ted them. They parted bathed in
tears, promising to love one another always.

Up to that time the two women had not formed any criminal resolution, and
possibly the tragical incident might never have happened, had not Frances
one night returned into his daughter's room and violently forced her into
the commission of fresh crime.

Henceforth the doom of Francesco was irrevocably pronounced.

As we have said, the mind of Beatrice was susceptible to the best and the
worst influences: it could attain excellence, and descend to guilt. She
went and told her mother of the fresh outrage she had undergone; this
roused in the heart of the other woman the sting of her own wrongs; and,
stimulating each other's desire for revenge, they, decided upon the
murder of Francesco.

Guerra was called in to this council of death. His heart was a prey to
hatred and revenge. He undertook to communicate with Giacomo Cenci,
without whose concurrence the women would not act, as he was the head of
the family, when his father was left out of account.

Giacomo entered readily into the conspiracy. It will be remembered what
he had formerly suffered from his father; since that time he had married,
and the close-fisted old man had left him, with his wife and children, to
languish in poverty. Guerra's house was selected to meet in and concert
matters.

Giacomo hired a sbirro named Marzio, and Guerra a second named Olympio.

Both these men had private reasons for committing the crime--one being
actuated by love, the other by hatred. Marzio, who was in the service of
Giacomo, had often seen Beatrice, and loved her, but with that silent and
hopeless love which devours the soul. When he conceived that the
proposed crime would draw him nearer to Beatrice, he accepted his part in
it without any demur.

As for Olympio, he hated Francesco, because the latter had caused him to
lose the post of castellan of Rocco Petrella, a fortified stronghold in
the kingdom of Naples, belonging to Prince Colonna. Almost every year
Francesco Cenci spent some months at Rocco Petrella with his family; for
Prince Colonna, a noble and magnificent but needy prince, had much esteem
for Francesco, whose purse he found extremely useful. It had so happened
that Francesco, being dissatisfied with Olympio, complained about him to
Prince Colonna, and he was dismissed.

After several consultations between the Cenci family, the abbe and the
sbirri, the following plan of act