ks be to the Madonna!

"But the Queen is safe, _Sanctissima Vergine_! The Queen is in the
Castle."

"There is His Excellency, Maestro Gentle, physician to Her Majesty, he
passeth but now, the glimmer of his mail beneath his cloak! Holy saints!
A gray-haired man, rushing out into the night--thinking first of the
Queen and of her safety! The Madonna will be good to her!"

The old court physician gave the password at the castle-gate and
entered.

The Signor Andrea Cornaro rode forth from his palace, fully armed, and
with him Marco Bembo, cousin to the Queen--surely, they would know! The
citizens called to them urgently for some explanation of the tumult, but
they passed swiftly by to the palace of the Bailo, the Venetian
Resident.

But the Bailo gave them no comfort.

"I know naught of the trouble," he answered them, "save that warning
hath been sent me by His Excellency, the Count of Tripoli, that it were
wiser that I keep within."

"Then art thou the more needed!" burst from the lips of Cornaro, made
desperate by this coolness; "for it well may be that the Count of
Tripoli is a traitor set high in trust!"

But the Bailo listened to their importunate pleadings as if it were a
trifle.

"Come with us swiftly to the Queen! By all the saints in heaven!--she
should have her own about her in this danger--whate'er it be!"

"Nay," he said, and would not move. "This is a place of intrigue--and
warning hath been sent me. It is, perchance, some one who seeketh my
life."

There was no time to parley.

"Haste thee to the royal palace," the elder man said to his nephew, as
they galloped away, "and bring from thence, with all speed, the Queen's
Chamberlain, the Bernardini--there is none more loyal. Let none hinder
thee."

"I serve our house and our honor!" young Marco called back to him, as he
put his horse to the spur.

"I go at once to Caterina," his uncle answered reassuringly, turning the
head of his good steed towards the castle--a place of security indeed--a
fortress famed as impregnable.

* * * * *

The Royal Palace was doubly guarded--as never before, and Marco when he
reached it, plead in vain for admission.

"By order of the Council of the Realm, no man might enter."

"Then take, I pray thee, this message to His Excellency, the Chamberlain
of the Queen, and bid him come hither--it is for life or death."

A golden coin, with the head of Janus stamped upon it, glittered in