fresh; they, when
they found all as they wished, gave a sign to their companions to come
and join them; next appeared one man on a dapple-grey horse, which was
carrying on the crupper the body of a dead man, his head and arms hanging
over on one side and his feet on the other. The two fellows I had first
seen exploring were holding him up by the arms and legs. The other three
at once went up to the river, while the first two kept a watch on the
street, and advancing to the part of the bank where the sewers of the
town are discharged into the Tiber, the horseman turned his horse,
backing on the river; then the two who were at either side taking the
corpse, one by the hands, the other by the feet, swung it three times,
and the third time threw it out into the river with all their strength;
then at the noise made when the body splashed into the water, the
horseman asked, 'Is it done?' and the others answered, 'Yes, sir,' and he
at once turned right about face; but seeing the dead man's cloak
floating, he asked what was that black thing swimming about. 'Sir,' said
one of the men, 'it is his cloak'; and then another man picked up some
stones, and running to the place where it was still floating, threw them
so as to make it sink under; as soon, as it had quite disappeared, they
went off, and after walking a little way along the main road, they went
into the lane that leads to San Giacomo. That was all I saw, gentlemen,
and so it is all I can answer to the questions you have asked me."

At these words, which robbed of all hope any who might yet entertain it,
one of the pope's servants asked the Slav why, when he was witness of
such a deed, he had not gone to denounce it to the governor. But the
Slav replied that, since he had exercised his present trade on the
riverside, he had seen dead men thrown into the Tiber in the same way a
hundred times, and had never heard that anybody had been troubled about
them; so he supposed it would be the same with this corpse as the others,
and had never imagined it was his duty to speak of it, not thinking it
would be any more important than it had been before.

Acting on this intelligence, the servants of His Holiness summoned at
once all the boatmen and fishermen who were accustomed to go up and down
the river, and as a large reward was promised to anyone who should find
the duke's body, there were soon mare than a hundred ready for the job;
so that before the evening of the same day,