ace, and the
studied brilliancy of the atmosphere about her made her fear a
conspiracy to keep her in childish ignorance of what was passing within
the kingdom. But surely, if she were not equal to comprehending these
things, she must bend herself to the task and try to grow!

It was of this that the young Queen was thinking as her husband rode
forth with his suite of gay, young nobles to the chase, and she summoned
Aluisi to her presence.

Already a blast of heat was rising over the land and the rasping cries
of the cicala fretted their talk; and Caterina bade him follow her down
into the _voto_--the vast, cool, underground chambers which, for the
patricians of Cyprus, made life possible during this heated term,
between the freshness of the morning and the comfort of the evening
shadows.

The talk was long and serious.

"There was never a court without some discontent," he answered lightly
to her questioning; "fair Madame, my cousin and Queen."

The mingling of protection and affection in his attitude towards her was
so natural in the older man who had known her as the petted child and
cousin of their house through the years of intimacy in Venice, that she
had never allowed him to change it when they talked alone together, and
it was only in the presence of the court that he taught himself to
remember her queenly estate.

"Nay, Aluisi," she answered, earnestly, "thou art in league with the
King--it was his very answer."

"It is but truth, in league with truth, most gracious Majesty," he
retorted playfully. "Nay--but no league at all; only two liege men
speaking truth; therefore the oneness of speech."

He had employed the stilted fooling of the period to cover his confusion
and to gain time; for the matter was of moment and it had taken him
unaware--he did not know how to answer her.

"Nay, nay, Aluisi--I am distressed; there is some great trouble; I
command thy knowledge."

He had never heard her use the word before, and it became her well.

"Fair cousin, it is not new," he answered deferentially, but pausing to
choose his words, for it was no time to fill her soul with alarms. "It
is, I hear them say, some question of a mutiny in Cerines."

"It will mean an uprising?--danger for the King?"

"Nay, have no fear; it was quelled at once."

"How quelled?"

"So soon as discovery of the plot was made--before any steps had been
taken to carry out their plans."

"_How_ quelled?" she asked again, dissatisf