The Viper of Milan: A Romance of Lombardy
"It angered Visconti strangely," he whispered. "But it was a handful of
madmen. Wandering robbers from the hills! They were four at most, and
they tried to scale the walls of Milan!" He smiled in scorn.
"And yet," said Alberic, "they were almost on the ramparts ere they were
discovered, and when they were pursued, fled back into the night
silently, nor could we find from whence they came, nor any trace of
them."
"However that may be," said Giannotto, "the Duke hath dismissed even me,
and the delivery of this parchment had best wait till his black fit has
left him."
He raised the arras from the entrance that opened on the stairway, and
passed out of sight along the corridor, leaving Alberic standing in the
unguarded entrance of the deserted audience-room, undecided, the
parchment in his hand.
But he did not stand there long alone. One or two servants stole back to
their places, afraid to stay away; and presently, with slow steps and
vacant smile, there passed by him Tisio Visconti, followed by the page
who never left him.
"Thou, my lord?" cried Alberic. "Now, how would it be if I ask him to
hand this parchment over?" and he turned with a swaggering laugh to the
page.
The page shook his head, not comprehending. Tisio, unheeding, seated
himself in one of the great chairs, Graziosa's bracelet still between
his fingers.
"I will wait no longer," cried Alberic suddenly; "let the Duke summon
me."
But the next moment Alberic's swagger dropped, and he swung his plumed
hat low to the lady who, unattended, stole across the threshold.
It was Valentine Visconti.
Her breast was heaving; suppressed excitement showed in every movement;
it was not difficult for Alberic to read she had heard of Count Conrad's
rescue.
With a motion of the hand she bade him wait, and turned to her brother,
huddled in his chair, gazing blankly at the floor.
"Tisio!" she said, and her tone was very gentle. "What dost thou here?"
He looked up, and his dull face lit at sight of her.
"I wait for Gian," he said simply.
Valentine shuddered. "What wouldst thou see him for, Tisio?"
He smiled, and held out the bracelet. "To show him this."
The tears rushed to Valentine's eyes, but she remembered the captain and
turned to him.
"Thou carryest something here to give the Duke?" she asked.
"Another parchment, lady," said the captain. "But I fear my lord is in
no humor for its contents."
Valentine's eyes sparkled lightly. "Thou hast not the courage to present
it?"
"I confess, lady, I am waiting till I am obliged to," answered Alberic.
Valentine held out her hand. "Give me the paper; I will give it to my
brother!"
The captain hesitated.
"Since thou hast not the courage," she added almost with a laugh. All
Gian's orders had not availed to prevent some whisper reaching Valentine
of his evil humor and the cause of it: Conrad's escape, the threatening
parchments; the hint that Della Scala lived. Alberic, glancing at her,
saw a triumph and a malice in the lady's glance that made him doubly
feel he did not care just then to wait Visconti's coming. But still he
hesitated; the Duke might vent on him his fury with his sister.
"This business will not wait," cried Valentine, "give me the parchment
to deliver, or knock at yonder door and hand it to the Duke yourself."
But the captain of the mercenaries bent low, shook his head with a
significant gesture, and, handing over the fatal missive, bowed himself
away. Valentine turned again to Tisio's page.
"Take thy lord away," she said. "The Duke may not be best pleased to see
him here."
But Tisio would not go. Valentine, bending over him, stroked his hands
tenderly, then breaking from him, leaned against the wall in sudden woe.
"All of us crazed," she cried bitterly. "All of us, surely; wretched
people that we are!"
Then, at the sight of the parchment she held, her former mood returned.
Conrad was alive! He had vowed devotion. He would return to her rescue.
She would live to be free; to come and go outside the Visconti palace,
outside Milan, out yonder in the world. She leaned back against the
arras a moment, dizzy at the thought of so much joy, and her courage
rose high, her eyes danced.
"The Duke must have this parchment," she said; "and since Alberic da
Salluzzo does not care to seek an audience for it, why, Tisio, thou
shalt see me give it. The Duke loves not an interruption when he is
angry," she added, with a soft laugh. "But 'tis my duty to show him
this."
And she advanced toward the ominously closed door.
The page looked uneasy. He had no wish to face Visconti in his fury. Yet
well he knew he dared not leave his charge.
Valentine tapped at the door with gentle fingers.
"Gian!" she called.
"Lady, this is madness!" cried the page, startled into speech.
She looked over her shoulder.
"I am also a Visconti, boy," she said. "Why should I fear the Duke?"
"Gian!" she called again, her beautiful head close to the dark panels.
"I have something here of great moment. Why let everyone know thou art
so moved? Gian! Thou makest thyself a mock; dost thou _fear_ Count
Conrad, that his escape moves thee so?"
A pause: then with a smile Valentine stepped back a pace or two into the
chamber.
"The Duke comes!" she said, and the page turned pale.
The inner door opened as smoothly as silently, and Visconti stood there
looking at the trio. He was dressed in purple velvet, but his doublet
was tumbled, the fine lace frills at his wrists were torn to rags, his
eyes strained wide open, and for a moment, as it was with any who
encountered it, his expression gave his sister pause. But again she
remembered Conrad lived, and she held out the parchment. "I thought it
well to give you this," she said.
Gian advanced and took it in silence. But those torn ruffles, that
disordered doublet, had their meanings, and the look in those wide eyes,
as he turned them on her, quelled the mockery in hers, spite of herself.
"Begone!" he said, "and do not usurp another's office again. Leave me."
"With thine own thoughts, brother?" she said softly, facing him.
"Be careful," he answered; "thou shouldst know my humors, and that 'tis
dangerous to cross them. Remember it only suits my purpose that thou
shouldst live!"
At this Tisio, as if half-comprehending the threat, rose, and his
brother's eyes fell on him.
"Thou too! What dost thou about my doors? hast thou come too to dare me
with thy folly?"
His eyes blazed, his hands worked. Tisio, dazed and affrighted, let fall
Graziosa's bracelet.
The page stooped to recover it.
"What hast thou there?" cried Visconti with sudden change of tone; and
the page, quivering for his life, handed the bracelet on bent knee.
Visconti studied it one second, then, with a sound of fury that sent the
boy crouching back against the wall, control left him. His eyes lighted
on Tisio, and in maniacal fury he seized him by the shoulder and shook
him as though he were a rag.
"How camest thou by this?" he yelled. "How came this bracelet in the
Visconti palace? Answer me!"
Tisio whimpered, but had no reply, till, with a shout, Visconti flung
him from him with such force that, save for Valentine, he would have
fallen; then he turned upon the page who knelt by, trembling.
"Answer me!" he cried furiously. "Answer! Where got the fool this?" He
held the bracelet out. And the sight of those torn ruffles around his
long white hands made the boy's hair rise.
"Indeed, my lord," he gasped, "a girl, whom my Lord Tisio--met by the
western gate----"
"Gave it him!" shrieked Visconti. "Ah, the three of thee shall pay
dearly for this hour's trifling with me!"
"My lord took it," cried the page, half-wild with terror. "He took it,
my lord; she wept to give it."
"She wept to give it," said Visconti slowly.
There was a pause. When he spoke again, his tone was calmer.
"Then he shall be slain for taking it," he said, flashing a look on
Tisio, who, huddled in the chair, moaned with distress as he leaned
against his sister.
"Shame! Calm thyself!" cried Valentine. "What has Tisio done? is this
the first ornament he has liked and taken? Have they not orders to let
him have his pleasure?"
"Mark me," returned Visconti. "Take care thou dost not make my dislike
overrule my ambition--the pair of thee hold your lives solely at my
pleasure."
He turned to the page.
"Go, and take thy fool with thee, and keep from my sight."
With a white face the wretched page rose and helped Tisio to his feet.
At a whisper from his sister he went meekly, Visconti's mad eyes on him
the while.
A terrible silence fell.
Valentine steadied herself against the arras. She was thankful to see
Tisio go--alive. To ask why the jewel Tisio had fondled had so angered
Gian was beyond her daring. "He is possessed," she murmured to herself.
With an unpleasant laugh Visconti turned to her.
"Didst thou urge him to flaunt me with this?" he asked.
"Flaunt thee?" said Valentine. "How should I know a toy like that could
rouse such fury?"
The Duke looked at her keenly, and crushed the bracelet together in his
hand.
"As I say, thou darest me far because thou art worth something to my
plans--but I have the power, and I keep it."
She was silent, and he turned to pass back into his own room. But at the
same moment Giannotto spoke. He had entered unobserved, and drew near
his master with an obsequious movement.
But Visconti met him with a snarl.
"I will see no one! Did I not say so? Take care, Giannotto, lest I see
_thee_ too often."
The secretary paled, but kept his composure. He had learned that to
shrink before Visconti only served to arouse him the more.
"I would merely say, my lord," he remarked, "Alberic da Salluzzo awaits
further orders."
"Hath he found the Count?" flashed Visconti.
"My lord, no; nor trace of him, unless these parchments be one."
"Thou hast another there?"
Giannotto, bowing low, handed Visconti a packet. His head was bent, his
eyes downcast, and the smile that flickered over his thin lips unseen.
"This, my lord, was brought in by one of Alberic's men--found an hour
since outside the gates of Count Conrad's villa."
It was sealed, and inscribed with the Visconti's name.
Visconti seized it, and Giannotto, stepping back, watched furtively his
furious face.
Gian looked at the packet. There was no attempt to disguise the writing.
It was the same as that upon the parchment Valentine had given him with
its brief threat: "Della Scala lives," and the seal of it was the Ladder
of the Scaligeri. Long Visconti fingered it in silence, then remembering
he was not alone, glanced wrathfully up to see that Valentine was
watching him with a faint smile of scorn, and that Giannotto, for all
his downcast head, waited with eyes keen with expectation. But Visconti
curbed himself. To have the mastery of others he must keep the mastery
of himself.
"Giannotto," he said, and the secretary started as if a whip had touched
him, "thou wilt see to it that Da Salluzzo searches Milan and all
Lombardy--that he spares neither treasure nor blood--and that he brings
to me dead, or living, Count Conrad von Schulembourg, and the writer of
these parchments."
With an obeisance Giannotto went, in silence, and Visconti slowly broke
the seal of the packet. Then he turned to Valentine.
"Art thou waiting to see if it contains a message from thy Conrad?" he
said fiercely. "Have no fear! Thou shalt see his head ere night."
She shuddered before the taunt, and turned to leave him. It was always
the same; let her meet Visconti with never so high courage, she left him
quelled, discomfited, dismayed.
"Go!" shouted Visconti, in sudden fury, and she stayed no longer to
question or defy.