erously calm voice she bade him see
to it that by morning he was no longer in Roccaleone. "Profit by the
night," she counselled him, "and escape the vigilance of Gian Maria as
best you can. Here you shall not stay."

At that a great fear took possession of him, putting to flight the last
remnant of his anger. Nor fear alone was it, to do him full justice. It
was also the realisation that if he would take payment from her for this
treatment of him, if he would slake his vengeance, he must stay. One
plan had failed him. But his mind was fertile, and he might devise
another that might succeed and place Gian Maria in Roccaleone. Thus
should he be amply venged. She was turning away, having pronounced his
banishment, but he sprang after her, and upon his knees he now besought
her piteously to hear him yet awhile.

And she, regretting her already of her harshness, and thinking that
perhaps in his jealousy he had been scarce responsible for what he had
said, stood still to hear him.

"Not that, not that, Madonna," he wailed, his tone suggesting the
imminence of tears. "Do not send me away. If die I must, let me die here
at Roccaleone, helping the defence to my last breath. But do not cast me
out to fall into the hands of Gian Maria. He will hang me for my share
in this business. Do not requite me thus, Madonna. You owe me a little,
surely, and if I was mad when I talked to you just now, it was love of
you that drove me--love of you and suspicion of that man of whom none of
us know anything. Madonna, be pitiful a little. Suffer me to remain."

She looked down at him, her mind swayed between pity and contempt. Then
pity won the day in the wayward but ever gentle heart of Valentina. She
bade him rise.

"And go, Gonzaga. Get you to bed, and sleep you into a saner frame of
mind. We will forget all this that you have said, so that you never
speak of it again--nor of this love you say you bear me."

The hypocrite caught the hem of her cloak, and bore it to his lips.

"May God keep your heart ever as pure and noble and forgiving," he
murmured brokenly. "I know how little I am deserving of your clemency.
But I shall repay you, Madonna," he protested--and truly meant it,
though not in the sense it seemed.

CHAPTER XXI. THE PENITENT

A week passed peacefully at Roccaleone; so peacefully that it was
difficult to conceive that out there in the plain sat Gian Maria with
his five-score men besieging them.

This inaction fr