e produced his comfit-box, and raised the lid.

"That is a thing he seems to have determined for himself," he answered
smoothly--he could be smooth as a cat upon occasion, could this bastard
of Costanzo Sforza. "I came upon him here, arrayed as you behold
him, and reading a book of Spanish quips. Is it not clear that he has
chosen?"

Between thumb and forefinger he balanced a sugar-crusted comfit of
coriander seed steeped in marjoram vinegar, and having put his question
he bore the sweet-meat to his mouth. The ladies looked at him, and from
him to me. Then Madonna Paola spoke, and there seemed a reproachful
wonder in her voice.

"Is this indeed your choice?" she asked me.

"It is the choice that was forced on me," said I, in heat. "They left me
no garment save these of folly. That I was reading this book it pleases
my lord to interpret into a further sign of my intentions."

She turned to him again, and to the appeal she made was joined that of
Madonna Lucrezia. He grew serious and put up his hand in a gesture of
rare loftiness.

"I am more clement than you think," said he, "in having done so much.
For the rest, the restoration that you ask for him is one involving
political issues you little dream of. What is this?"

He had turned abruptly. A servant was approaching, leading a
mud-splashed courier, whom he announced as having just arrived.

"Whence are you?" Giovanni questioned him.

"From the Holy See," answered the courier, bowing, "with letters for the
High and Mighty Lord Giovanni Sforza, Tyrant of Pesaro, and his noble
spouse, Madonna Lucrezia Borgia."

He proffered his letters as he spoke, and Giovanni, whose brow had grown
overcast, took them with a hand that seemed reluctant. Then bidding the
servant see to the courier's refreshment, he dismissed them both.

A moment he stood, balancing the parchments a if from their weight he
would infer the gravity of their contents; and the affairs of Boccadoro
were, there and then, forgotten by us all. For the thought that rose
uppermost in our minds--saving always that of Madonna Lucrezia--was that
these communications concerned the sheltering of Madonna Paola, and were
a command for her immediate return to Rome. At last Giovanni handed his
wife the letter intended for her, and, in silence, broke the seal of his
own.

He unfolded it with a grim smile, but scarce had he begun to read when
his expression softened into one of terror, and his face grew ashen.
Ne