a secret spring, and a drawer opens from under the table. Into
this drawer she deposits all that lies before her, her fingers still
clinging to the gold.

After a while she rises, and casting a parting glance at the portrait
of Castruccio--among all her ancestors Castruccio was the object of
her special reverence--she moves leisurely onward through the various
apartments lying beyond the presence-chamber.

The doors, draped with heavy tapestry curtains, are all open. It is a
long, gloomy suite of rooms, where the sun never shines, looking into
the inner court.

The marchesa's steps are noiseless, her countenance grave and pale.
Here and there she pauses to gaze into the face of a picture, or to
brush off the dust from some object specially dear to her. She pauses,
minutely observing every thing around her.

There is a dark closet, with a carved wooden cornice and open raftered
roof, the walls covered with stamped leather. Here the family councils
assembled. Next comes a long, narrow, low-roofed gallery, where row
after row of portraits and pictures illustrate the defunct Guinigi. In
that centre panel hangs Francesco dei Guinigi, who, for courtesy and
riches, surpassed all others in Lucca. (Francesco was the first to
note the valor of his young cousin Castruccio, to whom he taught the
art of war.) Near him hangs the portrait of Ridolfo, who triumphantly
defeated Uguccione della Faggiola, the tyrant of Pisa, under the
very walls of that city. Farther on, at the top of the room, is the
likeness of the great Paolo himself--a dark, olive-skinned man, with
a hard-lipped mouth, and resolute eyes, clad in a complete suit of
gold-embossed armor. By Paolo's side appears Battista, who followed
the Crusades, and entered Jerusalem with Godfrey de Bouillon; also
Gianni, grand-master of the Knights Hospitallers of St. John--the
golden rose presented to him by the pope in the corner of the picture.

After the gallery come the armory and the chapel. Beyond at the end
of the vaulted passage, lighted from above, there is a closed door of
dark walnut-wood.

When the marchesa enters this vaulted passage, her firm, quick step
falters. As she approaches the door, she is visibly agitated. Her hand
trembles as she places it on the heavy outside lock. The lock yields;
the door opens with a creak. She draws aside a heavy curtain, then
stands motionless.

There is such a mist of dust, such a blackness of shadow, that
at first nothing is