a heretic--"

"Should, I humbly advise, be declared a saint."

The Pope bent his brow for a moment, but the effort was too much for
him, and after a moment's struggle, he fairly laughed aloud.

"Go to, my son," said he, affectionately patting the Cardinal's sallow
cheek. "Go to.--If the world heard thee, what would it say?"

"That Giles d'Albornoz had just enough religion to remember that the
State is a Church, but not too much to forget that the Church is a
State."

With these words the conference ended. That very evening the Pope
decreed that Rienzi should be permitted the trial he had demanded.

Chapter 7.IV. The Lady and the Page.

It wanted three hours of midnight, when Albornoz, resuming his character
of gallant, despatched to the Signora Cesarini the following billet.

"Your commands are obeyed. Rienzi will receive an examination on his
faith. It is well that he should be prepared. It may suit your purpose,
as to which I am so faintly enlightened, to appear to the prisoner what
you are--the obtainer of this grace. See how implicitly one noble heart
can trust another! I send by the bearer an order that will admit one of
your servitors to the prisoner's cell. Be it, if you will, your task to
announce to him the new crisis of his fate. Ah! madam, may fortune be
as favourable to me, and grant me the same intercessor--from thy lips my
sentence is to come."

As Albornoz finished this epistle, he summoned his confidential
attendant, a Spanish gentleman, who saw nothing in his noble birth that
should prevent his fulfilling the various hests of the Cardinal.

"Alvarez," said he, "these to the Signora Cesarini by another hand; thou
art unknown to her household. Repair to the state tower; this to the
Governor admits thee. Mark who is admitted to the prisoner Cola di
Rienzi: Know his name, examine whence he comes. Be keen, Alvarez. Learn
by what motive the Cesarini interests herself in the prisoner's
fate. All too of herself, birth, fortunes, lineage, would be welcome
intelligence. Thou comprehendest me? It is well. One caution--thou
hast no mission from, no connexion with, me. Thou art an officer of the
prison, or of the Pope,--what thou wilt. Give me the rosary; light the
lamp before the crucifix; place yon hair-shirt beneath those arms.
I would have it appear as if meant to be hidden! Tell Gomez that the
Dominican preacher is to be admitted."

"Those friars have zeal," continued the Cardinal to himself, as