near the Duke. But the Envoy Extraordinary was nowhere to be seen; and Cesare, who missed nothing and left no riddles unsolved — particularly when they concerned a power so crafty and so hostile as that of Venice — was vexed to know the reason of this absence. It was the more remarkable in that Sinibaldi’s princess — a stately, blonde woman, whose stomacher was a scintillating cuirass of gems — was seated on Cesare’s right hand, between the sober black of the President of the Council and the scarlet of the handsome Cardinal-Legate.
The young Duke lounged in his great chair, a tall, supple gentleman of some five and twenty years, resplendent in a close-fitting doublet of cloth of gold that was edged with miniver. His pale, beautiful face was thoughtful, and his tapering, jeweled fingers strayed ever and anon to the point of his tawny beard.
The actual banquet touched its end, and the great hall, about three sides of which the tables were set, was being cleared by the seneschal. A comedy was about to be performed for the company’s delectation. Tragedy, however — all unsuspected — was in preparation; and the actor who suddenly stalked in to speak its prologue, thrusting aside the lackeys who would have hindered him, was Barbo, the ancient of Graziano’s company.
“My lord!” he bellowed. “My lord Duke!” And his hands fiercely buffeted the grooms. “I tell you, fools, that I must speak instantly with his Highness.”
The company had fallen silent, some startled by this intrusion, others wondering if this might be the opening of the comedy that impended. One or two rose to their feet. But it was Cesare who spoke, his voice crisp and metallic, bidding the man approach.
“What brings you thus?” quoth he, when Barbo stood before him.
“Treason, my lord,” said the soldier, startling the company with that ugly word.
Cesare signed to him to proceed, and the fellow plunged headlong into the speech he had prepared.
“Messer Graziani lies senseless with a broken head, else were he here in my place, Most Potent. By his command, we — ten men of his company — broke to-night into the palace of the Lord Ranieri, and —
“Stay!” the Duke interrupted him peremptorily. “We are too public here.”
But that was not his real motive. The real motive was that at Barbo’s words Cesare’s keen ears had caught the sounds of a sudden gasp and rustle on his right. He had shot a glance in the direction of the sound to see that Sinibaldi’s lady had sunk back in her chair, her cheeks livid, her blue eyes staring with terror.
In a flash his swift brain had laid fact to fact and had found the solution of the riddle that had earlier puzzled him — the riddle of Sinibaldi’s absence. He knew now where Sinibaldi had been that night, though he had yet to learn what manner of treason the Prince had been engaged upon.
He rose, and the company rose with him out of deference — all save Sinibaldi’s Princess, who made the effort, but failed in it, as Cesare noted. He waved a hand to the feasters, smiling urbanely.
“Sirs and ladies, it is my desire that you be not disturbed by this.” He turned to the President o: the Council: “If you, messer, will give me leave apart a moment with this fellow—”
“Assuredly, my lord, assuredly!” cried the President, flung into a sort of confusio
n by Cesare’s lordly deference. “This way, Magnificent — this closet here — you will be private so.” Stammering, fluttering, he stepped down the hall to throw open a side-door. Drawing back, he waved the Duke into a small antechamber.
Cesare entered, followed by Barbo. The door closed upon them, and beyond it there broke forth a babble of excited voices, as the guests fell to discussing this interruption.
Shortly now Barbo related the happenings of that night at Ranieri’s house, repeating what Graziani had bidden him, and announcing that he held captive at least one of the conspirators — the Prince Sinibaldi.
“I trust that in this I have done nothing to deserve reproach, Magnificent,” the fellow added with some hesitation. “His Excellency spoke of being an envoy of the Most Serene—”
Cesare waved his doubts aside.
“You have done well,” he cut in shortly.
He turned, and strode the chamber’s length and back again, slowly, fingering his beard, his brow dark with thought.
“You have no hint of the aim of the conspiracy? Of what this thing is they are to attempt to-night?” he asked.
“None, my lord — alas!”
“Nor who the men were that escaped?”
“No, my lord, save that one of them would probably be the Lord Ranieri.”
“Ay — but the others — And we do not even know how many there were.”
Cesare checked. He remembered the Princess Sinibaldi. She knew. Her bearing had betrayed that knowledge. He smiled darkly.
“Desire the Princess Sinibaldi to attend me here.”
Barbo saluted and withdrew. Soon the door opened again. Barbo ushered in the princess, and at a sign from Cesare vanished!
* * *
THE Venetian lady stood before Cesare, deathly pale, her bosom galloping. With the very courtliest grace his Highness waved her to a chair. She sank into it limply. She moistened her dry lips, her startled eyes upon the Duke’s face.
Collected Works of Rafael Sabatini Page 555
