"In the mean time Galeazzo seemed to feel that the day and hour of retribution had arrived. He would fain have avoided it; he sought to have mass performed in the palace; he applied to a chaplain--to the Bishop of Como--but in all instances slight obstacles presented themselves, and in the end he determined to go to the Cathedral. One touch of human tenderness and feeling, the first for many a day, broke from him. He sent for his two children, took leave of them tenderly, and embraced them again and again. He then went forth; but the conspirators awaited him in the church; and hardly had he entered when three daggers were plunged into his breast and back. Each struck a second blow; and the monster who had inflicted torture, and death, and disgrace upon so many innocent fellow-creatures sank to the pavement, exclaiming, 'Sancta Maria!'
"The three then rushed towards the street to call the people to arms; but Lampugnani stumbled, catching his feet in the long trains of the women who were already kneeling in the nave. As he fell he was killed by a Moor, one of Galeazzo's base retainers. My father was killed where he stood, and Olgiato escaped into the street only to find the people, on whom he trusted either dead to all sense of patriotism and justice, or stupified and surprised. Not a sword was drawn--not a hand was raised in answer to his cry, 'To arms!' and torture and the death of a criminal once more closed the career of a patriot.
"I was an infant at that time, but in the days of Galeazzo Sforza infants were not spared, and the nurse who had me in her arms hurried forth, carrying me with her, ere the gates of the city could be closed, or the followers of the duke came to search and pillage our house. She took refuge in a neighbouring village, whence we were not long after carried to Florence, where the noble Lorenzo de Medici, after whom I had been baptized, received me as his child, and when he felt death approaching, sent me to the court of France to finish my education among my relatives there."
"And was this Prince Ludovic the son of Galeazzo?" asked Leonora, as soon as he had paused.
"Oh no--his younger brother," replied Lorenzo. "He holds the son in durance, and the son's wife, on the pretence of guardianship, though both are of full age; but, if I be not mistaken, the day of their deliverance is near at hand, for I have heard the king say he will certainly see them, and learn whether they are not fitted to rule their own duchy without the interference of so dangerous a relation."
"God grant the king may be in time," said Bianca Maria; "for it is said the young duke is very sick, and people say he has poison in all he eats."
"Hush! hush!" cried Leonora, anxiously. "Long confinement and wearing care are enough to make him sick, Bianca, without a grain of poison. No one can die now-a-days without people saying he is poisoned. 'Tis a sad tale, indeed, you tell, Lorenzo, and I have often heard our sweet Princess of Ferrara say that Galeazzo was a bad man; but Ludovic surely is not cruel. He has pardoned many a man, I have heard, who had been condemned by the tribunals."
A somewhat bitter smile came upon the lips of Lorenzo Visconti, but he merely replied, "The good and innocent always think others good and innocent till bitter experience teaches them the contrary."
Perhaps he might have added more, but the sound of footsteps on the terrace above caught his ear, and he and Leonora at once turned to see who approached. The steps were slow and deliberate, and were not directed toward the spot where the young people sat; but they instantly checked further conversation on the subjects previously discussed, while from time to time each of the three gave a glance toward two gentlemen who had just appeared upon the terrace. The one was a man somewhat advanced in years, though not exactly what might be called an old man. His hair and beard were very gray, it is true, but his frame was not bent, and his step was still firm and stately. He was richly dressed, and wore a large, heavy sword, of a somewhat antique fashion. Lorenzo asked no questions concerning him, for he knew him already as the grandfather of his young cousin, Bianca Maria. The other was a younger man, dressed in black velvet, except where the arms were seen from under the long hanging sleeves of his upper garment, showing part of an under coat of cloth of silver. He was tall and thin, and his face would have deserved the name of handsome had it not been that the eyes, which were fine in themselves, and overshadowed by strongly-marked eyebrows, were too close together, and had a slight obliquity inward. It was not what could be absolutely called a squint, but it gave a sinister expression to his countenance, which was not relieved by a habit of keeping his teeth and lips closely compressed, as if holding a rigid guard over what the tongue might be inclined to utter.
They took their way to the extreme end of the terrace, and then walked back till they came on a line with the spot where the three young people sat, still silent, for there is a freemasonry in youth that loves not to have even its most trifling secrets laid bare to other eyes, or its most innocent councils broken in upon.
There the two gentlemen paused, and the younger seemed to end some conversation which had been passing between them by saying, "I know not much, Signor Rovera, of the history or views of other times, or for what men lived and strove for in those days; but I do know, and pretty well, the history of my own times, and the rules by which we have to guide ourselves in them. If we have not ourselves power, we must serve those who have power; and while we keep ourselves from what you would call an evil will on our own part, we must not be over nice in executing the will of those above us. Theirs is the deed, and theirs the responsibility. The race of Sforza is not, methinks, a higher or a better race than the race of Borgia. Both are peasants compared to you or me, but the Borgias are rising, and destined to rise high above us both; the Sforzas have risen, and are about to fall, or I mistake the signs of the times. Men may play with a kitten more safely than with a lion; and when Ludovico called this King of France into Italy, he put his head in the wild beast's mouth."
"Ah, that that were all!" exclaimed the old Count of Rovera. "I should little care to see that wild beast close his heavy jaws upon the skull of his inviter, if that would satisfy him; but Italy--what is to become of Italy?"
"God knows," answered the other drily. "She has taken so little care of her children, that, good faith! they must take care of themselves and let her do the same, my noble cousin. We are both too old to lose much by her fall, and neither of us young enough to hope to see her rise. Phoenixes are rare in these days, Signor Count. There," he continued, pointing to the little group upon the steps, "there are the only things that are likely to spring up, except corn, and mulberry-trees, and such vegetables. Why, how the girl has grown already! She is well-nigh a woman. She will need a husband soon, and then baby-clothes, and so forth. I must speak with her. Leonora! Leonora!"
At the sound of his voice, Leonora, who had been sitting with her head bent down and her eyes fixed upon the marble at her feet, sprang up like a startled deer, and ran up the steps toward him; but when within a step, she paused, and bent before him without speaking.
CHAPTER V.
"Who is that man?" asked Lorenzo Visconti in a low tone, while Leonora stood before the stranger, silent and, as it were, subdued.
"That is her father, Ramiro d'Orco," answered Bianca Maria; "he has just returned from Romagna, I suppose; he has not been here for a year, and I heard he was there."
"Her father!" exclaimed the youth; "and is it so a child meets a father? Oh God! had I a parent living who came back from a long absence, how I should spring to receive his first caress! how the first tone of his voice--the first sound of his footstep, would move the whole blood within me. I do believe the very proximity of his spirit would make my whole frame thrill, and I should know that he was present before one of my senses assured me of the fact. My father! oh, my father! could you rejoin your son, should I meet you as a stranger, or bow before you as a ruler?"
"It is not her fault, Lorenzo," said her cousin, eagerly, zealous in her friend's cause; "I do not know how to tell you what he is, Lorenzo. He is hard, yet not tyrannical; cold, yet not without affection. There is no tenderness in him, yet he loves her better than aught else on earth, except, I have heard my grandfather say, except ambition. He is liberal to her, allowing her all she wants or wishes, except, indeed, his tenderness and care. You and