t he told me more than elsewhere I could have learnt; it
was the cynical manner in which he conveyed his information. He had a
way of telling me of monstrous things as if they were purely normal and
natural to a properly focussed eye, and as if any monstrousness they
might present to me were due to some distortion imparted to them solely
by the imperfection of my intellectual vision.

Thus it was from him that I learnt certain unsuspected things concerning
Pier Luigi Farnese, who, it was said, was coming to be our Duke, and on
whose behalf the Emperor was being importuned to invest him in the Duchy
of Parma and Piacenza.

One day as we walked together in the garden--my Lord Gambara and I--I
asked him plainly what was Messer Farnese's claim.

"His claim?" quoth he, checking, to give me a long, cool stare. He
laughed shortly and resumed his pacing, I keeping step with him. "Why,
is he not the Pope's son, and is not that claim enough?"

"The Pope's son!" I exclaimed. "But how is it possible that the Holy
Father should have a son?"

"How is it possible?" he echoed mockingly. "Why, I will tell you, sir.
When our present Holy Father went as Cardinal-legate to the Mark of
Ancona, he met there a certain lady whose name was Lola, who pleased
him, and who was pleased with him. Alessandro Farnese was a handsome
man, Ser Agostino. She bore him three children, of whom one is dead,
another is Madonna Costanza, who is wed to Sforza of Santafiora, and the
third--who really happens to have been the first-born--is Messer Pier
Luigi, present Duke of Castro and future Duke of Piacenza."

It was some time ere I could speak.

"But his vows, then?" I exclaimed at last.

"Ah! His vows!" said the Cardinal-legate. "True, there were his vows.
I had forgotten that. No doubt he did the same." And he smiled
sardonically, sniffing at his pomander-ball.

From that beginning in a fresh branch of knowledge much followed
quickly. Under my questionings, Messer Gambara very readily made me
acquainted through his unsparing eyes with that cesspool that was known
as the Roman Curia. And my horror, my disillusionment increased at every
word he said.

I learnt from him that Pope Paul III was no exception to the rule, no
such scandal as I had imagined; that his own elevation to the purple was
due in origin to the favour which his sister, the beautiful Giulia, had
found in the eyes of the Borgia Pope, some fifty years ago. Through him
I came to know t