hey are both like that--he and she."

"All knights are like that, or they would be craven: that was no honor
to him. But what woman went with him from the palace? I watched them
going; it was a night like some great poem!"

"That was our dear Lady of the Bernardini; lest the Prince should be
strange without some loving face about him, and none can smile him into
quiet, as she with her gracious ways; and they feared a sound, for the
galley lay close under the fortress. So quietly they went, along the
shore, lingering where the nets are thrown by the shallows, to take the
galley by surprise--the Lady of the Bernardini shrouded in the mantle of
a fisher-woman."

"And after?--When they had found him? For it was not told where they hid
the child--or I heard it not."

"Yes--now it may be known; thanks be to our Mater Sanctissima!" Eloisa
answered devoutly. "They floated about in the fishing skiff until they
reached the private galley of the Signor Bernardini--so far around the
coast that it would be safe for the Prince. And of the peril, the Lady
of the Bernardini had no thought. The galley of His Excellency was dark
and with no sign of action, yet it had been manned for a cruise the
night before the treason--the poor Signor Bembo was to have gone
therein"--her voice faltered and they both crossed themselves, the
horror of that night was still so new.

"The crew were hidden within it," she continued after a moment's pause,
"and if there had been pursuit, it would have started swiftly for
Venice, to put the Prince in safety."

"How came this tale to thee?" Dama Ecciva asked with a sudden twinge of
jealousy--"we both being of the court?"

"Nay, nay, Ecciva," Eloisa pleaded; "we both are here to do our duty,
and in time of peril--thou knowest well--one may not ask counsel on the
house-tops; and this was for life or death. How might they hope to
surprise the galley of Naples, if it has been told to all the Court?"

"Thou, then?"

"Listen, Ecciva! Since it is past, thou shalt see how they are noble,
this Mother and her son! They left with me that night a message for the
dear Queen whom they might not reach with speech, to spare her greater
anguish, if they came not back. For, oh my God, how she hath suffered!"

"It is yet more a poem," Ecciva exclaimed, stirred by the hope of
further romance, and already half ashamed that she had shown her
momentary feeling of jealousy. "The message--tell it!"

"'If we come not back,