n which I am to lead them myself, sharing such risk as
there may be, I do not doubt but that by this time to-morrow I can have
a score of them enrolled--such is their confidence in Ercole Fortemani.
But if I take them to enter a service unknown, under a leader equally
unknown, the forming of such a company would be a mighty tedious
matter."

This was an argument to the force of which Gonzaga could not remain
insensible. After a moment's consideration, he offered Ercole fifty gold
florins in earnest of good faith and the promise of pay, thereafter, at
the rate of twenty gold florins a month for as long as he should need
his services and Ercole, who in all his free-lancing days had never
earned the tenth of such a sum, was ready to fall upon this most noble
gentleman's neck, and weep for very joy and brotherly affection.

The matter being settled, Gonzaga produced a heavy bag which gave forth
a jangle mighty pleasant to the ears of Fortemani, and let it drop with
a chink upon the table.

"There are a hundred florins for the equipment of this company. I do not
wish to have a regiment of out-at-elbow tatterdemalions at my heels."
And his eye swept in an uncomplimentary manner over Ercole's apparel.
"See that you dress them fittingly."

"It shall be done, Magnificent," answered Ercole, with a show of such
respect as he had not hitherto manifested. "And arms?"

"Give them pikes and arquebuses, if you will; but nothing more. The
place we are bound for is well stocked with armour--but even that may
not be required."

"May not be required?" echoed the more and more astonished swashbuckler.
Were they to be paid on so lordly a scale, clothed and fed, to induce
them upon a business that might carry no fighting with it? Surely he
had never sold himself into a more likely or promising service, and that
night he dreamt in his sleep that he was become a gentleman's steward,
and that at his heels marched an endless company of lacqueys in
flamboyant liveries. On the morrow he awoke to the persuasion that at
last, of a truth, was his fortune made, and that hereafter there would
be no more pike-trailing for his war-worn old arms.

Conscientiously he set about enrolling the company, for, in his way,
this Ercole Fortemani was a conscientious man--boisterous and unruly
if you will; a rogue, in his way, with scant respect for property; not
above cogging dice or even filching a purse upon occasion when hard
driven by necessity--for all