The horror of the night still lay over Caterina like a dense pall,
clouding her understanding, when the Chief of Council and the Archbishop
passed between the guards whom Rizzo had placed to watch within the
doors of the Queen's chambers, where, prostrated by anguish and anxiety,
one scheme after another for the recovery of her child absorbed her to
the exclusion of all other grief. She looked up dumbly as Rizzo and
Fabrici drew near her couch--her eyes deep with unspeakable misery.
The Lady Margherita, watching near her, was indignant at the intrusion;
she rose and stood before the Queen.
"My Lords, you forget yourselves--Her Majesty hath not summoned you."
"There are moments, my Lady of Iblin, when Majesty is but a farce--and
Power need not do it reverence!"
The Queen heard without heeding the words: but the insolent smile on the
face of the speaker displeased her. She closed her eyes and turned her
head away, imploring them by a gesture to leave her. She had exhausted
every argument to induce them to restore her child or even to disclose
his whereabouts--she had pleaded as only a mother may, but in vain; and
worn by the unequal contest and all unnerved, she now feared to anger
them further with impotent protests lest she should tempt them to
cruelty towards her child.
The Archbishop took a step towards her, pausing for a moment,
irresolute, before attempting further coercion. But the cold glitter in
the eyes of his companion urged him to conclude his task, and he spread
a paper open on the table beside her.
From pity, or from wile, if not from shame, he assumed a tone of
deference as he explained:
"Your Majesty, it will be needful at once to send advices to Venice,
bearing our condolences for the sad fate of our noble Messrs Andrea
Cornaro, and the young Seigneur Marco Bembo."
The names roused her: she had been told of their fate, but everything
had been forgotten in the later anguish. Now she remembered with a sharp
sting of pain, and she turned her face toward the speaker, waiting to
hear why they stayed to torment her.
"It will be well for your Majesty to sign this writing, which we have
prepared to explain to the Signoria the tragic ending of the quarrel of
their Excellencies with a band of laborers whom they had refused to
pay."
Caterina had been gazing fixedly at the Archbishop while he spoke,
trying to understand. Now she made a supreme effort to shake off her
lethargy, seeming for the moment so like her usual self that the two
conspirators trembled for their schemes.
"The Council hath not found our signature needful for their
extraordinary action of the night," she said. "This letter is of less
consequence. We pray you to leave us."
Rizzo strove to hearten his colleague with a glance, as the Archbishop
produced the casket which held the Royal Signet and placed it open on
the table beside the letter which the Queen had thrust aside, and which
lacked only the royal signature to be complete. It had been folded and
superscribed with all due formality and homage.
"_Serenissimo Principe et Domine excellentissimo, Domine Nicolo
Marcello, Dei gratia inclito duci Venetiarum, etc., Domine
colendissimo._"
The broad band of white-dressed skin by which it was to be closed was
already fastened to the letter, though it hung loose with the silken
fillets of blue and white which were to attach the great Seal of Janus
the III--the helpless infant king whom his wily ministers had stolen
from his mother's arms.
Rizzo, opening the casket, stood for a moment gloating over the mastery
he was to achieve with this little instrument of the Great Seal of the
Kingdom--his triumphant gaze fastened on his scarlet treasure--a pretty
toy of wax for such a ruffian to find of consequence, bearing the
escutcheons of Jerusalem, of Cyprus, of Armenia and Lusignan, with the
naked sword of Peter the Valiant for a crest; and for _border,
encircling_ the Seal, the legend punctuated by heraldic roses--
"_Jacobus, Dei Gratia, 22 us Rex Jherusalem, Cipri et Armenia._"
* * * * *
"_Rizzo, Rex!_"
The Chief of Council syllabled the sweet morsel of his outrageous
thought without utterance. There was no further need for any keeper of
the Privy Seals; there was no longer any need for anyone but Rizzo in
this Council of the Realm!
But Dama Margherita, closely watching and fearing treachery, stole
nearer to the table, standing over the open letter which she had read
from end to end before the Chief of Council, in his absorption, had
perceived her action. Now he felt her condemnatory eyes upon him, like
the merciless gaze of a fate, and he would not look towards her while he
rudely seized the letter and pushed it nearer to the Queen.
"It is well for your Majesty to understand," he said imperatively, "that
this matter is not one for choice--but of necessity."
"We do not understand," the Queen answered haughtily, but already her
voice showed failing strength.
"Guards!" cried the Lady Margherita with tingling cheeks, to the men who
stood just within the doorway, "arrest these intruders!--They trouble
the Queen's peace."
Unconsciously the men took a step forward--the words had rung out like a
command: but Rizzo, with a face of insolent mastery, made a motion which
arrested them, and they knew that their impulse had been a momentary
madness.
"The Child----" Rizzo began in icy tones, speaking with slow emphasis,
his eyes fixed upon the Queen.
The mother sprang to her feet, alert on the instant, her strength
surging back tumultuously--every faculty tense.
"The child is safe--_while your Majesty is careful to fulfil our
pleasure_."
"My Lords," cried Dama Margherita, fearlessly, "the writing on this
parchment is not true."
The hand of the Chief of Council fell to his sword, as if he would have
struck her down--then--remembering that she was but a woman, in spite of
her splendid courage, he withdrew it with a shower of muttered oaths.
"It is the writing which Her Majesty will sign to insure the safety of
her child," he asserted, in uncompromising tones.
The Queen turned from one pitiless face to the other and knew that there
was no hope for her.
"My God, I shall go mad!" she moaned, as she seized the pen with
trembling fingers, unconscious that she had spoken: then in a last,
desperate appeal, she cried to Fabrici:
"Most Reverend Father, by your hopes of Heaven, I implore you--give me
my boy again! _il mio dilettissimo figlio!_ See, I sign the parchment!"
and with feverish strokes she wrote her name; then with hands strained
tightly together, awaited her answer.
Fabrici moved uncomfortably, turning his gaze away from the stricken,
overwrought face: his cruel triumph began to seem unworthy.
But Rizzo calmly affixed the Royal Seal, covering it with the small
wooden case prepared for its protection and knotting it firmly in place
with the silken fillets--so careful lest a bruise should show upon the
fair, waxen surface--he who could crush a woman's heart to breaking, or
watch the life-blood dripping from some cruel wound that he had made, as
lightly as he would drop the red wax for his stolen signet--it was all
one to his deadly purpose.
"Thanks, your Majesty," he said, "there are yet other documents to be
signed," and he laid them before her.
"My child!" she cried in extremity; "have mercy--restore him to me--I
have fulfilled your pleasure!"
"Your Majesty hath forgotten these," said Rizzo, "and the penalty--if
they are left unsigned."
* * * * *
Again she seized the pen and wrote her name as with her
life-blood--great veins starting out on her white forehead, her eyes dim
and blurred, her heart beating so that she scarce could trace the words
that seemed an irony:
"_Caterina, Regina!_"
"At last!" she gasped, as the pen fell from her hand--"_Madre
Sanctissima_--they will bring my boy!"
"It is enough that he is safe," the Chief of Council answered her. "We
did not promise more."
The Archbishop, stout-hearted though he was, felt his soul quail within
him, as he glanced at the figure of this young mother agonizing for her
child--his Sovereign to whom he had sworn fealty. He turned away from
her to strengthen his resolve, taking a few paces forward, thinking
perhaps of that "_act of homage_," over his own signature, duly
witnessed, sealed and recorded in the Libro delle Rimembranze, "_Homagio
et fidelta che e obligato a fare a la Magiesta sua, segondo le lege et
usanze di questo regno_."
("Homage and faith, which he is obliged to swear to Her Majesty,
according to the laws and customs of this realm.")
Margherita turned to Fabrici, who seemed to her less inhuman than Rizzo,
for she had noticed the slight weakening in his attitude. "Pardon me,
your Grace," she said in a tone of quiet deference; "hath the learned
body of the Queen's Council no knowledge of the crime of lese-majesty?"
Fabrici made no answer, being conscious-stricken; but Rizzo turned upon
her with blazing eyes.
"Beware!" he stormed, "a man, for less, hath paid the forfeit of his
life."
"Life were worth little," she answered undaunted, "if one must forfeit
it for speaking truth--or for so poor attempt as mine to spare our Queen
in such extremity."
He had looked to see her cower and shrink as men had often done under
the glare of his angry gaze; but she stood before him tall, straight and
calm--so near that he might have felled her to the ground; there was no
fear in her deep eyes while she gave him back his look of hatred,
unflinching; dimly he realized that this woman had measured the manhood
in him and found it beneath her scorn.
Then--as if he had not been--she turned her gaze from him.
"Your Grace," she said proudly, "it is for the last time,--your
Queen--whom you have sworn to uphold--and I--Margherita, of the most
ancient noble house of the de Iblin, who have ever served their
Sovereigns with their life--we _demand_ our Prince of you; and all
Cyprus is with us!"
But if these dastardly usurpers were inexorable, heaven, more merciful,
sent the respite of unconsciousness to quiet the mother's anguish just
as she could bear no more. Rizzo was speaking when she tottered and
fell into the shielding arms of Margherita.
"We may need the infant," he was explaining pitilessly, "to force a deed
of renunciation in favor of Alfonso, _Prince of Galilee_."
"A sword thrust were more merciful," cried Margherita, now roused to a
passion of scorn. "How may a man dare perjure his soul to bring her to
this!"
Rizzo having nothing further to gain from the interview left the chamber
precipitately, muttering oaths; but the Archbishop lingered, from a dim,
dawning sense of compunction, watching helplessly while Dama Margherita
ministered to the victim of these Councillors who had been created to
assist their youthful Queen in her weary task of ruling.
"More air!" Dama Margherita ordered of the guards, pointing to the
closely barred windows. "Strong wine--and one of Her Majesty's ladies to
aid me--I may not leave her for an instant. The Lady of the Bernardini
were best--will your Grace give the order? We must needs save her life
while she hath yet a favor to grant."