nit, "first 'Plac' stands for Placentia where he will meet his
doom; and then it contains the initials of the four chief movers in this
undertaking--Pallavicini, Landi, Anguissola, and Confalonieri."

"You force the omen to come true when you give me a leader's rank in
this affair," said I.

He smiled but did not answer, and returned the coin to his pocket.

And now the happening that is to be related is to be found elsewhere,
for it is a matter of which many men have written in different ways,
according to their feelings or to the hand that hired them to the
writing.

Soon after dawn Galeotto quitted us, each of us instructed how to act.

Later in the morning, as I was on my way to the castle, where we were
to assemble at noon, I saw Galeotto riding through the streets at
the Duke's side. He had been beyond the gates with Pier Luigi on an
inspection of the new fortress that was building. It appeared that once
more there was talk between the Duke and Galeotto of the latter's taking
service under him, and Galeotto made use of this circumstance to forward
his plans. He was, I think, the most self-contained and patient man that
it would have been possible to find for such an undertaking.

In addition to the condottiero, a couple of gentlemen on horseback
attended the Duke, and half a score of his Swiss lanzknechte in gleaming
corselets and steel morions, shouldering their formidable pikes, went
afoot to hedge his excellency.

The people fell back before that little company; the citizens doffed
their caps with the respect that is begotten of fear, but their air
was sullen and in the main they were silent, though here and there some
knave, with the craven adulation of those born to serve at all costs,
raised a feeble shout of "Duca!"

The Duke moved slowly at little more than a walking pace, for he was all
crippled again by the disease that ravaged him, and his face, handsome
in itself, was now repulsive to behold; it was a livid background for
the fiery pustules that mottled it, and under the sunken eyes there were
great brown stains of suffering.

I flattened myself against a wall in the shadow of a doorway lest he
should see me, for my height made me an easy mark in that crowd. But he
looked neither to right nor to left as he rode. Indeed, it was said
that he could no longer bear to meet the glances of the people he had
so grossly abused and outraged with deeds that are elsewhere abundantly
related, and with whi