The Viper of Milan. Bowen Marjorie

my lord?" cried Alberic. "Now, how would it be if I ask him to hand this parchment over?" and he turned with a swaggering laugh to the page.

      The page shook his head, not comprehending. Tisio, unheeding, seated himself in one of the great chairs, Graziosa's bracelet still between his fingers.

      "I will wait no longer," cried Alberic suddenly; "let the Duke summon me."

      But the next moment Alberic's swagger dropped, and he swung his plumed hat low to the lady who, unattended, stole across the threshold.

      It was Valentine Visconti.

      Her breast was heaving; suppressed excitement showed in every movement; it was not difficult for Alberic to read she had heard of Count Conrad's rescue.

      With a motion of the hand she bade him wait, and turned to her brother, huddled in his chair, gazing blankly at the floor.

      "Tisio!" she said, and her tone was very gentle. "What dost thou here?"

      He looked up, and his dull face lit at sight of her.

      "I wait for Gian," he said simply.

      Valentine shuddered. "What wouldst thou see him for, Tisio?"

      He smiled, and held out the bracelet. "To show him this."

      The tears rushed to Valentine's eyes, but she remembered the captain and turned to him.

      "Thou carryest something here to give the Duke?" she asked.

      "Another parchment, lady," said the captain. "But I fear my lord is in no humor for its contents."

      Valentine's eyes sparkled lightly. "Thou hast not the courage to present it?"

      "I confess, lady, I am waiting till I am obliged to," answered Alberic.

      Valentine held out her hand. "Give me the paper; I will give it to my brother!"

      The captain hesitated.

      "Since thou hast not the courage," she added almost with a laugh. All Gian's orders had not availed to prevent some whisper reaching Valentine of his evil humor and the cause of it: Conrad's escape, the threatening parchments; the hint that Della Scala lived. Alberic, glancing at her, saw a triumph and a malice in the lady's glance that made him doubly feel he did not care just then to wait Visconti's coming. But still he hesitated; the Duke might vent on him his fury with his sister.

      "This business will not wait," cried Valentine, "give me the parchment to deliver, or knock at yonder door and hand it to the Duke yourself."

      But the captain of the mercenaries bent low, shook his head with a significant gesture, and, handing over the fatal missive, bowed himself away. Valentine turned again to Tisio's page.

      "Take thy lord away," she said. "The Duke may not be best pleased to see him here."

      But Tisio would not go. Valentine, bending over him, stroked his hands tenderly, then breaking from him, leaned against the wall in sudden woe.

      "All of us crazed," she cried bitterly. "All of us, surely; wretched people that we are!"

      Then, at the sight of the parchment she held, her former mood returned. Conrad was alive! He had vowed devotion. He would return to her rescue. She would live to be free; to come and go outside the Visconti palace, outside Milan, out yonder in the world. She leaned back against the arras a moment, dizzy at the thought of so much joy, and her courage rose high, her eyes danced.

      "The Duke must have this parchment," she said; "and since Alberic da Salluzzo does not care to seek an audience for it, why, Tisio, thou shalt see me give it. The Duke loves not an interruption when he is angry," she added, with a soft laugh. "But 'tis my duty to show him this."

      And she advanced toward the ominously closed door.

      The page looked uneasy. He had no wish to face Visconti in his fury. Yet well he knew he dared not leave his charge.

      Valentine tapped at the door with gentle fingers.

      "Gian!" she called.

      "Lady, this is madness!" cried the page, startled into speech.

      She looked over her shoulder.

      "I am also a Visconti, boy," she said. "Why should I fear the Duke?"

      "Gian!" she called again, her beautiful head close to the dark panels. "I have something here of great moment. Why let everyone know thou art so moved? Gian! Thou makest thyself a mock; dost thou fear Count Conrad, that his escape moves thee so?"

      A pause: then with a smile Valentine stepped back a pace or two into the chamber.

      "The Duke comes!" she said, and the page turned pale.

      The inner door opened as smoothly as silently, and Visconti stood there looking at the trio. He was dressed in purple velvet, but his doublet was tumbled, the fine lace frills at his wrists were torn to rags, his eyes strained wide open, and for a moment, as it was with any who encountered it, his expression gave his sister pause. But again she remembered Conrad lived, and she held out the parchment. "I thought it well to give you this," she said.

      Gian advanced and took it in silence. But those torn ruffles, that disordered doublet, had their meanings, and the look in those wide eyes, as he turned them on her, quelled the mockery in hers, spite of herself.

      "Begone!" he said, "and do not usurp another's office again. Leave me."

      "With thine own thoughts, brother?" she said softly, facing him.

      "Be careful," he answered; "thou shouldst know my humors, and that 'tis dangerous to cross them. Remember it only suits my purpose that thou shouldst live!"

      At this Tisio, as if half-comprehending the threat, rose, and his brother's eyes fell on him.

      "Thou too! What dost thou about my doors? hast thou come too to dare me with thy folly?"

      His eyes blazed, his hands worked. Tisio, dazed and affrighted, let fall Graziosa's bracelet.

      The page stooped to recover it.

      "What hast thou there?" cried Visconti with sudden change of tone; and the page, quivering for his life, handed the bracelet on bent knee. Visconti studied it one second, then, with a sound of fury that sent the boy crouching back against the wall, control left him. His eyes lighted on Tisio, and in maniacal fury he seized him by the shoulder and shook him as though he were a rag.

      "How camest thou by this?" he yelled. "How came this bracelet in the Visconti palace? Answer me!"

      Tisio whimpered, but had no reply, till, with a shout, Visconti flung him from him with such force that, save for Valentine, he would have fallen; then he turned upon the page who knelt by, trembling.

      "Answer me!" he cried furiously. "Answer! Where got the fool this?" He held the bracelet out. And the sight of those torn ruffles around his long white hands made the boy's hair rise.

      "Indeed, my lord," he gasped, "a girl, whom my Lord Tisio—met by the western gate——"

      "Gave it him!" shrieked Visconti. "Ah, the three of thee shall pay dearly for this hour's trifling with me!"

      "My lord took it," cried the page, half-wild with terror. "He took it, my lord; she wept to give it."

      "She wept to give it," said Visconti slowly.

      There was a pause. When he spoke again, his tone was calmer.

      "Then he shall be slain for taking it," he said, flashing a look on Tisio, who, huddled in the chair, moaned with distress as he leaned against his sister.

      "Shame! Calm thyself!" cried Valentine. "What has Tisio done? is this the first ornament he has liked and taken? Have they not orders to let him have his pleasure?"

      "Mark me," returned Visconti. "Take care thou dost not make my dislike overrule my ambition—the pair of thee hold your lives solely at my pleasure."