The Viper of Milan: A Romance of Lombardy
"For love, my lord?" ventured the secretary, with a hint of sarcasm.
"Whom I please," said Visconti. "Which is not what Valentine is doing,"
he added with a smile.
"She may give trouble yet, my lord."
Visconti frowned. He thought of Conrad von Schulembourg, the brilliant
young German noble, who had been a favorite with him and all his court,
and had won the heart of Valentine Visconti; no favorite of his now. "As
for my lady sister," he said, "let her dare turn her eyes save where I
bid her."
His own grew ominous, and Giannotto shuffled uneasily.
A noise without broke the sudden silence of reflection. Visconti,
responding at once to what it meant, glanced a moment from the window
where he still stood, then swept down to the head of the table. He
leaned across to Giannotto, not that he valued any response that he
could offer--Visconti's secretary was no more to him than the chair on
which he sat, valued solely for his skill in letters--but his triumph
had to have its vent. "Hark!" he cried. "Listen to it, Giannotto! The
wealth of Verona is pouring into Milan! The spoils of Verona, Giannotto,
the treasures from Mastino della Scala's palace!"
Giannotto winced before Visconti's passionate joy.
"'Twas a man I hated, Giannotto--I would he had lived to feel it. The
only man I ever _hated_, because the only man I ever feared, the only
man who ever dared to despise me! But he has fallen, he is dead, his
wife is in my power, and in his fall he has placed me higher than my
highest hopes."
Carried away by his transports, he seized Giannotto by the arm and
dragged him to the window.
The secretary gazed into the courtyard, where a group of soldiers and
servants were busy conveying statues, gilt and silver plate, rich
tapestry, glass, china, and arms, from carts and mules into the narrow
doorways that led into the grim interior of the palace. They were
presided over by a major-domo in a black gown, who called out directions
in a shrill voice. To one side a few unhappy men, of note enough to have
been spared, watched in grim silence the unlading of the spoils that
came from the sacking of their palaces. The great gates stood at their
widest, and through them wound a long train of soldiers, some driving
before them groups of prisoners, tightly chained together, others
galloping in laden with plunder of all kinds, art treasures, blackened
as if by fire, banners and suits of armor.
"Ah, Giannotto, look," cried Visconti, "_Della Scala's_ collection,
_Della Scala's_ jewels. How my treasury will be enriched! Only one thing
mars it, that he should not be here to see!"
He turned from the window. Giannotto followed, cringing.
"Still, thou hast his wife, my lord," he said. Gian's eyes flashed
afresh.
"Isotta d'Este--ah!"
He leaned back against the wall in silence. A certain winter morning,
five years ago, rose clearly before him; a massive castle, frowning from
the rocks above Modena, and on its steps a fair girl who stood there and
laughed to see him ride away back to Milan, his offer of the Visconti's
friendship scorned and flung in his face by her proud family, the
haughty Estes. Visconti's face grew dark as he remembered her; almost
more than Della Scala, her dead husband, did he hate Isotta, Della
Scala's wife. And she was in his power. Greatly would it have soothed
him to know her death was in his power too, but the lust of ambition was
greater with this man even than the lust of pride or hate.
Isotta d'Este was a valuable hostage to be used against her family,
should they think of avenging their fallen kinsman.
"Where hast thou finally placed her, my lord?" asked Giannotto, with his
stealthy glance. The Duke started from his reverie.
"In the West Tower," he smiled. "Every day I go to gaze on the room that
holds her to make sure it is not a dream; to see and feel with my eyes
and my own hands that her prison is doubly sure. If Isotta d'Este
should now escape me--but she will not!"
He crossed the room to leave it, but paused at the door.
"Be watchful, Giannotto, the Princess Valentine may try to leave the
palace. I have spies on her every movement; still, thine eyes upon her
also will do no harm--to _me_!"
He laughed an instant. A rustle of the hangings and he was gone.
Giannotto sat on silently, looking in front of him. His thoughts were
with Valentine Visconti, Gian's unhappy sister, whom he had been told to
watch; from her they traveled to the German Count, who, five days ago,
had left the palace.
"I wonder if she loved him," he mused. "I do not think she did. Dear
God, she did not need to wait to love a man, her life was not such that
she could pick and choose her way of escaping from it. Conrad offered
one and she was ready to take it--now--_five days ago!_ Yes--Count
Conrad is dead, and she will marry the Duke of Orleans! Ah, well! The
German was a fool, he deserved no better fate than a fool! I do not
think she'll break her heart if she can find some other way."
He returned to his papers, pausing now and then to glance toward the
door, as if to keep himself on the alert for the Duke's noiseless entry.
But Gian had bent his steps elsewhere. Plainly dressed, he passed almost
unnoticed across an inner courtyard to a dark angle of a wall where a
secret door anew admitted him. The whole Visconti palace was a somber
and gloomy place; men crept about it on tiptoe, glancing fearfully
around them, afraid of their own shadows. Visconti smiled to himself at
sight of fear; he loved to be feared, to hold lives in the hollow of his
hand, and play with them and death.
The door let him into a long narrow passage flagged with stone, and lit
by diamond-shaped holes left in the walls; the air was damp and chill,
and Visconti drew his cloak around him. Unlocking a second door, he
ascended a flight of stone steps, pitch dark, from which he emerged into
a large circular chamber with a thick pillar in the middle from which
the groined ceiling sprang. Save table and high-backed chair of
blackened wood, there was no furniture. This chamber was the outer
guard-room of the prison-wing, and a gloomy-faced man leaned against the
pillar, his eyes fixed upon the opening door. It could be no other than
the Visconti entering thus, and he crouched almost to the ground.
"What is thy guard?" said Visconti.
"Twenty men in each guard-room my lord, and each one picked for size and
trustworthiness, and I myself keep watch upon the door. Escape is
impossible."
"By so much the more that thy head will answer for it."
As he spoke, Visconti flung wide one of a ring of doors opening from the
chamber, and stepped into a posse of soldiers. No one spoke. Glancing
keenly to the right and left, Visconti passed through their ranks into
the room beyond,--a small apartment, dim lit and hung with arras. An old
woman sat at a tapestry frame with her back to the door, but at
Visconti's entrance she rose, as at something expected, and sank in a
deep obeisance.
Gian Maria closed the door behind him.
"How is she?" he said. "How does she bear her change of prison?"
The old woman glanced toward an inner door, massive and iron-clamped.
"When I am with her, my lord, she sits in silence, her eyes forever on
her missal; indeed she has not spoken since we brought her here; but
when she is alone, she weeps. I have heard her through the door; she
weeps passionately, and calls wildly upon her husband to save her."
"I would I had him, to stand him gagged against the door to hear her,"
said the Duke.
"By the look of her she will die of it," continued the old woman. "But
if I know anything of prisoners, and I have seen a few, thou wilt never
break her spirit, my lord."
"She _must_ be more humbled now," he said to himself. "She _must_ turn
and implore me for pity."
The huge door creaked and swung on its hinges, and he stood at the top
of two low stone steps, looking down into Isotta's prison. It was little
better than a dungeon of stone, lofty but dark, with one window deep
set, high out of reach, and thickly barred. The walls were hung with
faded tapestry, the gloomy, sad-looking folds drooping like torn,
captured standards. A huge chest of somber blackness leaned against the
wall; above it hung a horn lantern, which after dark gave all the light
that was obtained. For the rest, a few high-backed chairs stood stiffly
about the room. In his black dress Visconti, pausing at the head of the
steps, seemed part of its gloom. His wide-open gray eyes looked straight
across at the solitary occupant.
Isotta sat in one of the huge black chairs, her delicate hands resting
on the faded crimson velvet of the arms, her feet on a wooden footstool.
She was of a fair and noble appearance, but her face was marred by
sorrow and her eyes red from many tears. Her pale yellow hair was drawn
away under a white veil. Her long gray dress clung close about her
slender figure. On her knee rested a little book, and on this she kept
her eyes. Not by so much as a flutter of her hand did she show she knew
of the Visconti's presence.
He waited, raging inwardly, but words would not come easily to break
that silence. At last he slowly descended into the room, his eyes still
on her face.
She never stirred, nor raised her own. With his noiseless tread,
Visconti paced around the chamber, raising the arras, and testing with
his dagger every block of stone. It was a superfluous precaution; any
attempt to escape would have been simple madness, and Isotta d'Este was
not likely to give way to frenzy. Still it was joy to be sure and doubly
sure that she was safe. Every inch was inspected, every crevice
searched. Meanwhile from time to time he observed her keenly. But she
seemed not to know her solitude was broken, save that once, when he
passed her, she swept in the train of her gown, as she might have done
had a leper come too near. A simple thing, but it goaded him, and for a
moment she was near her death; rage almost overcoming prudence. But as
he stood behind her chair, half-inclined to strike, he noticed on her
hand a ring. His expression changed; he smiled; his hand dropped down.
The ring was of pearl, cut with the arms of Della Scala, and worn on the
third finger of her left hand; her wedding ring.
Visconti smiled again. Stooping, he raised her hand, and--"Will she bear
this in silence?" was his thought. For a moment it seemed as if she
might not. The delicate fingers stiffened and half-closed, then, as if
remembering anew, she left her hand passive in Visconti's hold, and only
by a faint quiver told she knew the ring had been withdrawn. The
despoiled hand fell back again on to the velvet arm, her eyes were fixed
immovably upon her book, and Visconti, turning away to the door, silent
as he came, looked back at her incredulous of such control. She was
sitting straight and slender, her delicate head poised high, but--ah
yes, he thought it must be so!--he noted with delight that her breast
heaved and the firm line of her mouth trembled ever so slightly. For a
second he stood thus, a ray of the pale prison light caught by the ring
he held, then the door clattered and shook back into its bolts, and he
was gone.
CHAPTER FOUR
VALENTINE
Swiftly as he had come, Visconti returned to the palace, and the
banqueting hall beyond. He stepped in silently, and softly let the
curtains fall behind him.
The room was of enormous size, and overawed the gaze. The four large
entries, one in each wall, were curtained alike with gloomy purple. The
ceiling was domed and of immense height, showing a dim tracery of carved
wood, from which hung golden chains, suspending jeweled lamps. The high
and narrow windows were wrought with painted saints, splendid in
coloring. From domed ceiling to paneled floor the walls were carved with