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n 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?"

"You are too good," she answered sweetly. "I will hear the man myself."

He bowed submissively, and then his eye moved to Francesco.

"We might arrange with him for the safe-conduct of this gentleman," he
suggested.

"There is no hope they would accord it," she answered easily. "Nor could
I hope so if they would, for Messer Francesco has consented to fill
the office of Provost of Roccaleone. But we are keeping the messenger
waiting. Sirs, will you attend me to the ramparts?"

They bowed, and followed her, Gonzaga coming last, his tread heavy as a
drunkard's, his face white to the lips in the bitter rage with which he
saw himself superseded, and read his answer to the hot words that last
night he had whispered in Valentina's ear.

As they crossed the courtyard Francesco discharged the first act of his
new office in ordering a half-dozen men-at-arms to fall in behind them,
to the end that they might make some show upon the wall when they came
to parley with the herald.

They found a tall man on a tall, grey horse, whose polished helm shone
like silver in the morning sun, and whose haubergeon was almost hidden
under a crimson tabard ornamented with the Sforza lion. He bowed low as
Valentina appeared, followed by her escort, foremost in which stood the
Count of Aquila, his broad castor pulled down upon his brow, so that it
left his face in shadow.

"In the name of my master, the High and Mighty Lord Gian Maria Sforza,
Duke of Babbiano, I call upon you to yield, lady, laying down your arms
and throwing open your gates."

There followed a pause, at the end of which she asked him was that the
sum of his message, or was there something that he had forgotten.
The herald, bowing gracefully upon the arched neck of his caracoling
palfrey, answered her that what he had said was all he had been bidden
say.

She turned with a bewildered and rather helpless look to those behind
her. She wished that the matter might be conducted with due dignity,
and her convent rearing left her in doubt of how this might best be
achieved. She addressed herself to Francesco.

"Will you give him his answer, my Lord Provost," she said, with a
smile, and Francesco, stepping forward and leaning on a merlon of that
embattled wall, obeyed her.

"Sir Herald," he said, in a gruff voice that was unlike his own, "will
you tell me since when has the Duke of Babbiano been at war with
Urbino that he should thus beset one of its fortresses, and demand the
surrender of it?"

"His Highness," replied the herald, "is acting with the full sanction of
the Duke of Urbino in sending this message to the Lady Valentina della
Rovere."

At that Valentina elbowed the Count aside, and forgetting her purpose of
conducting this affair with dignity, she let her woman's tongue deliver
the answer of her heart.

"This message, sir, and the presence here of your master, is but another
of the impertinences that I have suffered at his hands, and it is the
crowning one. Take you that message back to him, and tell him that when
I am instructed by what right he dares to send you upon such an errand,
I may render him an answer more germane with his challenge."

"Would you prefer, Madonna, that his Highness should come himself to
speak with you?"

"There is nothing I should prefer less. Already has necessity compelled
me to have more to say to Gian Maria than I could have wished." And
with a proud gesture she signified that the audience was at an end, and
turned to quit the wall.

She had a brief conference with Francesco, during which he consulted her
as to certain measures of defence to be taken, and made suggestions,
to all of which she agreed, her hopes rising fast to see that here, at
least, she had a man with knowledge of the work to which he had set his
hand. It lightened her heart and gave her a glad confidence to look on
that straight, martial figure, the hand so familiarly resting on the
hilt of the sword that seemed a part of him, and the eyes so calm;
whilst when he spoke of perils, they seemed to dwindle 'neath the
disdain of them so manifest in his tone.

With Fortemani at his heels he went about the execution of the measures
he had suggested, the bully following him now with the faithful wonder
of a dog for its master, realising that here, indeed, was a soldier of
fortune by comparison with whom the likes of himself were no better than
camp-followers. Confidence, too, did Ercole gather from that magnetism
of Francesco's unfaltering confidence; for he seemed to treat the matter
as a great jest, a comedy played for the Duke of Babbiano and at
that same Duke's expense. And just as Francesco's brisk tone breathed
confidence into Fortemani and Valentina, so, too, did it breathe it into
Fortemani's wretched followers. They grew zestful in the reflection of
his zest, and out of admiration for him they came to admire the business
on which they were engaged, and, finally, to take a pride in the part he
assigned to each of them. Within an hour there was such diligent
bustle in Roccaleone, such an air of grim gaiety and high spirits, that
Valentina, observing it, wondered what manner of magician was this she
had raised to the command of her fortress, who in so little time could
work so marvellous a change in the demeanour of her garrison.

Once only did Francesco's light-heartedness fail him, and this was when,
upon visiting the armoury, he found but one single cask of gunpowder
stored there. He turned to Fortemani to inquire where Gonzag

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