you with your grooms?"

Her face lighted. A sunny smile broke on me from her heavenly eyes.

"I should have thought of that," said she. And what more she would have
added I put off by urging her to mount.

Sitting the man's saddle as best she might--well enough, indeed, to
fill us all with surprise and admiration--she took her leave of me with
pretty words of thanks, which again I interrupted.

"You have but to follow the road," said I, "and it will bring you
straight to Cagli. The distance is a short league, and you should come
there safely. Farewell, Madonna!"

"May I not know," she asked at parting, "the name of him that has so
generously befriended me?"

I hesitated a second. Then--"They call me Boccadoro," answered I.

"If your mouth be as truly golden as your heart, then are you
well-named," said she. Then, gathering her mantle about her, and waving
me farewell, she rode off without so much as a glance at the cowardly
hinds who had failed her in the hour of her need.

A moment I stood watching her as she cantered away in the sunshine; then
stepping to the litter, I vaulted in.

"Now, rogues," said I to the escort, "strike me that road to Fabriano."

"I know you not, sir," protested Giacopo. "But this I know--that if
you intend us treachery you shall have my knife in your gullet for your
pains."

"Fool!" I scorned him, "since when has it been worth the while of any
man to betray such creatures as are you? Plague me no more! Be moving,
else I leave you to your coward's fate."

It was the tone best understood by hinds of their lily-livered quality.
It quelled their faint spark of mutiny, and a moment later one of those
knaves had caught the bridle of the leading mule and the litter moved
forward, whilst Giacopo and the others came on behind at as brisk a pace
as their weary horses would yield. In this guise we took the road south,
in the direction opposite to that travelled by the lady. As we rode, I
summoned Giacopo to my side.

"Take your daggers," I bade him, "and rip me that blazon from your
coats. See that you leave no sign about you to proclaim you of the House
of Santafior, or all is lost. It is a precaution you would have taken
earlier if God had given you the wit of a grasshopper."

He nodded that he understood my order, and scowled his disapproval of my
comment on his wit. For the rest, they did my bidding there and then.

Having satisfied myself that no betraying sign remained about them,