THE SWORD DECIDES (continued 2)

Beside Giovanna her sister leaned on the arm of her chair, gorgeous, opulent in gold and green, but indifferent eyes beneath the chestnut brows and a tragic mouth behind the fluttering fan of peacock feathers.

To right and left were the ladies, whispering and laughing together, the pages, the Queen’s gentlemen, then the nobles in their velvet seats. These pageants had not been common in the old King’s time, and Giovanna’s violet eyes were eagerly noticing the signs of pleasure and approval in the gay crowd about her. She wanted their good-will—yea, down to the merest scullion breathing garlic there beyond the rope, she wanted them on her side in the coming struggle with her husband.

When she was crowned alone in Santa Chiara, she must have these people on her side. When Andreas of Hungary, despite justice and the King’s will, was thus flagrantly disregarded, he must evoke no sympathy. Naples must look to her—the Queen.

And so she gave them their jousts and tourneys, though Raymond de Cabane complained of the lavish expense, and she found it wearisome to sit for hours with the noise in her ears, the glare in her eyes, and the crown pressing unmercifully on her aching head.

She looked down curiously at Sancia’s smiling face. It was evident the fair Paduan did not find it wearisome.

“A ducat on the Prince of Taranto,” said Sancia. She swung a velvet purse tasseled in steel, and her blue eyes sparkled with merriment.

“Why many lay their money on him,” smiled the squire, “but Carlo di Durazzo goes a-begging——”

Sancia dropped the canopy, shutting out the squire. The Queen stirred in her heavy dress and rested her pointed chin in her hand. Her heart swelled to think how Andreas played into her hands by always absenting himself and his friends from these sports. He was forever hunting. The Italians did not love hunters.

A movement came through the crowd, a shout, a sudden flash of jewels from the stand as each turned his head in one direction. The halberdiers put back the people and with a blast of trumpets the petticoated heralds entered the lists.

They rode slowly round, then took up their stations at either end opposite the respective tents of their masters. One was in bronze and azure for Luigi of Taranto, the other in violet and noir for Carlo of Duras.

Now the knights themselves were coming. White necks were strained to catch the first glimpse of them, and the Queen’s stand shimmered with gauze and tissue coifs, bright locks and silk veils. First entered the Prince of Taranto on a white horse whose bronze and azure satin trappings left trails in the sand as they swept either side of him. Over his damescened Milan armor the Prince wore an ermine surtout and a great silk scarf of his colors. From the twisted wreath of blue and brown on his helm floated the graceful folds of the lambrequin, and above rose his emblem of a swan with a silver circlet round its neck. On his left arm was a huge painted shield that blazed with fifteen quarterings; his right supported the spear in its socket.

Cleopatra Perlucchi, Contessa di Montalto, led his horse. Her orange gown and gold twisted yellow hair blazed like one sheen in the sunlight. On her brow was a wreath of dark ivy leaves.

To the cheers of the crowd and the murmured applause of the stands she led him round the lists, while the tossing of the noble horse’s head caused her little hand to be pulled up and down on the studded reins. As they passed the Queen, Luigi of Taranto lowered his lance and the Contessa swept an obeisance, at which the charger shook his head free, and the people laughed.

The Prince reined in the impatient animal. Cleopatra di Perlucchi, smiling, but a little flushed, took the bridle again, and the two passed to their place in front of the bronze and azure herald.

The trumpets rose again, the shouting, far more lusty and far louder, proclaimed the next comer—a general favorite.

The ladies clapped their soft hands. Maria d’Anjou leaned a little forward, with the peacock fan shadowing her face, as Carlo of Duras entered the lists.

His armor was gilt from head to foot; his surtout was noir, the bluebells on white, his lambrequin violet, his crest, a red rose transfixed with an arrow sparkled in jewels on his helm. Leading his black horse was Guilia di Terliggi, the Conte Raymond’s sister. Her bold, dark-eyed beauty was clothed in vivid scarlet; in the waves of her somber hair glittered the gems of a chaplet.

At a quick pace they passed round. The breeze sweeping across from Pausillpo and scented with the orange groves of Sorrento blew back Guilia di Terliggi’s gown, showing the line of her figure, and ruffled the tassels on the chest of the great war horse. As they paused before the throne, Maria saw Carlo raise his visor and look up at her with adoring, ardent eyes. She smiled faintly and they passed on.

Now Raymond de Cabane, unarmed, in black velvet and wearing the Queen’s color, was galloping about arranging the order of the jousts, and fresh and less famous competitors were entering the lists. San Severino, in white and blue, his horse led by the Contessa da Morcane, Guilia di Terliggi’s sister; Bertrand d’Artois, a young noble from Provence; Lello d’Aquila, the Captain of the Florentine mercenaries; the Conte di Terliggi; and Bertrand des Beaux, grand seneschal of the Kingdom of Naples.

Then followed unknown knights who tilted without crests or arms, and refused to disclose their identity until they had tried their fate. The lists were now full; a mass of sparkling color and movement.

“Oh, the dust and the heat,” murmured Giovanna, but she dare not appear disinterested. Her white velvet gown stirred a little with her impatient movement, then she was still again.

Pages in the livery of the Queen ran forward and put up the wood and silk barriers down the center of the lists; the ladies who had led on the knights came up to their places by the Queen, escorted by the squires.

“Now—God wot,” said Cleopatra di Perlucchi, “my arm is near broken——”

“Would mine were—in such a manner!” cried Sancia. “I would give much to lead a knight round the lists.”

“Why—it is well enough,” said Guilia di Terliggi with sparkling eyes.

The Queen turned her pure-tinted, clear-cut face toward the speaker.

“When ’tis my cousin Carlo’s horse you lead?” she asked. She smiled, not pleasantly. “He should wear your favors, not my sister’s, at his breast.”

There was a flutter among the ladies. Guilia di Terliggi laughed magnificently.

“It begins,” said Giovanna. She leaned back in her chair and played with a rose she took from her bosom.

Cleopatra di Perlucchi whispered to her friend. “When she is on such ill terms with her own lord, she does well to remark on others!”

As Luigi of Taranto and Carlo of Durazzo now advanced, the others fell back and there was a hush.

Then the fierce thunder of galloping hoofs as each rode either side the barrier, the crash of meeting and breaking spears, and it was over.

The Prince of Taranto had splintered his rival’s weapon at the hand guard; he rode back to the acclaims of the crowd.

Then two more rode up, then again, and so through the sunny afternoon it was repeated with intervals for encounters on foot between the squires and the wrestling matches between the citizens.

Luigi of Taranto, having overthrown all his opponents, was the victor of the jousts, and there were many smiles and cheers from those who had put their money on his prowess, while the followers of the more popular Duke of Duras groaned and even hissed at their defeated champion.

It had come to the last bout; the sun was gilding the house tops and the cool of evening had begun to replace the hot ardors of the day.

A miniature tower built of wood and hung with velvet was placed in the center of the lists; a silk banner bearing a fanciful device waved above it, and it was garrisoned by ten of the Queen’s ladies.

Ten young gentlemen, unarmed and bareheaded, made an attempt to storm the castle, and the ladies defended themselves with showers of scented water, flowers, and sweetmeats, and little harmless gilded arrows that rose like an accompaniment to their laughter.

In the midst of this mimic warfare there ran round a rumor of an unknown knight having sent a challenge to Luigi of Taranto to tilt with him for the honor of the day. The Prince accepted, ’twas said, and presently Raymond de Cabane announced that ’twas so, and that this would be the last event of the jousts.

The Conte da Morcane had wrested the banner from the hands of the Contessa di Montalto, and to the triumphant sound of lutes, the victors wheeled the castle out of the lists, while pages threw the ammunition of sweets and scents among the crowd.

Raymond de Cabane came up to the Queen.

“Is it nearly over?” she asked in a whisper.

“Yes—your cousin Luigi will be the victor—a pity he is not popular.”

“But the people are pleased?” Her beautiful eyes were anxious.

“Yes. Andreas mistakes greatly to absent himself—you cannot be too grateful, Madonna.”

“He will not come near me,” she whispered, “since I shut the council down on him, and that my head alone is on the coinage irks him, so the boy plays his own fortunes false.”

Once more the trumpets rose, and the spectators looked with some curiosity at the unknown knight. He was a man of great stature in plain armor, riding a bright brown horse. He rode round the lists, saluted the Queen, and wheeled into his place.

Luigi of Taranto closed his visor and put his lance in rest, both crouched on the saddle bow, there was a breathless pause, the rush of galloping hoofs, and the shock of meeting spears. The stranger sat firm, but Luigi of Taranto had shaken in his seat. Shouts rose for the unknown knight. The two backed their horses into place and came at each other again. This time his weapon shivered in the Prince’s hand, and the other’s onslaught bore him backward off his horse. He clattered to the ground, scattering the sand; his squire dashed forward to seize the rearing charger, and a thunder of applause broke forth for the man who had overthrown the champion.

The Queen rose and came to the edge of the canopy. The last sunlight like rosy pearl fell over her sumptuous dress, her fine gold crown, and exquisite face. The ladies about her also moved; there was a stir of purples, reds, and greens as they flashed in and out of the crimson canopy.

Sancia handed the Queen a fine gold chain set with emeralds, the reward for the victor, who was being led by his page to the steps of the Queen’s throne.

Giovanna stepped down. Her violet shoes gleamed softly on the Eastern carpet, and her heavy train, dragging after her, sparkled wonderfully.

The Knight dismounted. All eyes were turned to this, the charming finish of the jousts. The victor came slowly up the steps, but, instead of dropping on one knee before the blazing Queen, he flung up his visor and looked at her.

Giovanna was staring into the fair, sullen face of Andreas of Hungary.

As he was recognized, as his name passed from lip to lip, wonder swept the spectators. Then they cheered him; it was a knightly exploit, such as was beloved by Naples.

But the Queen stood cold and rigid with the chain hanging in her hand. As she heard them shout for him, she went white.

“You do ill,” she said, “to come thus secretly.”

His level brows frowned.

“God wot, I should not have been welcome under my own name,” he answered.

Without another word she gave him the chain, and even before he moved she turned away. Maria was by her side in an instant, catching her arm.

“Giovanna!—you must not let him depart in such fashion—the people—do you wish them to see this breach?”

The Queen whispered back in fury. “He shall not force me with his boy’s tricks—hark! how they cheer!”

Andreas, unhelmed, his heavy fair hair waving over his armor, rose from the lists. As Giovanna watched him her eyes grew cruel, for he was breaking her chain, link from link, and flinging it ostentatiously among the shouting crowd.

“Santa Maria!” murmured Cleopatra di Montalto, and she glanced at the Queen.

“Let us away,” said Giovanna wildly. “Ladies, let us go home.”

She caught Guilia di Terliggi’s arm and hurried her down the steps.

Her soldiers, her gentlemen and pages surrounded her. Her white palfrey was brought and Luigi of Taranto, freed from his armor, came to hold her stirrup; but she took no heed of any, only to herself she said:

“This boy—and I!—this boy!”

So in the absorbed silence of furious hate she swept through the streets of Naples. The shouts of the returning crowd brought her no pleasure; had they not also cheered Andreas of Hungary? As she came into the hall of the palace she met Carlo di Durazzo, and she waved her attendants back.

“Where is he—my husband?”

The Duke, standing with his arms akimbo and his legs well apart to show off his elegant figure, smiled.

“He intends to give a feast to-night, my cousin.”

Her rings flashed into points of light at the tighter clasping of her hands, but she remembered those behind her. She beckoned to the Conte Raymond. The others, taking their dismissal, were scattered about the great hall, watching curiously from a distance. Only Maria stood near, swinging her peacock fan against the lily-bespattered tapestry on the wall.

“You see,” said the Queen to Raymond quickly. “He defies me——”

“He must not feast his Hungarians here, Madonna; there will be bloodshed.”

“His hopes of Avignon must be strong,” murmured Giovanna, “or he would not dare——”

“My hopes are also strong,” answered Raymond de Cabane sternly.

There was a little silence between them. The Conte looked covertly at his promised reward; Maria d’Anjou, sad and beautiful, wistfully waving her fan; and Giovanna thought passionately of the day when she would rule Naples alone—alone.

Then, suddenly through the crowd came Andreas himself, resplendent in blue and purple, hanging on to the arm of Henryk of Belgrade.

The Queen gave him a sidelong, wicked look, and laid her fine fingers on the Conte Raymond’s wrist.

“My lord,” she said softly.

Andreas paused and looked full at her with insolent eyes.

“I give no feast to-night,” she said steadily, “and when the Queen does not—no others do——”

Andreas flushed hotly.

“What is this?” he demanded hoarsely. “Do ye seek to rule me?”

“Ye give no feast here, Lord Andreas,” she returned. “The Conte Raymond has my orders, and ye will find none within the palace to serve you.”

“Now, by God’s Heaven!” he breathed, “am I to endure this malice?”

She put her hand to the square line of her velvet bodice.

“Ye are too generous with the public purse,” she said. “Why, your living has cost me somewhat. I do not feast seditious men such as follow thee.”

Andreas stood utterly silent. He looked at the man whose wrist she held, and was minded to stab him where he stood, but the dignity that tempered his uncouthness came to his aid.

“Well, Henryk,” he said, and his eyes were flaming, “we must even dine at taverns until I get my answer from Avignon.”

He turned on his heel, saw Maria, swept her an obeisance, then, throwing his arm round Henryk of Belgrade, went splendidly from the hall.

CHAPTER EIGHT. THE KING MOVES

The King awoke to find himself lying on his gold and crimson bed with the sunlight in a great patch on the floor beside him.

For a while he kept quite still, looking about him. Through the diamond panes of the window was a pleasant view of trees and sky and sunshine. Andreas turned on to his side and watched it lazily; then he noticed some spilled wax over the floor and clothes lying half out of an opened coffer. This led him to observe that he was in his dress still. He held up his arm and saw the sleeve was torn; he sat up and gazed at the rose and white hose he always wore; they were stained, and one of his shoes was gone.

Now he sat up he found his head was heavy and aching, his squire lying under the window asleep.

“Carobert!” he called.

The boy took no heed, and the King, looking round, saw his sword lying on the chair beside him. He seized it, and leaning from the bed, prodded the huddled figure.

“Carobert, fat, lazy good for naught!” he cried. “Wake up!”

The squire groaned and struggled into a sitting posture. Andreas replaced the sword on the chair and sank back on to his bed.

“What happened last night?” he demanded.

Carobert stretched himself and yawned.

“Last night!” he said with another groan. “Mass! What did not happen last night!”

“You were drunk, I suppose,” said the King with an air of disgust.

The squire smiled weakly.

“We met the Conte Raymond and his men——”

Andreas turned his face on the pillow.

“Yes—when we were returning from the Tavern.”

“And there was a fight,” finished Carobert.

The King lay gloomily silent. This was the climax of all the insults, wrongs, and indignities he had to endure at the court of Naples; that he should be driven to take his friends to taverns and have to brawl with the Conte Raymond’s men before he could return to the Palace.

The squire, yawning, was slowly setting the room in order. The growing sun touched the King’s long limbs and his tumbled yellow hair. He was thinking of Giovanna. With softer feelings, with something of the generous sense of youth and chivalry, he had gone to her joust. It had given him great pleasure to overthrow Luigi of Taranto, because he had thought that she, and all of them, finding him a man and a warrior, would be moved to some respect.

But when he had beheld her face, seeing who he was, he had hated her. He hated her now very bitterly, he saw that she would never be won, that always she would seek to humiliate and degrade him, that only by force would he be King in Naples.

He sat up on his bed, and drew a parchment from under his pillow. It was a list of those persons he intended to behead upon his coronation day, and the first on the list came the name of Raymond de Cabane, though he loathed all the smooth nobles who paid court to the Queen and mocked him, most of all did he fiercely loathe this man, who was to win his brother’s betrothed as payment for his intrigues against himself. He thrust the parchment back under the pillow, and his beautiful hand beat up and down on the coverlet.

“Avignon!” he muttered. “When shall I hear from the Pope at Avignon!”

He rose and went to the window. His anger of last night and the tavern revelry that had been the result of it, had left him stale and sick. He rested his square chin in his hand, and, gazing across the great beauty of Naples, thought there was no life he would not change this vile existence for. Brooding over his wrongs he grew sullen and out of humor with every one—with his brother who had sanctioned the match, with the old dead King who had made such late amends, with his envoys in Avignon who were so long.

The only thought that brought him any pleasure was that he could mount his horse, take up his spear, and ride away toward Melito and Capua to the great woods of Aversa after the boar. Leaving behind their music, their painted faces, covert insults, and silken grandeur, he could revel in the knowledge of his youth and strength, the feel of the great steed under him, the swinging past him of the countryside, the farms, the vineyards, the olive trees and chestnuts.

Once he had ridden as far as Baia, with its remains of superb marble palaces, the blues unspeakable and regal purples of the coast; and he had mounted the wall of the old Acropolis and seen such beauty as had shaken his soul.

The perfect islands of Ischia and Procida slept in the vivid Mediterranean, and the mist of enchantment was over them; traced in the foreground were the wild roses and grasses growing round some fallen Greek altar on the shore. Andreas remembered the stillness, the sun on his face, and the translucent sea that was blue beyond belief, and the gulls that had flashed through the enchanted silence, with that light that only three things can give forth—a sea bird’s wings, a ship’s sails, and a man’s sword.

Andreas, thinking of this place, longed for it.

“Carobert,” he said. “We will go hunting to Cuma and Baia.” He moved into the room and, yawning, stretched his long limbs; then relaxed himself quickly and turned, for Konrad of Gottif had flung himself into the chamber, breathing excitement. Andreas thought only of one thing.

“From Avignon?” he cried.

The lord of Gottif fell to his knees and caught the King’s hands.

“The Pope has recognized you,” he said in an unsteady voice. “The legate, with the bull of coronation, waits at Capua. At last—at last ye are master over this proud woman.”

With an inarticulate sound Andreas turned away, his cheeks became crimson, his lips quivered, he said nothing.

Konrad of Gottif, still kneeling and panting with the haste of his coming, broke into hot speech: “The Legate’s forerunner is come secretly and is below, my lord,” he said, “with letters of this import, that the Pope is prepared to support you with the whole of his authority, and has declared that any attempt to put up the Queen will be held as treason against the Holy See.”

Andreas turned about. His shining eyes dwelt ardently on his friend’s face.

“The people?” he asked. “Will the people stand—her—friends——”

“These Neapolitans will not rise against the Pope—they dare not—and if they did ye will have all Italy to back ye.”

The King’s bosom heaved.

“There are some men would give half their estates,” he said huskily, “that they had not insulted me.”

Konrad of Gottif rose to his feet.

“Why, God wot, ye will not have many enemies now.”

“Nay,” answered Andreas, showing his teeth, “for their heads shall grace the pageantry of my coronation, and blood instead of wine shall flow in the streets to celebrate my accession.”

“A fine resolution!” cried Konrad. “We will show them how Hungary may be avenged.”

The King’s eyes gleamed hard and set as steel; his nostrils were distended.

“The Queen,” he said, “does she know?”

“No—is it well she should—before we are ready?”

“She can no longer protect her friends,” breathed Andreas. “God’s Heaven—no; not against me—the King.”

“You will let her know?” cried Konrad.

“I am going to her,” he answered hoarsely.

“Is it wise?” asked Konrad.

The King answered from the door.

“It is my desire.”

Even as he was, in his disordered clothes, his hair disarranged, he sought for her through the palace. Finding the Legate’s messenger in the hall, he took the letters and thrust them into his breast. He was too excited to stay now to read.

By questioning those whom he met, he learned that Giovanna was in the loggia overlooking the garden.

Without a thought as to what he intended to do or say, with no conception what her behavior would be, he entered the antechamber of the loggia.

It was all marble. For background the trembling green of the garden to be seen between the slender pillars of the loggia that was filled with light.

The bright clear colors of the dresses of the company showed like velvet petals of flowers laid on snow.

Andreas stood looking at them.

Sancia and the Conte Raymond were playing chess, seated on scarlet cushions. Her fairness was like the ivory of the pieces, his swarthiness like the ebony. Maria was turning over the pages of a vast book; on the hem of her blue kirtle sat a little white cat. Walking up and down outside was Luigi of Taranto in a striped orange mantle that burned like flame against the marble.

In the center of the room stood Giovanna with a little arrow in her hand.

The pale green côte-hardie that showed her shape to the waist, ended in a jeweled girdle clasped about her hips, and a full white skirt rippled about her on the pavement.

Her auburn hair hung in nets over her ears, and across her brow was a close little wreath of roses.

When she saw Andreas she frowned and a delicate color came into her face.

“So—ye hold court,” he said.

All eyes turned to him. He swaggered nearer the Queen, and the shadow of his big frame fell blue on the marble.

“Giovanna d’Anjou,” he said. “By God His grace, and His Holiness’s commands, I am King here.” He flung up his head and eyed them. Raymond de Cabane rose softly; there was a little rattle as the chessmen fell from the board.

“Have your envoys returned from Avignon?” asked Giovanna faintly.

He stuck his thumbs in his girdle and set his legs wide apart, gazing at their silence with a flushed, triumphant face.

The Queen lifted her eyebrows and glanced at the Conte; she was very piteously pale.

“There are some friends of yours,” said Andreas, “shall find the King remembers.”

“Is this a threat, Lord Andreas?” she answered, breathing fast.

“No; I have no longer need to threaten.”

They had all risen to their feet. The white cat, disturbed, walked away from Maria.

Giovanna glanced round her. “Ladies,” she said, “the Lord Andreas has come for our good wishes—shall we withhold them—and you, Conte, pay your court to him—I am no longer Queen.”

Into Andreas’s young face came bewilderment, crossing the anger. Maria spoke. “May there not be a King and a Queen at one and the same time, Giovanna?”

“If my lord permit it,” said the Queen, “but it is all a matter for Naples to decide.”

Before her cold self-possession Andreas stood speechless, scowling, his insolence of triumph deserting him.

“This has come over suddenly,” she continued. “Maria, take my arm. Good lord, we will speak of this again in a little while.” She gave him a lazy smile and went very slowly out on to the loggia, leaning on her sister. Raymond and Sancia followed.

“I will go and write me a warrant for that man’s arrest,” muttered Andreas; then he thought him he would follow the Queen. He did not trust their quiet.

But as he stepped on to the sun-flecked marble, Luigi of Taranto faced him and laid a hand on his arm.

“My lord the King,” he said gently. “May I speak with ye?”

Andreas flushed at the address.

“Aye,” he assented ungraciously.

“Let us step out of the sun,” said his cousin.

They returned to the antechamber. Andreas looked at the resolute face, the contained gray eyes of the Prince, who, as considerably the older man, held a half-careless authority over him which his calm deference did not lessen.

“Ye unhorsed me splendidly yesterday,” said Luigi frankly. “And by San Gennoro! I have a good seat—a fine knight should make a fine King, cousin,” he smiled pleasantly.

Andreas crimsoned violently with pleasure.

“Why, I was fresh,” he answered apologetically. “Ye had already overthrown many—we must try a bout on equal terms.”

He resolved to ask his cousin to hunt with him and gazed on him with eager eyes of friendship.

“Ye have great strength,” said the Prince. “I had not believed that I could have been so overcome.”

The King laughed in a half-shamefaced manner. “I can squeeze a bough until the sap runs out,” he admitted. “But then it is a common thing in Hungary.”

“We Italians rely more on finesse,” remarked the Prince.

Andreas set his back against the marble wall. “Ye wished to speak to me?” he asked.

“Why, as a prince of your house and one near the throne, I am interested in this matter between you and the Queen.”

He took a turn about the chamber. “What do ye intend to do?” he said shortly.

Andreas frowned.

“To arrest her friends and my enemies. I have three hundred names—and as for the Queen,” he hesitated. “We—ye know—how she has treated me—cousin.”

Luigi of Taranto surveyed him with narrowed eyes.

“Ye cannot manage Giovanna,” he said quietly. “Perchance not many could—still we have not come to talk of her as yet, but of you; ’tis a great thing to be a King, cousin.”

“God wot, I have waited.”

Luigi of Taranto suddenly laughed. “I also,” he said.

The King became interested; this stately cousin fascinated him. “For what have ye waited?” he asked.

The Prince looked at him curiously—pityingly, perhaps.

“For fortune,” he answered. The great bars of orange shone on his mantle as he moved to and fro. Andreas wondered what he had to say to him, why he did not come to the matter.

“Have ye letters from Avignon?” asked Luigi at length. Andreas pulled them from his pocket and broke the seal.

“Latin!” he frowned.

“I can decipher them,” smiled the Prince. He took the parchments, unrolled them, and began to read aloud. It seemed to Andreas that his movements were all very slow; he began to fret, but Luigi’s easy imperturbability and calm held him quiet.

The Prince read from beginning to end of Clement’s florid epistle, spelled out all the blessings, the titles, the inscriptions, abused the clerk’s Latin, and made many comments on the contents. When he had almost finished and the King’s patience was exhausted, Henryk of Belgrade burst in upon them.

“Andreas!” he cried. “Carlo of Duras, who was in the suburbs collecting troops, has ridden up to say that he saw the Queen, Maria, and a number of men riding out of Naples!”

“God’s Heaven!” yelled Andreas. “Raymond has gone—they have escaped me!”

Furious, he turned to Luigi, who was quietly folding up the letters.

“Were ye beguiling me here while they fled?”

Luigi of Taranto looked him straight in the eyes. “Giovanna d’Anjou has her friends yet,” he said.

CHAPTER NINE. THE CONVENT OF SANTO-PIETRO-A-MAJELLO

Andreas of Hungary ruled in Naples; no one disputed the title the Pope had sanctioned, nor made any effort on behalf of the Queen, who had admitted the justice of her husband’s claim by her sudden flight. In the triumphant court of the King she was never mentioned, seldom thought of, only Carlo di Durazzo had sometimes an uneasy remembrance of disdainful eyes unclosing on him, of a cruel face stricken into pallor, a delicate woman in a heavy gown, utterly forsaken—so had he seen her ride away.

And, as he knew his cousin well, as he thought of the fifteen great nobles with her, he shivered a little in his elegance at the things he had put his hand to for the King.

San Severino, the Queen’s councillor, had been executed in the Grand Palazzo three days after her flight; the prescription list grew daily longer, for the King ruled recklessly and with a heavy hand, treating Naples more as a conquered city than as his heritage.

Hungarians replaced Italians in every office of the crown, a thousand men were hired from Verona to keep the murmuring people down. The standard of Anjou no longer floated above the castle; there, as everywhere, it had given place to the banner bearing the proud arms of Hungary. Andreas, like a reckless rider managing fierce steeds, drove his fortunes at a headlong pace, and never glanced aside for obstacles nor looked ahead for danger. He knew nothing of the Queen’s whereabouts and cared little, save a generous concern for Maria d’Anjou. It was represented to him that Giovanna might escape to Provence and raise a war against him there or enlist some city of Italy in her favor; but he was careless of these things.

And then she sent to him from the Convent of Santo-Pietro-a-Majello at Aversa, some few miles outside the town. He read her letter through between pride and shame, and took it to Konrad of Gottif and the Duke of Duras, whom he found together in the garden comparing falcons.

The King, very gorgeous to look upon, in a gold-laced habit above the rose and white hose, drew Konrad of Gottif aside with that half-shy manner that changed him when he had to speak of the Queen.

“A letter from Giovanna,” he said, coloring, and thrust it into his friend’s hand. “Read it and show it to my cousin.”

The Duke, yawning, gave his falcon to the page and came up to them.

“The Queen has written to me,” Andreas spoke, awkwardly.

“By St. Catherine!” cried the Duke, and grew a little pale; “where is she?”

“At Aversa.” Andreas seated himself on the stone bench among the laurels, and his fine fingers pulled at the flame-colored and white gladiolas beside him.

Konrad of Gottif glanced over her small writing. “Of course you will not go?” he said, quickly, and handed the letter to the Duke, who read:

At the Convent of Santo-Pietro-a-Majello, Aversa, this eleventh day of September, in the year 1344, to the Lord Andreas of Hungary, in the Castel del Nuovo, Naples:

In the honor and welfare of the Kingdom, for our several comforts, for the sake of the illustrious Maria d’Anjou, will you come and confer with me in this house of peace? Being a woman and defenceless, I dare not enter a city you have armed with your soldiery, being your wife, by God His Grace Queen of this realm also, I will not patiently be wronged, therefore come here and treat with me, and God his blessing be upon our meeting.

Giovanna d’Anjou.

Carlo di Durazzo laughed.

“Defenceless! She does not mention Conte Raymond or the others.”

“Yet she had but fifteen men,” said Andreas, grandly. “Saying that even they are with her in this convent—and I shall go.”

“God’s name, why, my lord?” cried Konrad of Gottif.

Andreas lifted his blue-gray eyes.

“Those men, Konrad, I have sworn to punish before I am crowned King, and my cousin Maria I shall bring back to Naples. I shall not go alone.”

The Duke paced uneasily a few steps this way and that. “You intend to take the convent by storm?”

“I shall go there with my retinue,” answered the King. “After the hunt to-day I will arrest those traitors and execute them on my coronation morning. Maria I will send to Hungary as my brother’s bride. Cousin, what are the names of the fifteen she has with her?”

The Duke ran them over: “De Cabane, de Squillace, Godefroi de Marsan, Bertrand d’Artois——”

“The Frenchman!” interjected Andreas.

“From Provence, yes; di Terliggi, Morcane, Mileto, Cantangero, Roberto of Cyprus, the notary, Nicolo de Melaggo Acciajuoli, Lello d’Aquila, de Fondi, Tomaso Pace——”

“Write me down those names that I may remember them,” said Andreas.

“They are great and desperate men,” remarked Konrad of Gottif. “And I think, my lord, ye are unwise to go yourself.”

“Shall I stay away as though I am afraid?” flashed the King. “No, by God’s Heaven, as they insulted me, so will I trample on them, and as Giovanna watched it before, so may she watch it now.”

He rose, and his fierce glance rested on the Duke.

“You, messer, saw her triumph; you shall accompany me to Aversa.”

“And the Queen?” asked Konrad of Gottif.

The blood rose to the King’s noble young face.

“She may go free for me… the Holy Father will annul the marriage, seeing we are first cousins… I—have nothing to say to the Queen.”

He turned abruptly through the laurels toward the palace.

The Duke and the Hungarian looked at each other.

“Your master is very headstrong,” said Duras, with a faint smile. “He acts foolishly in visiting the Queen.”

“She can do nothing if he is armed with men. What should she do?”

The Duke picked a white rose and studied it attentively. “Of course,” he said, slowly; “what should she do?”

Konrad of Gottif rose.

“You are accompanying us?”

Duras replied with downcast eyes:

“Will you excuse me to the King? I have a headache—in truth, I am indisposed.”

“Too indisposed to hunt, my good lord?”

The Duke smiled. “I am no mighty hunter, messer——”

“We shall not hunt boars alone to-day——”

“I pray you excuse me and tender my duty to the King. Indeed, I am too sick to ride to Aversa.”

Andreas, hearing this an hour later as he mounted in the courtyard, laughed carelessly.

“My little cousin is a weakling,” he said.

It was a glorious morning, with a fine veil of cloud over the sun, tempering the heat, though promising thunder, the Italians said. The King’s spirits were tip-toe with youth, strength and triumph; he rode at a hand gallop through the streets of Naples, and for the sake of his sheer young splendor the people cheered him. More than one house was hung with silk and flowers in honor of his approaching coronation; more than one bright face smiled down upon him from casement and balcony. And Andreas laughed up at them, feeling his heart as high as his banner that waved above the city, for he was a King, and it seemed to him that his fortunes danced with gold like the blue bay that flashed between the houses.

Konrad of Gottif rode on his right, and the King gayly talked with him of his plans for the future and of little things that occurred to him.

He would build a lordly palace at Pausilippo, among the orange groves; he would send to his mother for a jewel to give Maria on her wedding—this brought him to remember that he should have written to his brother.

“But to-night,” he said; “I will write to-night.” Then he spoke of the little peasant girl who had disappeared; he told Konrad of the amulet, and laughing, added:

“I do not need it now.”

They left Naples behind them and started across the country toward Capua.

“Was ever sky so blue?” cried Andreas, exulting in the sun.

The cavalcade plunged into a forest of pine and chestnut, where the eager dogs were loosed. By the middle of the morning they had started a boar, and the King, adding the elation of his heart to excitement of the chase, was soon far ahead of the others in pursuit. Henryk of Belgrade alone kept up with the noble white steed as it thundered down the forest glade and across the flowered meadows. With the blazing sky swirling overhead, the scented grass underfoot, the trees to right and left, his heart and the horse’s hoofs keeping time in a wild measure, the King pursued the boar; his cap had gone and his yellow locks floated out with his gold cloak; one hand grasped the reins, the other held aloft the great spear; the white mane of the eager horse fluttered back and struck the rider’s flushed face; his breath came quickly in little sobs of excitement through his cleft lips; so, down the slopes and up the slopes, bringing a wind with him, rode Andreas of Hungary.

As the sun was dipping behind the chestnuts, they came upon the boar at bay, ringed about with crouching dogs, and one, bleeding, on the uprooted grass. It was on a low knoll under a cluster of beeches, all grown about with white flowers and limp scarlet poppies. Henryk of Belgrade rode up, shouting, and plunged at the boar, who turned and rushed at him.

“Take care!” laughed the King, reining up his foaming horse; but Henryk’s steed reared with fright and his master was thrown among the dogs.

The boar charged, but the King leaped splendidly from his horse and met him with the spear, standing over his prostrate friend; even for a moment his strength shook before the onslaught of the desperate animal. Then he drove home with the spear, then with the hunting knife, killing his foe cleanly.

Henryk scrambled up from the trampled beech mast. The King, panting, stepped back.

“Where are the others, Henryk?”

No one was in sight. Dark, heavy clouds were rising above the trees.

“There will be a storm,” said Andreas. He seated himself on the root of the beech beside the dead boar and the dogs.

“We must be near Capua or Aversa,” answered Henryk. “We can see no sign of a town from here.”

“It is no matter,” cried the King gayly. “The others, I think, must pass this way. We will wait awhile.”

Now the excitement of the chase was over, he felt himself tired, and laughingly told Henryk that he was hungry; then he fell to talking of his cousin Maria and of Raymond de Cabane’s designs upon her, and of his resolution that she should marry none other than his brother. “How much I talk of Ludovic to-day!” he said, smiling. “By God’s Heaven, he comes constantly to my thoughts. Henryk, I should have written to him—it is five days since he wrote to me—ah, the storm!”

In a moment it had blown up, a thick cloud obscuring the sky; a little distant thunder rolled. “We must find some shelter for the night,” remarked Henryk. “Nor linger for the others——”

“Some one comes,” said the King.

It was a shepherd boy hurrying toward the trees with the little wind that is the herald of rain blowing in his hair.

“Friend!” cried Andreas, in his halting Italian. “Come here——”

The boy turned, and started to see the gorgeous hunter seated among his hounds, with the dead boar beside the splendid great horses.

The King laughed light-heartedly.

“A poor specimen of venery, friend, as my huntsmen are not here—but tell us where we may find shelter if we will?”

The shepherd came softly up to him, gazing at the boar with wide eyes.

“Lord, there is no place near save the convent, whither I go.”

“Why, we will go there also,” cried Andreas. “Where is it?”

The boy pointed where the wood dipped into a valley.

“Below there—it is nearby—one may come upon a road.”

“Well, if it rain and our friends come not, we will ask asylum,” answered the King. He put his hand in the gold and leather purse that hung at his waist and gave the boy a piece of silver.

The shepherd took it with an awestruck admiration. The King’s yellow hair and blue-gray eyes and magnificent bearing were even as the figures in the missals illuminated by the monks. He was turning away slowly when Andreas called after him: “What is the name of your convent?”

The boy’s thin voice came over his shoulder.

“Santo-Pietro-a-Majello.”

Henryk gave a little exclamation.

“Where the Queen is!” said Andreas.

“And Raymond de Cabane,” added Henryk. “You will not go there?”

The King frowned. “Why not? I should be glad to see my cousin—I meant to go.”

“But not alone——”

“God’s name, Henryk,” cried the King impatiently. “What can a woman do? Have I grown to be afraid of such an one?”

“She has fifteen men with her.”

“We do not know it.”

“Would we had asked the boy,” said Henryk. “But he has gone.”

It began to rain in great drops; the thunder grew nearer. Andreas sprang up and looked about him for any trace of his company.

“Henryk, I am going to the convent.”

“Then you go, not as a King, but as a fool,” answered his friend roughly.

Andreas laughed.

“Why, you seem to think they might lay hands on me.”

“God knows they might.”

“By God, Henryk, I cannot bring myself to any fear of anything in the circle of the world—but I am tired, now, and something hungry.” He leaped, laughing, on to his horse. The whole landscape had darkened, and it was raining heavily. Henryk mounted.

“We must abandon the spoil,” said Andreas ruefully. “But perhaps there are those at the convent can come for it.”

The hounds behind them, they rode across the grass in the direction the shepherd had indicated, and the moment they cleared the scattered trees they beheld the convent, black against the stormy sky. It was a fine building, walled about with a great garden and shaded with many slim poplar trees that shuddered to and fro now dolefully in the gusts of rain.

A few moments brought them to the gate. On their summons it was instantly opened by a monk.

“I am the King,” said Andreas. “I ask your hospitality to-night.”

The monk bowed his head in silence, and the two men rode up the path through multitudes of sweet-smelling flowers, fragrant with the rain, to the convent of Santo-Pietro-a-Majello.

CHAPTER TEN. THE NIGHT OF SEPTEMBER THE THIRTEENTH

Andreas, laughing, singing, bringing the gayety and splendor of his triumphant youth into the gray old building, followed the monk his guide up the stairs.

The Queen, on being informed of his arrival, had at once asked to see him. She sent Sancia to tell him that she was alone save for two or three of her nobles who had followed her and her sister, the rest having returned to their estates.

The King thought her message conveyed an appeal; for mercy, perhaps, and remembering how he had last stood before her, his heart swelled with exultation. They brought him into a large room in the front of the building that opened its full length by arched windows on to a stone balcony grown with small clustering red roses.

The walls were hung with arras worked in bright colors, showing the Seven Virtues striving with the Seven Sins; there were one or two high, stiff chairs and a low table against the wall bearing an alabaster angel holding a lamp and a brass bowl filled with white lilies; above was a little copper gilt statue of the Virgin on a carved bracket. Either side of the room was a door reached by two steps, and as Andreas entered, that to the right opened and the Queen came down.

They regarded each other a moment in silence. She looked ill and thin, stooping more than her wont, while the brightness of her auburn hair caused her smooth face to appear ivory-white. She moved her fingers in a restless fashion at her breast, staring at him; then she said:

“How it rains! My roses will all be spoiled!” And laughed unsteadily.

“Through the storm I am here to-night,” answered Andreas, struggling with embarrassment.

“Ah,” she said quickly. “So you were not coming?”

He was eager she should understand that he had never been afraid of her.

“I was coming in a more kingly fashion,” he said haughtily. “I have not even one servant in attendance.”

She looked at him in an extraordinary fashion.

“So you are alone—” She paused, then repeated the word. “Alone.”

“Henryk of Belgrade is with me, Madonna.”

The Queen moved slowly toward him.

“I will sit down,” she said faintly. “I have been ill.” She seated herself by the table, and so slight and frail she seemed that his strength was moved to pity her.

“You should not have left Naples, Madonna,” he said bluntly. “Did you think I should touch a woman?”

“My position was not to be borne,” she answered. “Your wife and not your wife—the Queen and not the Queen—and my friends——”

“They are here?” he interrupted. “I warn you of some of them I have sworn the death.”

“I have five with me—ten have gone,” she answered slowly. “And these five wish to make peace with you—I have no means wherewith to bribe them more.”

He noticed that she wore no jewels, though still wearing the gorgeous dress in which she had fled from Naples.

“De Cabane has gone?” asked Andreas.

“Yes, oh, yes.”

The King hated these men for having forsaken her. In his triumph he could afford to pity; he looked curiously at her faint beauty.

“Giovanna—what did you wish to say to me?”

“I am at your mercy,” she answered. “You have the crown, the people——”

“And the right,” he added.

“I am at your mercy,” she repeated.

The King frowned. He recalled how she had treated him when the power was hers, but an instinct of generosity kept him silent as to that.

“Where is Maria?” he demanded.

“She is in bed with a little fever,” answered the Queen.

“She goes to Hungary,” said Andreas. “I take her back with me to Naples.”

“Yes,” assented Giovanna.

The King walked to the window and looked out upon the rain and the bruised roses. Giovanna watched him and her face was like a mask.

“And what of me?” she asked.

He was silent. This listless submission roused in him a vague wonder. Why had she not fled to Provence or some other part of Italy?—why have waited here without striking a blow in her own cause? He glanced over his shoulder at her.

“You are grown meek,” he said.

“No,” she answered, “hopeless.”

At this his superb self-assurance felt an increased pity for her. ’Twas a woman’s manner of fight, from insolence to despair!

He came up to the table where she sat with her fingers trifling among the lilies in the brass bowl.

“Giovanna,” he spoke quietly. “What do you want with me?”

She kept her eyes very steadily down. “Pardon for my friends.”

“Not, by God, for Raymond de Cabane.”

“No—for the five who remain with me.”

“Who are they?”

“Godefroi de Marsan, de Squillace, Lello d’Aquila, di Terliggi, and de Fondi.”

“Let them return to their allegiance and I will pardon them.”

She bent her head.

“For myself—who am no wife to you—freedom from the form of it, an’ you can attain it from the Pope—the title of Duchess of Calabria and all revenues thereto appertaining, freedom to marry again whom I will, and money to support my state as first princess of the blood to the extent of three thousand ounces of gold a year.”

He had it in his power to thrust her into a convent for life. This considered, her terms were extravagant, and she seemed to be waiting for him to so pronounce them.

“And for so much I will renounce publicly all claim to the throne and engage to live in peace,” she added.

“But so be it the Pope will not annul our marriage?” asked Andreas, flushing.

“Then must I have the title of your Queen—but I will not trouble you…”

He interrupted her, lifting his noble face.

“Cousin, we will not talk of all this to-night—there are many to consult—but I swear,” and his color deepened, “that I will give you all you ask.”

She gave a start, looking up. “You mean it?” she cried.

“By God’s heaven, yes,” he glanced at her proudly, his color coming and going. “You—may have thought me—a boor—Giovanna, but I can behave even as a King,” he added, and his eyes flashed.

“You are generous, my lord,” said Giovanna, “but, as you say, we cannot discuss these matters to-night—I am still weakened by sickness.”

She rose and slowly, by reason of her heavy dress, moved across the room. The youth wondered why she wore such splendor; then it came to him she had fled in what she stood in. He was angry with himself that it had not occurred to him to send her her clothes and jewels.

She put one of her little hands to her forehead.

“My lord King, I am sorry for it all,” she said faintly. “I have been too ambitious.”

Her manner was almost humble, her guise pale and pitiful.

“Madonna,” said Andreas impetuously, softening instantly at her humility. “Will you sup with me and Count Henryk—forgetting these things for to-night?”

“No, no,” she answered hastily. “I must sit with Maria.”

“May I not see her?”

“She is in her bed,” said Giovanna. “The monks will look after you—I will send my lords to you—I shall see you in the morning——”

She stopped; her breath seemed to come with difficulty.

“Mass,” said Andreas gently, “I am grieved to see you so ill.”

“Good night, good night,” she answered with her face away from him.

“Good night, Madonna.” He strode with his easy strength to the door and opened it.

“Andreas!”

At his name that she had never used before, called so suddenly and sharply, he swung round.

She had put the room between them now, and was leaning against the window frame, her wide, purple eyes staring at him. A branch of the wet red roses had fallen in through the stone arch and lay against her skirt.

“What is it?” he asked curiously.

“Nothing,” she answered. “Nothing.”

He left her and went singing down the stairs.

He supped that night with Henryk of Belgrade and the five Italian lords, who were profuse in their professions of loyalty. Konrad of Gottif and some of the Hungarian soldiers arrived at the convent during the evening, having come upon it in their search for the King.

Merrily they jested and laughed together until well into the evening, Andreas at the height of gay spirits. The flattery of those present, the submission of his late enemies, the knowledge that he had done royally by the Queen, all combined to swell the young man’s triumph. He spoke of the hunt, of the boar they would fetch in the morrow, of the day’s sport they would have again when he had settled with the Queen. He praised the beauty of the scenery, the good fare the monks provided, he mentioned again his brother Ludovic, and toasted him, coupling his name with that of his cousin Maria. He, however, drank but little, and rose from the table early, soon after ten.

“As I have neither page nor servant,” he said, laughing, to Konrad of Gottif, “will you knock upon my door at the waking hour?”

“What hour is that, my lord?” smiled di Terliggi. “Surely you will sleep late to-morrow?”

“No,” said Andreas. “By daybreak, my good lord!”

“I’ll wager my falcon you’ll be asleep,” answered the Italian, “at daybreak.”

So still jesting, he parted from them and followed one of the monks to the room prepared for him. It was that opening on the left from the chamber where he had spoken with the Queen, and directly facing her apartment.

He asked for his few soldiers, and was told they lay in the outhouses, the two Hungarian nobles being lodged in another part of the convent.

The King entered his room gayly and asked for writing material. The monk brought it and retired.

It was a small chamber scantily furnished, and very ill lit by a smoky lamp. The bed was gaunt, the walls hung with worn tapestry. Andreas, yawning, seated himself at the little table by the window and commenced a letter to his brother.

But after the first few lines, weariness and the bad light overcame him; he put it aside for completion in the morning and rose, again yawning.

Struggling with sleep, he removed his gold-laced habit and his sword and laid them on the table beside the unfinished letter. He wore now his rose and white hose laced at the waist to a sleeveless jacket of the same color, and his white shirt ruffled round the throat. His high leather boots he took off, and as he bent over them the chain round his neck caught on the edge of the table and broke. He uttered an exclamation of annoyance, for he never went without it. It bore a jewel Ludovic had given him, a case containing a lock of his mother’s hair, and Hippolyta’s little amulet. As he laid the broken chain beside his habit he looked on these objects one by one, and a sudden sadness came over him; he wished he were not so far from the only two people he loved. Restlessly he went to the window and looked out.

The rain had ceased and the moonlight lay over the peaceful garden. On the horizon rested the thunder clouds that had retreated sullenly with their threat unfulfilled; it was absolutely still.

The King’s melancholy gave place to a wave of exultation, a thousand glorious projects formed themselves before him, he thought of the submission of the Queen and of the nobles; their last toast rang in his ears:

“Andreas, King of Naples!”

He turned into his chamber, put the light out and flung himself upon the bed. Then, sleepy as he was, some uncontrollable impulse made him rise and test the door.

As he stretched himself again upon the bed, the monastery bell rang out sharply, summoning the monks to the service held every hour of the day and night. Andreas crossed himself and fell asleep.

He slept heavily, dreamlessly for a while, then very suddenly awoke.

The room was filled with the gray light of dawn. It was so still he lay wondering what had wakened him, when a soft knock sounded on the door. Andreas remembered his boast that he would rise with the break of day, and sprang to his feet.

Sounds like suppressed laughter came from the other room, and Andreas, believing it was the nobles making a jest of his laziness, called aloud:

“I am coming, my lords!” He looked about for his clothes, but the knock being repeated, he went as he was, in his hose and shirt, gayly to the door, and opened it.

Opened it upon Raymond de Cabane with a dozen men behind him. Immediately he was seized and dragged from his door.

He gave a great shout, seeing what they intended, seeing in Raymond’s face murder, knowing instantly their purpose.

“Konrad! Henryk!” he cried, and with a terrific effort of his great strength disengaged himself from them and staggered across the room toward the Queen’s door, yelling with fury.

But they closed round him. He struggled hand to hand with the Conte Raymond and flung him off, escaped from them again, and endeavored to reach his room with the wild idea of arming himself, but Nicolo de Melaggo thrust his dagger through the staples of the lock.

At that the boy wrenched away from di Terliggi, who clung to him, and made for the center door, calling fiercely on his God and his Hungarians for succor. That door also was locked, and the Italians made a third rush.

He defended himself like a lion, rage at their trickery, scorn of their cowardice lending his strength a fury. Bertrand d’Artois, the Frenchman, he dashed against the wall and laid senseless at his feet. He struggled to the table and seizing the gilt statue of the Virgin from her bracket, struck Conte Raymond with it. The tapestry ripped from the wall in the fight, and the table went over. With flaming eyes Andreas shouted for help. Di Terliggi, the man who had laughed with him on his early rising, drew his dagger and wounded the King in the shoulder. It was the first weapon used, for it had been the Conte Raymond’s desire that they should strangle him with their hands. Andreas, feeling the blood flowing and his strength breaking, uttered horrible cries of despair, and with an effort of desperation dragged himself and the conspirators clinging to him to the Queen’s door. It was unsecured.

“Giovanna! Giovanna!” he shouted, and thrust them back and dashed into her room. He smashed the heavy door back in their faces, locked it and bolted it, then torn and bleeding, stumbled on to his knees in the center of the gray room.

She was standing by her bed with her bodice half unlaced and her bare feet showing under her gorgeous dress, her hair hung about her shoulders, that rose fair and white from her falling sleeves. She looked at Andreas, stepping back.

“The door—I forgot to bolt the door,” she muttered.

The King fell forward against her bed, great heaving breaths tore his frame; he was exhausted almost to death; the blood ran from his forehead and his shoulder on to the sheets and coverlet.

“Giovanna,” he sobbed. “They came to murder me—” His fair head sank on to the pillows; his shirt hung in rags on his torn body.

“You murdered San Severino,” said the Queen fiercely. “You would murder Raymond and all my friends——”

“Call my friends!” cried Andreas. “Is there no one will stand by me now?”

He made an effort to rise, but fell forward again. “Stanch this bleeding, cousin—for—the—love—of God——”

Outside they thundered on her door for their victim.

Giovanna crossed swiftly to her husband. “Am I to falter with what I have begun?” she said with dilated eyes.

“O God!” he murmured, half fainting. “Did you set them on—when you had lied to me?” He lifted his blood-smeared face, and his eyes were terrible in their anguish. “Yet do not let them in—now,” he said hoarsely. “I am spent—pity me, cousin.”

He was faint with loss of blood. She looked down at him and made no movement either to assist him or to unclose the door to those who beat upon it. Her white face and bosom showed ghastly above her splendid dress in the gray light. She crept a little closer and stared at Andreas. His last energy appeared to have left him, his head sunk helplessly upon her lavender pillow, crimsoning it. A little early wind blowing in through the open window fluttered his thick yellow hair and her long curls. There came the sound of the Conte Raymond cursing and struggling with the door.

Andreas put out his beautiful hand and caught her down. “Giovanna—tie up my arm——”

She flung the hand from her.

“You’ll stain my dress,” she said, and laughed light-headedly.

At that he looked up, his eyes burning blue in his gray face.

“Are you going to let them in?” he asked under his breath.

She made no answer and he staggered to his feet, supporting himself by the bed post. He stared into her dark eyes and read her purpose. “You damned witch,” he said, panting. “I am still strong enough to kill you—remember that—afterwards——”

He seized her as he spoke. Utter scorn and wrath shone in his eyes. He turned her about, his bloody fingers on her long throat.

“I could kill you now,” he said. He laughed in a fury and pressed his pale lips to her bare shoulder—“good-by—Giovanna,” and he let her go.

She wiped her throat, where he had touched her, slowly with the ends of her hair, then she gathered up her glittering dress and ran to the door and opened it.

The fifteen rushed in and Andreas of Hungary stood against the bed post to meet them.

“A rope!” shouted Conte Raymond.

Lello d’Aquila cut down the cord from the Queen’s bed with his dagger… the others were upon the King. The Conte Raymond seized him round the waist and after a desperate resistance felled him and dragged him by his long hair and his shoulders to the door.

The Queen stood there with her hand on the bolt as she had opened it, and as her husband was dragged past her, he flung out his hand in his agony and clutched her dress and her hair.

Roberto of Cyprus leaped forward and cut her free. The King, still struggling fiercely, was forced down the steps into the outer room.

The others, following, loosened the Queen’s hold and closed the door upon her.

“Make haste,” said Raymond de Cabane, panting, “some one will be roused.”

“The balcony!” cried de Fondi.

“Ludovic,” moaned the King. They drew him to the window, Raymond with his knee on his breast to keep him down.

They got him out among the roses, and there he struggled with the tears of impotent anguish running down his cheeks. He half got upon his feet, but Lello d’Aquila flung the rope from the Queen’s bed round his neck.

As the King felt it tightening there, he made a last wild effort to rise, but they drew the knot and pushed him and dragged him on to the parapet.

Even then his dying strength was almost too much for them. Bertrand d’Artois turned away and fainted at the horror of the sight. Di Terliggi let go his hold, but Raymond de Cabane and the others threw him over the balcony and hurled their weight desperately upon the other end of the rope.

Then Conte Raymond looked over, leaning from the stone parapet and the scattered roses, and saw him writhing in mid air with impotent fingers clutching at his throat.

“A fine death for a King!” he called, and severed the cord with his dagger.

Andreas of Hungary fell the height of three storeys on to the flowers of the convent garden.

They listened a moment, then, scrambling over one another in a mad panic, rushed from the room.

CHAPTER ELEVEN. THE AUBURN CURL

Maria d’Anjou, roused by distant cries, and finding her door for the first time in many hours unguarded, hastily threw on some of her clothes and ran out into the convent corridor.

She listened. That sound of shouting and crying coming through the pale-lit convent made her shudder; she connected it wildly and vaguely with the King’s visit and the fact that she had been kept a prisoner all day. She hurried down the dim gray stairs, not knowing where she went, and found herself in the great quiet hall of the convent. She paused and listened again.

A shriek rang out—and another—Maria, maddened by a sense of helplessness, confused by the strange light, ran up and down wildly. She could not find her way about nor discover any living soul abroad. With her limbs trembling she rushed down the gaunt passages until she came upon a mellow light softening the grayness—the candles of the chapel glowing through its open door.

Maria, panting, with her terrified face half-veiled by her fallen chestnut hair, her violet gown gathered hastily about her, turned into the chapel and confronted the six monks who knelt before the altar. The high springing tracery of arch and window was half revealed by the yellow candle-flames; the long, black habits of the monks showed somberly against the dim, painted glories of the altar.

“Something is happening,” said Maria, with dry lips. “What were those shrieks?”

The first monk turned about and stared at her. “We heard nothing, Princess.”

Indeed, now all was quiet, utterly quiet. Maria waited a second, then spoke.

“I have been a prisoner all day—I saw the King ride up—” Her accent became full of horror. “I think—it was his voice that I heard just now.”

The monks all crossed themselves in silence.

“Will you come with me to find him?” asked Maria, putting the hair back from her haggard face. “Where are his friends—will you rouse them? I think—I think they were murdering him.”

Without a word or gesture, their faces hidden in their deep cowls, the monks came slowly toward the door, each bending the knee to the altar as they passed. One put a candle into Maria’s hand, and in his toneless voice bade her lead them where she would.

“Hush!” she answered, and her eyes dilated as she crouched against the wall.

There came a sound of subdued but steady tramping; of a number of men walking stealthily, but heavily. Maria, gazing from the chapel door down the dark corridor, saw a little group pass at its far end. One held a lantern, and the light flashed, and the face of Raymond de Cabane, the chain collar of the man behind him, and the fair head of Bertrand d’Artois, who hung like a sick man between two others. They passed hurriedly and the passage was dark again.

“Where do they come from?” whispered Maria hoarsely. “Where do those stairs come from that they have descended?”

“The King’s room and the Queen’s room,” answered the man. “From the Royal rooms of the convent.”

Maria shivered.

“Rouse the Hungarians,” she cried, “bring some one——”

The monk behind her, she went down the corridor, walking unsteadily, the smoking flame of the perfumed candle bringing out her wild face and the flung-back splendor of her hair from the surrounding darkness.

In this manner, meeting no one, they reached the room from which the King’s chamber opened. Cold with dread, Maria looked about her, saw the fallen table, the poor scattered lilies, the torn tapestry. She gave a heart-smitten cry.

“Andreas!” she tried to call, and found her voice would not rise above a whisper. She stumbled to his chamber door, saw the dagger that bolted it, and now shrieked aloud.

One of the passionless monks withdrew the dagger, and with a sick catch at her heart Maria entered, fearing to see her cousin murdered, stretched on his bed, fearing…

Nothing—the room empty—yet as horrible as anything her fears had pictured—the tumbled bed, the clothes and boots as he had flung them down—the broken chain and the unfinished letter on the table—all desolate in the brightening light… she saw his sword in the corner and his hunting knife. So—he was without arms.

She picked up the letter and the chain, placed them in the bosom of her dress, and came back to the monks.

“He is not there,” she said, and extinguished her candle; it was so light they did not need it.

“Perchance he is with the Queen,” said one of the Benedictines.

Maria turned to her sister’s door. As she crossed the floor the strengthening daylight showed her strange, dark marks upon the floor—the little red roses, too, were torn from their place.

“Giovanna!” She struck on the Queen’s door wildly. All old dreads, old horrors, black visions of forsaken days and weeping nights came crowding upon her. Impossible horrors seemed realized in a reality worse than any dream. “Giovanna! Where is the King? Andreas!”

The door was locked from within and there came no answer.

“O God! pity me,” she moaned. She stumbled into the room again and fell on her knees beside the stains on the floor. “Look!” she shrieked. “Blood—wet blood.” She put her finger on one of the dark patches and held it up stained with red.

“And behold here by the window,” exclaimed a monk. Maria, dragging herself upon her knees, followed the trail of blood. At the sight upon the balcony she shrieked again—on the defiled roses lay little locks of bloody yellow hair and shreds of white linen. Tied to the parapet was a red silk cord.

“I can’t look over,” cried Maria frantically. “This is his blood—his hair—they have murdered him——”

She hung back, clinging to the window frame as one of the monks advanced and, leaning forward, gazed below.

“Do you see anything, padre?” she muttered.

“There is something among the flowers—but I cannot see for the syringa bushes.”

“Is it—is it a man, padre?”

“Jesu! look down upon us! I see a man—one of his hose is white—the other pink——”

“It is the King!” screamed Maria.

She fell on her knees again and gathered up the fragments of his hair, the little scraps of his shirt, and pressed them to her cold bosom.

“It is over now,” she said. “They have murdered him.” She shook with great tearless sobs, then rose and gathered her dress round her breast.

“I am going to him.”

They followed her down the dark winding stair into the quiet garden.

A breeze blew softly from Melito heavy with the scent of grapes; the sky was glowing with an amber color flushed with rose; the cedars along the convent wall stood out clear cut, purple against the dawn; the soft-hued poplars shook silver leaves; in the flowerless lilac bushes a thrush was singing as Maria and the monks entered the waiting spaces.

The grass was wet with last night’s rain. She had lost her shoes, and her bare feet and her falling dress brushed the moisture from the flowers.

They found him under the balcony among the syringa with the rope round his neck. The monks knelt, two at his feet, two at his head, and began reciting the penitential psalms in a low monotone.

Maria stared at him a moment, then fell down at his side all cold on the wet grass.

The murderers had left little of the splendid Andreas. There was no trace in this mangled flesh of the gallant youth who had ridden into the convent a few hours ago. The brutal fall had finished their handiwork. Her mad eyes could not trace even the semblance of his face in that piteous head… only his hand—his beautiful hand, lay out on the grass unmarred. She took hold of that and laid her cheek to it, while the sun broke through the blushing sky in gold. Then she saw that there was something in his hand; a piece of embroidery, a lock of hair; she drew them from the dead fingers; a long auburn curl roughly severed—a gold brocade embroidered with a purple peacock and a crimson rose.

“O God! be merciful,” breathed Maria. She rose stiffly from beside the corpse and turned away across the garden, walking mechanically toward the house.

And after her rose the murmur of the psalms, a steady rise and fall through the laurels and lilac.

The whole convent was roused, the alarm had spread. Maria met Konrad of Gottif, fully armed, a drawn sword in his hand, rushing from the door.

The sight of him roused her into a flash of energy. “The King is murdered!” she cried hoarsely, catching hold of him—“he is in the garden with his head crushed in—they hanged him—from the balcony——”

The Hungarian uttered a sound of terrible woe and wrath and tried to push on, but she detained him.

“Fly! fly!” she said, “while there is time—they will prevent it soon—fly to Hungary——”

She crushed up the curl and the brocade in her hand.

“Bring King Ludovic to avenge his brother,” she said with a sudden ghastly composure.

Konrad of Gottif struck his hand fiercely against his forehead. “Is he dead—dead?”

“As we all shall be,” shuddered Maria. “Did you not bring your King to save us—quick—fetch Count Henryk—get your horses——”

She fell against the wall and could say no more. Konrad of Gottif looked at her.

“I will go, Princess; but, by God, I shall return.” He ran out into the garden.

Maria crawled slowly and painfully to her chamber. Noises were about, hurryings to and fro, but she met no one. When she was in her room she took from her bosom the letter, the chain, and the torn yellow curls, and laid them on the bed, and wept over them bitterly. Through her sick tears she read the few lines across the top of the parchment:

To my ever beloved Lord Ludovic:

The Queen has submitted, I am a King indeed with nothing to wish for—I rode through Naples to-day very triumphantly. We killed a boar to-day larger than any I have seen at home——

The writing broke off abruptly where his tired hand had dropped. Maria laid it down reverently, and with a kind of holy horror picked up the broken chain. It bore a case set with rough pearls containing two locks of hair, one yellow—like his own—the other black, of great brilliancy, as if gold sparkled underneath it, and a crystal cylinder with lapis-lazuli ends that encased some sacred relic, then there was the little amulet.

Maria stared at these things, and her throat and eyes ached with tears. She put beside them the auburn curls and the scrap of brocade.

“O Giovanna! Giovanna!” she sobbed.

Thinking of him young and splendid yester evening, writing light-heartedly to his brother, thinking of him now shapeless in the garden with the monks at his feet, thinking of those shrieks of agony that had rung through the silent convent, a passion of utter fury against his murderers shook her. She gathered up those poor objects of his tenderly and laid them in her jewel casket (despoiled of its contents by the Queen to pay for the loyalty of her followers) and locked it and put the key, together with the auburn curl and the brocade, under her pillow.

Then she wept anew, and flung herself along her bed, face downward.

The bright sun crept in through the narrow window, but Maria covered her eyes from it, remembering what it had shone upon through the syringa bushes.

Horror and misery in the form of cowled monks seemed to pace the room. The events of the night rose before her, dreadful, distorted. She sank into a feverish, half-conscious swoon, and terrible visions showed themselves to her like pages of a book turned over. She saw Giovanna on a gigantic white horse, riding over Naples and scattering cities like dust beneath her hoofs; she saw the sun rising out of the sea and a warrior lean from the East and take it from the sky and place it on his arm as a shield; she saw Giovanna again, calm and crowned, at the church door; then she saw the church crack and split, pressing the Queen into nothingness; then it seemed the world, gold and glittering, floated in eddying currents of blue, and over all the faces of it were great armies that struggled together and the blood that dropped from them stained the blue and put out the little pure stars that circled round about; then the Queen again, half naked with Andreas clinging to her hair and gown, and hideous shapes striking at him till he fell backward into a great void and lay at last still, with no head, under syringa bushes, and the syringa blossoms swelled into trumpets that blew a blast for vengeance, louder and louder, and the trumpets grew into armed men that loomed gigantic, and the blood of Andreas became a crimson flag that a warrior held aloft. Maria ran down to him and they stepped past the headless body of Andreas and began mounting innumerable steps, up, up, until a great wind began to take their garments, and they came upon a bare room where Giovanna crouched in a corner. And her auburn curls had grown over the room. They had to fight through them, like silken nets round their feet they clung, till at last the warrior pulled her from the meshes, and she showed very small and thin; he dragged her to the balcony where yellow hair and roses lay; he dragged her to the edge of the balcony…

Maria sat up on her bed, raving with horror, on the verge of madness, when her distended eyes caught sight of a sparrow that had flown in through the window and beat desperately round the room.

It steadied her, bringing her back to reality. With a fierce effort she struggled into self-control and got weakly from the bed, and, after a little, caught the frightened bird and put it forth again.

The sight of the fair, warm landscape quieted her. The sun was high in the soft, misty heavens, above the yellowing beeches and chestnuts rose the clustering towers of Aversa, toward Melito were the vineyards and orange groves. Her tears renewed themselves yet peacefully, and she returned to her bed and lay quiet. It was not the time now to lose her wits. If she kept her senses and her strength there was much she might do—she was Anjou as well as Giovanna; she had Alba, Giordano—fine estates in men and money; there was the Pope at Avignon and Ludovic of Hungary—if she went cautiously…

The door was lightly opened and Giovanna entered; not the gorgeous Giovanna of her visions, but a pale, tired-looking girl with lips feverishly red.

Maria could not speak to her. She lay still, thinking of the curls under her pillow.

The Queen came slowly to the bedside, and sat down heavily on the coverlet.

“You must make ready to come to Naples,” she said.

Maria looked up from her pillow with swollen eyes. “Ah, how you have been weeping!” said the Queen curiously; “you know what happened last night?”

“Yes,” answered her sister. “I have seen him——”

Giovanna winced.

“My God! did you dare?”

Maria sat up and gazed at the Queen.

“Giovanna, who murdered him?”

“Do you think I know?” cried the Queen. “What do you mean? They slew him last night in some quarrel—I do not know anything.”

“You did not hear the noise?” asked Maria. “Nor me knocking at your door?”

“No, no.”

“You did not lure him to this lonely convent that——”

“No,” interrupted the Queen fiercely. “No——”

Maria’s blue eyes stared in a strange fashion at her sister, with an expression Giovanna had not seen in them before, with a look that made her draw back before her sister.

“Listen, Maria,” she said feverishly. “We have all been playing deep—my friends have done this for me—I am innocent, I did not know before, no, nor till I heard he was dead—yet I cannot weep a man I hated—my rival and my enemy—let him go as better men have gone when they have staked their lives against kingdoms—as for me, I am the Queen again—the Queen——”

“And innocent—you say?” said Maria evenly.

Giovanna rose, shaking from head to foot.

“Do you think these men would make a woman their confidant? I know nothing, nothing.”

“Why was I kept a prisoner yesterday?”

“Ask Raymond de Cabane, he is master, not I,” flashed the Queen.

Maria put her hand over the pillow. It was as if she could feel the curl burning through like flame to her flesh.

“Giovanna—when did you last see him—the King?”

“When he came—for a few moments—Maria, do you believe what I am telling you?”

The Queen walked up and down the room, twisting her fingers together.

“Do you believe I am innocent?” she asked in a low voice. The gold, purple, and crimson of the borders of her dress flashed as she passed and repassed the window.

Maria, with her hand on the pillow, uttered the first lie of her life.

“Yea, I do believe you, Giovanna.”

The Queen looked at her over her shoulder.

“Who will do otherwise?” she said proudly.

Maria suddenly began laughing hysterically.

“Your dress—it is all torn at the side, Giovanna!”

The Queen paused instantly in her walk and gazed at her sister.

“Your beautiful dress!” laughed Maria wildly.

“Sancia tore it,” said the Queen, moistening her scarlet lips. “It will mend… get ready to come to Naples.” She put her hand to her side. “Why did you speak of my dress?” she added.

Maria had fallen back on the pillows.

“It is such a lovely gown,” she answered. “It seemed a pity.”

“Yes,” replied Giovanna. “It is a pity.”

And she abruptly left the room.

Maria d’Anjou sprang on to the floor when she was alone, and her face was distorted with passion.

“Liar!” she sobbed. “Liar! We have all been playing deep you say—but you, by God, you have not won yet—even though you have staked—and lost—your soul——”

CHAPTER TWELVE. THE LAST MASQUERADE

They held a great fête at the Castel del Nuovo, more splendid than had been known for many years. The dead, disfigured King was in his tomb in Santa Chiara, and no one spoke his name.

It was three days before the coronation of the young Queen, and the marriage contract between Raymond de Cabane, Conte d’Eboli, and Maria d’Anjou had that day been drawn up by the notary Nicolo de Melaggo. They who knew the state of the Kingdom, the discontent of the people, the quarrels of the nobles, the emptiness of the Queen’s coffers—those who guessed at a slow vengeance gathering against the Kingdom that had slain its King, marked a wildness, a reckless profusion in the festivities that showed both defiance and imprudence.

It was the Queen’s wish that she should shine with great magnificence before her people. Raymond de Cabane, of all things no statesman, made little effort to restrain her with talk of unpaid troops and a murmuring people; he also was near the summit of his desires, and careless of the last step.

The splendor of the scene in the great hall and garden was beyond words. The Duke di Duras, masked in purple, leaned from the gallery with the Contessa di Terliggi, who wore a trembling crown of peacocks’ feathers, and watched the shifting, laughing crowd below.

“Can she pay for it?” asked the Contessa, and her black eyes flashed through her bronze-colored mask.

“An Emperor could not pay for it,” answered the Duke. “They say the supper cost a year’s revenue—and the prizes at the tournament yesterday were fabulous.”

“It does not matter,” said the Contessa. “Let her dance to ruin—after all, it is better than crawling to it!”

The Duke smoothed his silver sleeve.

“But what of us?”

She shrugged until her white shoulders rose out of her bright green gown.

“We must die as gayly as we have lived, Carlo.”

“That,” answered Duras, “is the talk of a woman—the way the Queen talks. At the same time you are both of you trusting in the men to avert the disaster.”

She turned her face to him. Her painted lips and her round chin showed under her mask.

“Carlo, why are you despondent?” She laughed and laid her warm, bare arm along the gallery rail and caressed his clasped hands with her little fingers.

“Guilia, enchantress, the Queen has absolutely no money—she has squeezed from her own estates and borrowed from the nobles——”

“My husband,” said the Contessa, “told me that she had great hopes in Bertrand d’Artois—his father has a great treasure at Santa Agatha.”

“Yes—but the old man is close as a Jew.”

“Well, I suppose one could take it by force—at least, while the money does last, Carlo, let us enjoy it.”

“For my part,” said the Duke, “I do not enjoy dancing on a triumphal arch with a loose keystone. There is Hungary—and Avignon——”

“And the present moment,” interrupted Guilia di Terliggi. “And—me——”

“Sweetheart, you beguile me into folly——”

“Am I not folly?” said the Contessa. “Am I not a woman? And the business of a woman lies, not with past or future, but with the present—now, I am—to-morrow, I may not be—yet I could die laughing any day, being Folly, who cannot weep—and so—and so——”

“Guilia, you are entrancing——”

“Hush! I would see the Queen.”

They bent over the gallery and looked down; in the press of gorgeous costumes they could not discern Giovanna or her sister.

“She is changed of late,” said the Contessa. “She laughs too much and makes a show of herself—she did not use to——”

“You think she knew—about the King?”

“Knew!” the Contessa laughed. “My husband will never speak of it to me, but I think—” She lowered her voice. “I think the Queen was even there—when it was done——”

“Christ, no!”

“Sancia di Renato tells me she was shut out of her mistress’s room that night—and she says ever since that the Queen will sleep with a light—and that she puts her hands to her neck as if to loosen something—she will have no cords to her bed and fancies she is being strangled.”

“I have noticed that,” answered the Duke. “But I do not think she more than knew——”

“Listen,” insisted the Contessa. “The day after the Queen herself took all the sheets off her bed, and rolled them in the coverlet—and forbade Sancia, very sharply, to meddle with them. But before they left the convent the Queen took occasion to call the washerwoman, who had come with her linen, and gave her the bundle. Sancia followed the washerwoman, and found her taking the sheets off the King’s bed to wrap him in, for even de Cabane didn’t care to leave him in the garden—once the sun grew fierce—and Sancia looked into the bundle, and all the Queen’s bed linen was dabbled over with blood. Sancia spoke of it to the woman, who said the Queen had told her that she had cut her foot on a broken wine glass, and as this happened on the night of the murder, she desired the sheets washed quietly—to which end she gave the woman a ducat. Now Sancia knows that is a lie—there was no wound on the Queen’s foot and no glass in her chamber.”

“You think, then—” began the Duke.

She interrupted.

“Oh, I think a great deal—put it to yourself, my Carlo—if they slew the King in the outer chamber, her door locked, as she says, the whole time, how did those bloodstains come upon her coverlet? And how was it that her dress, that was whole the night before, was torn in the morning, and how was it they could not find the piece, though search was made everywhere?”

“Where was it, then?” asked di Duras.

The Contessa dropped her voice.

“In the King’s hand. Who knows—and the Queen lives in terror that someone may perhaps—who knows?”

“Di Terliggi must know, then—and the others.”

“They will not speak—no one dare believe them if they did. As for my husband, he went so sick he knows not what happened.” She grimaced and shrugged her shoulders.

The Duke shuddered. “Do not let us speak of it, Guilia—Maria, at least, believes her sister’s innocence——”

“Oh, bah!” cried the Contessa. “She knows well enough—she knows Raymond did the thing and the Queen sanctioned it——”

“She would not be so calm an’ she did,” replied the Duke, firmly. “There is no evil nor condoning of evil in Maria d’Anjou.”

The Contessa laughed.

“My simple Carlo, she is marrying the most powerful man in the Kingdom—she is not displeased. There are no saints in this court of Naples.”

“The Queen,” said Duras, and pointed to her, passing through the throng beneath.

“Ah,” answered the Contessa, watching her curiously. “Whatever they may say, she is not beautiful——”

Giovanna was fantastically dressed in a gown of close brown, clouded with veils of hyacinth blue; her auburn hair hung down in thin curls to her waist; her mask was of gold brocade; her slender arms were bare and her fingers almost hidden in rings. She was leaning, rather heavily, on the arm of Luigi of Taranto, who wore a vizard in the shape of a wolf’s face and a gray mantle.

A hundred figures of fantasy followed her: men and women in extraordinary rich garments; dyed, painted faces, distorted masks, bare limbs and tumbled autumn flowers, flashing, interchanging colors, and a riot of jewels.

Their shrieks of laughter, their broken songs, rose to the ears of the two watchers in the gallery.

“She is fair enough,” said the Duke, who was gazing at the Queen.

“Well, she has broken no hearts yet,” smiled the Contessa.

“She could an’ she would,” he answered. “But she is too proud.”

Guilia di Terliggi shrugged her shoulders again carelessly. “Where is Maria?” she asked.

Duras rose from his leaning posture on the gallery rails and the silver tissue of his coat glittered in the hazy lamplight.

Some of the revelers were running up the stairs and invading the quiet spaces; a half-naked girl, masked as a leopard and hung with roses, and a minstrel in pink, with a zither fluttering yellow ribbons, ran by laughing. The Contessa and Carlo di Durazzo turned and descended into the great hall.

The doors opening on to the garden were flung wide and the trees without and the room within were lit by softly-glowing lamps that mingled with the ivory moonlight; the walls were hidden beneath hangings of velvet and brocade. Everywhere the triumphant lilies of Anjou gleamed in gold and silver.

Giovanna had moved to the dais where the forgotten King often sat. She sat there now among green cushions, laughing. Before her a space was cleared, where a tall girl in white danced with the dwarf in black, to the accompaniment of faint instruments, played by gorgeous minstrels.

Shining vases of porphyry and serpentine, crushed full of trailing flowers, stood on the steps of the dais; fine white dogs moved to and fro in stately fashion, and among them dwarfs dressed like animals; from the garden came the sound of flutes and song and laughter; negro slaves in yellow and scarlet passed up and down, carrying salvers heavy with grapes and peaches; costly wines were handed about, spilled and drunk with careless profusion; the masquers danced together, danced apart and swirled round, a many-hued wave of brilliancy.

From out the thickest crowd came a lady in a turquoise blue habit and a black mask and ran toward the door. A misty white veil floated about her and hid her hair.

A mask in dusty lavender and russet red detached himself from the dancers and pursued her.

The lady turned down a side path, where the lamps glowed, globes of light in the rose bushes, and he followed to a marble fountain, where the water plashed softly into a cool, deep basin and wetted the citron leaves. The moonlight lay ivory-hued and clear over everything. From the distant chestnuts a voice came singing:

The lady sank on the edge of the fountain and looked at the man following her.

“Messer Raymond de Cabane,” she said quietly: “are you also tired of the noise within?”

He took off his mask impatiently and showed his sullen face.

“I am soon weary of folly.” He sat beside her and stared into the fountain.

The song rose again, plaintively:

“You have wondered,” said Raymond de Cabane, speaking slowly, “at the Queen’s profusion?”

“At nothing,” answered Maria d’Anjou. She shook out her veil in the moonlight, and her voice was as expressionless as her mask.

“She stands on the edge of ruin,” said the Conte Raymond, speaking very low. “The people seethe beneath her rule. Hungary is on the watch, and Avignon——”

“Well?” asked Maria.

“She is straining the resources of the Kingdom for this coronation, but I have saved your estates. I have wrung from her the moneys of the title of Duke of Calabria. She does refuse me nothing—we, Madonna, shall not suffer by her follies.”

Maria’s hand, like a lily in the moonshine, floated lightly on the surface of the water. He gazed at her black mask with straining eyes.

“Are you not pleased, Madonna, that I have spared your revenues?”

“Oh, you have done so much for me,” she answered quietly. “Even—murder.”