s part, the husband's part. He was
most explicit; Molly grew white, ended by fainting. Amilcare carried her
to bed; she refused to sleep with him. He raged; she cared nothing. She
was wild with terror, shame, discovery of her lover's worth, and of her
love's. He had to beg her pardon on his knees, made an enemy of
Bentivoglio, a fool of himself, and left next morning in a tearing
passion.

Grifone, who met his master at Cremona, lost no time in seeing that
something had gone counter, and very little in finding out what it was.

"Leave it to me, my good lord," he said comfortably; "I will explain it
to Madonna in another way."

Before they went to bed he had a little guarded talk with his Duchess,
half excusation of his absence which might have aggravated her alarms,
half condemnation of Amilcare; the whole, consequently, a veiled eulogy
of himself.

Molly was very quiet at first, subdued and miserable, but sincerely
grateful. To express this, she fell into her natural way, a way of
little timid tendernesses, little touchings of the arm, urgings of the
cheek. Grifone received them rigidly; she was reduced to tears.
Thereupon he kissed her ardently, twice, and fled. She remained a long
while in the dark, breathless, limp, awed, and absurdly happy. Next
morning he was as distant as the Alps and quite as frosty. At dusk they
reached Milan.

Whatever Duke Ludovic (titular of Bari, actual of Milan) may have
intended to ensue, he gave them a proper reception. Cardinal Ascanio
himself came to the city gate with clergy and the Council; cavalry, a
parti-coloured array, pennoned and feathered, escorted them to the
castle. There, on the steps within the great courtyard, the Moor
himself, sumptuous in silver brocade, and Donna Beatrice his wife; there
his tired sister, Duchess Bona, and her by no means tired daughter,
Bianca Maria of the green eyes, stood panoplied to await them. Trumpets
announced the greetings that passed; yet another fanfare the greetings
that were to come when within the hall, at the foot of the broad
staircase, they found and kissed the hands of the anxious little Duke
Galeazzo Gian and his pretty wife--pair of doomed children, even then in
the cold shadow of their fate.

Half-hearted, fainting Molly went through her little part with the
accustomed success. Her pretty English-Italian, her English lips, again
her eager hands, so anxious to search friends out, found their sure way
to one at least. Bianca