e, but he was a fool to allow Ramiro to see
what lie he had discovered. Already he has paid the penalty. He is lying
with a dagger in his throat, for an hour ago Ramiro stabbed him while he
slept."

I shuddered. What a place of blood was this! Could it be that Cesare
Borgia had no knowledge of what things were being performed by his
Governor of Cesena?

"Poor Lampugnani!" I sighed. "God rest his soul."

"I doubt but he is in Hell," answered Mariani, without emotion. "He
was as great a villain as his master, and he has gone to answer for his
villainy even as this ugly monster of a Ramiro shall. But let Lampugnani
be. I am not come to talk of him.

"Returning from his bloody act, Ramiro ordered me to bed. I went, and
as I passed Lampugnani's room I saw the door standing wide. It was thus
that I learnt what had befallen. I remembered his words concerning the
hat and I remembered old suspicions of my own aroused by the thought
of the potent wine which Ramiro had ordered me to see given to the
couriers. I sped back to the gallery that overlooks the hall. Ramiro was
absent, and I surmised at once that he was gone to the kitchen. Then was
it that I thought of you and of what service you might render if things
were indeed as I now more than suspected. Like an inspiration it came to
me how I might prepare your way. I ran down to the hall, sweating in
my terror that he should return ere I had performed the task I went on.
From the buffet I drew a flagon of that same stout wine that Ramiro used
upon his messengers. I ripped away the seal and crimson cord by which it
is distinguished, and placing it on the table I removed the flagon I had
set for him before I had first departed.

"Then I fled back to the gallery, and from the shadows I watched for his
return. Soon he came, bearing a hat in his hand; and from that hat he
took a letter, all as you have surmised. He read it, and I saw his face
lighten with a fierce excitement. Then he helped himself freely to wine,
and drank thirstily, for all that he was overladen with it. One of the
qualities of this wine is that in quenching thirst it produces yet a
greater. Ramiro drank again, then sat with the letter before him in the
light of the single taper I had left burning. Presently he grew sleepy.
He shook himself and drank again. Then again he sat conning his epistle,
and thus I left him and came hither in quest of you."

There followed a pause.

"Well?" I asked at length. "What