and do belong to Giovanni d'Anguissola--Agostino's father."

Cosimo shrugged at this, and some of the dismay passed from his
countenance.

"What folly is this?" he cried. "Giovanni d'Anguissola died at Perugia
eight years ago."

"That is what is generally believed, and what Giovanni d'Anguissola has
left all to believe, even to his own priest-ridden wife, even to his own
son, sitting there, lest had the world known the truth whilst Pier Luigi
lived such a confiscation as this should, indeed, have been perpetrated.

"But he did not die at Perugia. At Perugia, Ser Cosimo, he took this
scar which for thirteen years has served him for a mask." And he pointed
to his own face.

I came to my feet, scarce believing what I heard. Galeotto was Giovanni
d'Anguissola--my father! And my heart had never told me so!

In a flash I saw things that hitherto had been obscure, things that
should have guided me to the truth had I but heeded their indications.

How, for instance, had I assumed that the Anguissola whom he had
mentioned as one of the heads of the conspiracy against Pier Luigi could
have been myself?

I stood swaying there, whilst his voice boomed out again.

"Now that I have sworn fealty to the Emperor in my true name, upon the
hands of my Lord Gonzaga here; now that the Imperial aegis protects me
from Pope and Pope's bastards; now that I have accomplished my life's
work, and broken the Pontifical sway in this Piacenza, I can stand forth
again and resume the state that is my own.

"There stands my foster-brother, who has borne witness to my true
identity; there Falcone, who has been my equerry these thirty years; and
there are the brothers Pallavicini, who tended me and sheltered me
when I lay at the point of death from the wounds that disfigured me at
Perugia."

"So, my Lord Cosimo, ere you can proceed further in this matter against
my son, you will need to take your brief and your bull back to Rome and
get them amended, for there is in Italy no Lord of Mondolfo and Carmina
other than myself."

Cosimo fell back before him limp and trembling, his spirit broken by
this shattering blow.

And then Gonzaga uttered words that might have heartened him. But
after being hurled from what he accounted the pinnacle of success, he
mistrusted now the crafty Lieutenant, saw that he had been played with
as a mouse by this Imperial cat with the soft, deadly paws.

"We might waive the formalities in the interests of justice,"