Rafael Sabatini - The Strolling Saint

Having spoken thus, he bowed to the Court, stepped back, and sat down.

The Ten looked at Gonzaga. Gonzaga looked at me.

"Have you anything to say?" he asked.

I rose imbued by a calm that surprised me.

"Messer Cosimo has left something out of his narrative," said I. "When he says that I violently invested his palace here in Piacenza on the night of his marriage, and dragged thence the Lady Bianca, others abetting me, he would do well to add in the interests of justice, the names of those who were my abettors."

Cosimo rose again. "Does it matter to this Court and to the affair at issue what caitiffs he employed?" he asked haughtily.

"If they were caitiffs it would not matter," said I. "But they were not. Indeed, to say that it was I who invested his palace is to say too much. The leader of that expedition was Monna Bianca's own father, who, having discovered the truth of the nefarious traffic in which Messer Cosimo was engaged, hastened to rescue his daughter from an infamy."

Cosimo shrugged. "These are mere words," he said.

"The lady herself is present, and can bear witness to their truth," I cried.

"A prejudiced witness, indeed!" said Cosimo with confidence; and Gonzaga nodded, whereupon my heart sank.

"Will Messer Agostino give us the names of any of the braves who were with him?" quoth Cosimo. "It will no doubt assist the ends of justice, for those men should be standing by him now."

He checked me no more than in time. I had been on the point of citing Falcone; and suddenly I perceived that to do so would be to ruin Falcone without helping myself.

I looked at my cousin. "In that case," said I, "I will not name them."

Falcone, however, was minded to name himself, for with a grunt he made suddenly to rise. But Galeotto stretched an arm across Bianca, and forced the equerry back into his seat.

Cosimo saw and smiled. He was very sure of himself by now.

"The only witness whose word would carry weight would be the late Lord of Pagliano," he said. "And the prisoner is more crafty than honest in naming one who is dead. Your excellency will know the precise importance to attach to that."

Again his excellency nodded. Could it indeed be that I was enmeshed? My calm deserted me.

"Will Messer Cosimo tell your excellency under what circumstances the Lord of Pagliano died?" I cried.

"It is yourself should be better able to inform the Court of that," answered Cosimo quickly, "since he died at Pagliano after you had borne his daughter thither, as we have proof."

Gonzaga looked at him sharply. "Are you implying, sir, that there is a further crime for which Messer Agostino d'Anguissola should be indicted?" he inquired.

Cosimo shrugged and pursed his lips. "I will not go so far, since the matter of Ettore Cavalcanti's death does not immediately concern me. Besides, there is enough contained in the indictment as it stands."

The imputation was none the less terrible, and could not fail of an effect upon the minds of the Ten. I was in despair, for at every question it seemed that the tide of destruction rose higher about me. I deemed myself irrevocably lost. The witnesses I might have called were as good as gagged.

Yet there was one last question in my quiver—a question which I thought must crumple up his confidence.

"Can you tell his excellency where you were upon your marriage night?" I cried hoarsely, my temples throbbing.

Superbly Cosimo looked round at the Court; he shrugged, and shook his head as if in utter pity.

"I leave it to your excellency to say where a man should be upon his marriage night," he said, with an astounding impudence, and there were some who tittered in the crowd behind me. "Let me again beg your excellency and your worthinesses to pass to judgment, and so conclude this foolish comedy."

Gonzaga nodded gravely, as if entirely approving, whilst with a fat jewelled hand he stroked his ample chin.

"I, too, think that it is time," he said, whereupon Cosimo, with a sigh of relief, would have resumed his seat but that I stayed him with the last thing I had to say.

"My lord," I cried, appealing to Gonzaga, "the true events of that night are set forth in a memorial of which two copies were drawn up, one for the Pope and the other for your excellency, as the Emperor's vicegerent. Shall I recite its contents—that Messer Cosimo may be examined upon them.

"It is not necessary," came Gonzaga's icy voice. "The memorial is here before me." And he tapped a document upon the table. Then he fixed his prominent eyes upon Cosimo. "You are aware of its contents?" he asked.

Cosimo bowed, and Galeotto moved at last, for the first time since the trial's inception.

Until now he had sat like a carved image, save when he had thrust out a hand to restrain Falcone, and his attitude had filled me with an unspeakable dread. But at this moment he leaned forward turning an ear towards Cosimo, as if anxious not to miss a single word that the man might utter. And Cosimo, intent as he was, did not observe the movement.

"I saw its fellow at the Vatican," said my cousin, "and since the Pope in his wisdom and goodness judged worthless the witnesses whose signatures it bears, his holiness thought well to issue the brief upon which your excellency has acted in summoning Agostino d'Anguissola before you here.

"Thus is that memorial disposed of as a false and lying document."

"And yet," said Gonzaga thoughtfully, his heavy lip between thumb and forefinger, "it bears, amongst others, the signature of the Lord of Pagliano's confessor."

"Without violation of the seal of the confessional, it is impossible for that friar to testify," was the answer. "And the Holy Father cannot grant him dispensation for so much. His signature, therefore, stands for nothing."

There followed a moment's silence. The Ten whispered among themselves. But Gonzaga never consulted them by so much as a glance. They appeared to serve none but a decorative office in that Court of his, for they bore no share in the dispensing of a justice of which he constituted himself the sole arbiter.

At last the Governor spoke.

"It seems, indeed, that there is no more to say and the Court has a clear course before it, since the Emperor cannot contravene the mandates of the Holy See. Nothing remains, then, but to deliver sentence; unless..."

He paused, and his eyes singularly sly, his lips pursed almost humorously, he turned his glance upon Galeotto.

"Ser Cosimo," he said, "has pronounced this memorial a false and lying document. Is there anything that you, Messer Galeotto, as its author, can have to tell the Court?"

Instantly the condottiero rose, his great scarred face very solemn, his eyes brooding. He advanced almost to the very centre of the table, so that he all but stood immediately before Gonzaga, yet sideways, so that I had him in profile, whilst he fully faced Cosimo.

Cosimo at least had ceased to smile. His handsome white face had lost some of its supercilious confidence. Here was something unexpected, something upon which he had not reckoned, against which he had not provided.

"What has Ser Galeotto to do with this?" he demanded harshly.

"That, sir, no doubt he will tell us, if you will have patience," Gonzaga answered, so sweetly and deferentially that of a certainty some of Cosimo's uneasiness must have been dissipated.

I leaned forward now, scarce daring to draw breath lest I should lose a word of what was to follow. The blood that had earlier surged to my face had now all receded again, and my pulses throbbed like hammers.

Then Galeotto spoke, his voice very calm and level.

"Will your excellency first permit me to see the papal brief upon which you acted in summoning hither the accused?"

Silently Gonzaga delivered a parchment into Galeotto's hands. The condottiero studied it, frowning. Then he smote it sharply with his right hand.