Nathan Gallizier - The Hill of Venus

Raniero Frangipani regarded them for a moment in silence, tapped with his foot, like one to whom a new idea has come, then with a long low sound, very much like a snarl, he vanished in the gloom.

Francesco turned to the girl who still clung to him. She knew the look on his face, but there was in it an expression she had never seen before, penetrating, sorrowful, crushed. His breath came and went in gasps, yet he spoke not.

"Francesco," she said after a pause, while she anxiously watched the play of light and shadow on his face. "Listen! Messer Raniero seems to bear you a grudge. Promise me to avoid a meeting with him! He has said much to me, thinking thereby to win my favor. He now knows, – let that suffice!"

"He has told you much? What has he told you?"

"You have not told me what took you away so suddenly!"

He held up his hand deprecatingly.

"A secret mission of the Viceroy's," he said blushing, as he stammered the falsehood. Yet he could not bring himself to avow even to the girl he loved best on earth, his father's shame. The pain of life could not be made less, by adding more pain.

"Trust me!" he begged. "We have always felt together, – I have never deceived you!"

"Until now!" her voice sounded shrill and strained.

"No! Ilaria, no! Were it mine to tell, – there is no secret for you in this heart of mine. But the matter concerns another! Perhaps – in time – "

He broke off and closed his eyes.

"I crave my youth!" cried Ilaria unheeding. "My youth, and the joy of life which comes but once. If one will not give me what I seek – I look elsewhere, if so I may!" Her lips trembled. "Why do you look at me so?" she continued impatiently after an instant's pause. "Before you came into the wood I saw your eyes, and I see them still in the dark! What was the object of that mission?"

Francesco drooped his head, but made no reply. In a clover leaf at his feet a dew-drop mirrored a star, breaking the light into a thousand tiny shafts.

"I will give you your youth," he spoke at last in a low strained voice that sounded like a broken sob.

Ilaria laid her hand on his and spoke low. Her light soft fingers were fevered.

"What do you mean?"

"It is a simple matter!"

She gazed at him startled, terrified. Suddenly she threw her arms about him.

"Forgive me! Forgive!"

He pressed her to his heart and kissed her dark eyes.

Then slowly they retraced their steps towards the castle.

When Francesco reached his chamber, the moon was slowly sinking through the azure night-sky.

He noted it not. It seemed to him he was standing in the midst of a great void. All life about him had died. And he stood there, digging his own grave, and, as the last spade of turf flew up, the stifling night of annihilation swallowed up the universe.

WHENFrancesco waked on the following morning, the June sun touched the tree-tops which bounded the western horizon with their delicate feathery twigs. Throughout the castle of Avellino there was the hum and murmur of life. An unusual activity prevailed; the Apulian court was preparing to depart, as the long train of horses and jennets drawn up in the courtyard indicated.

Francesco listened to the dim murmur of familiar voices, and the echoes of laughter which reached his ears as he stood contemplating himself undecidedly in a steel mirror that hung from an iron hook upon his bedroom wall.

Of what use to deck himself in fine raiment for the last time he should ever wear it? Sackcloth was henceforth to be his garment; – what matter if he went unkempt on the last day in the home he loved?

But the thought of the part he wished to play, came back to him. He could not bear the thought that his companions should know of his undoing. Despair is concealed more easily for an hour than unrest. And so Francesco heaved a long heavy sigh and went to the great carven chest wherein he kept his apparel.

Slowly, with the demeanor of one whose heart is not in what he does, he arrayed himself in his splendid court costume, as if preparing to share the gladsomeness of his companions.

He descended into the courtyard as one walking in a dream, and as in a dream his ear caught the sounds of laughter and merriment, such as had not resounded in the Castle of Avellino since the days of Emperor Frederick II.

On every lip were the glad tidings: Conradino had crossed the Alps! Conradino was about to descend into Italy with his iron hosts to claim his heritage. Like an Angel of Vengeance he would march on to Rome, where the arch-enemy of his house sat enthroned in the chair of St. Peter. From all parts of Italy the Ghibellines were flocking to the banners of the golden-haired son of Emperor Conrad IV, – Conradino, as they lovingly called him, – the last Hohenstauffen!

From the adjoining gardens there came sounds of joyous laughter; the music of citherns and lyres rippled enchantingly on the soft breeze of the morning. It was as if an evil spell had been lifted from the land, but the spell had caught one who could not shake it off, as with stony gaze and quivering lips he walked along, noting the preparations for events, in which he was to have no further share. He noted it not that the grooms and lackeys, pages and squires regarded him curiously, as if wondering at his luxurious attire, so little in keeping with the exigencies of a tedious journey. Hardly he noted the casual greeting of a companion who passed hurriedly, as if bent on his own preparations. After rambling aimlessly through the demesne, he bethought himself that the time for repast was at hand, and after pausing here and there, as if to convince himself that what he saw was not the phantom of a mocking dream, he returned to the castle, his heart heavy with the weight of the impending hour.

The banqueting-hall in the Castle of Avellino presented a busy scene. A small army of lackeys and pages was at work preparing a repast, the last the court was to partake ere the Viceroy set out. They were to start at dusk, owing to the extreme noon-day heat in the plains.

One great board stretched down the centre of the room, containing places enough for every occupant of the building.

Presently the doors leading into the banqueting-hall turned inward and a throng of court attendants filed into the dimly lighted room. These were followed by an array of visiting mendicants, who never failed to infest any noble household, and they had scarcely grouped themselves standing about the board, when the Viceroy, arm in arm with Galvano Lancia, entered the hall.

These two seated themselves at the board at once, watching the others as they entered. The women and their escorts, who had entered laughing and chatting among themselves, grew silent as they beheld the Viceroy already seated. One girl, garbed in a flowing gown of sea-green damask, entered the room alone. As she advanced to her place, after the prescribed courtesy to the Viceroy, her dark eyes searchingly scanned the throng of pages. Apparently she did not find among them the one she sought.

"Donna Ilaria looks for her errant knight," whispered Galvano Lancia into the ear of Conrad Capecé.

"Has not Francesco returned?" queried the Viceroy.

"I hardly expected him before to-day, even if the Grand Master's illness has not taken a fatal turn."

"Here are the monks!"

"And there – at the door – "

Conrad Capecé followed the direction of Lancia's gaze.

"Francesco!" – he finished with a gasp, staring bewildered at the youth's dazzling garb, richer even than the Viceroy's.

There was a sudden round of forbidden whispering among Francesco's companions, and significant glances passed between many at the expense of Ilaria Caselli, for Francesco's entrance had been indeed destined to create a commotion among the members of the Vice-regal household.