nobiles, inter agnationes et familias ceusetas et
connumeratus._" Pietro was now a gentleman of Florence, and he at once
assumed the airs of such, as he conceived they should be, but his bad
manners and his arrogance brought upon him the contempt of the whole
Court.

Francesco at first shielded his protege, but his overbearing conduct and
his importunities at length alienated his regard, and he made no attempt
to conceal his displeasure. Bianca pleaded with her husband in vain,
success had turned his head, and now came "the parting of the ways."

Pietro had consented that Bianca should be "_La cosa di Francesco_"; he
too would enjoy life, and he sought his compensation in the embraces of
the most attractive and most scheming flirt in Florence, Madonna
Cassandra, the wealthy widow of Messer Simone de' Borghiani--born a
Riccio. Although well over thirty years of age, she was run after by all
the young gallants of the Court and city. Two already had been done to
death for love of her--mere boys--Pietro del Calca and Giovanni de'
Cavalcanti.

Pietro Buonaventuri vowed he would marry her, but the Ricci would have
none of him; and he fell, one summer's night, under the very windows of
his wife's bedchamber, pierced with twenty-five savage dagger thrusts.
That same night--it was 27th August 1572--Madonna Cassandra was
stabbed, in her own apartment, also twenty-five times, and two stark,
mutilated corpses were mercifully borne away, in the dawn, by the
brethren of the _Misericordia_, and given burial.

Bianca, widowed, demanded at the hand of her princely lover justice for
the spilling of her husband's blood; but, for answer, Francesco drew her
gently to his heart and said: "The best thing I can do now, my own
Bianca, is to make you, before long, Grand Duchess of Tuscany!"

The Cardinal was keenly interested in this tragedy, not indeed that he
took any part therein, but it had a distinct bearing upon his line of
conduct, and he noted with apprehension the redoubling of Francesco's
devotion to "the hated Venetian."

Bianca, of course, was perfectly aware that she was the real cause of
Ferdinando's animosity, in spite of his protestations of admiration and
the like. She set about to unmask his real intentions and to circumvent
his hypocrisy. Her methods were at once original and full of tact, for
she disarmed his aggression by playing to his personal vanity and by
furthering his lust for money.

Not once, nor twice, but m