Palace, in the very heart of the
city. The two accomplices were Baldo Baldinanza, a grey villain, and
young Francesco della Rocca Rossa. All three were armed with swords and
daggers; the cloaks lay with the masks on the table. A servant came to
the door, knocked, and waited. Can Grande, who (to be just) feared no
eye upon his goings, shouted him into the room.

"Well, son of a pig," was his greeting, "and what is it now?"

The fellow, whose teeth chattered in his head, announced a veiled lady,
very tall, who would not be denied. Baldinanza, grizzled and scarred as
he was, took a quick breath and glanced at Rocca Rossa. The younger man
was at no pains to conceal his emotions. His face ran the gamut from
white to red, from red back again to white. It ended ashen. Neither
looked at his master.

"Let her in," said Can Grande; and each noticed how laboriously he
spoke.

The servant turned to obey: there in the doorway stood the Lady.

Tall enough she was, her head seemingly about a foot from the cross-beam
of the door. She was cloaked from crown to foot; nothing but the oval of
her face, colourless white with lips very wan, and a droop to them
inexpressibly sad, showed out of the dark column she made. The servant
shrank into the passage and stayed there praying; of the three men at
the table only one, Can Grande himself, had the spirit left to be
courteous. He got up; the other two remained seated, Francesco with his
face in his arms.

"Madonna," began the tyrant; but she uncloaked her hand and put a finger
to her sad lips.

"I may not stay," she said, in a voice so weary that it drew tears to
Baldinanza's wicked old eyes--"I may not stay; but I must warn you, Can
Grande, before I go. Walk not in the streets this night, walk not by the
Piazza, pass not the arched way; peril lies there. No sword shall help
you, nor the royal seat you have,--enter it not. Now I have warned you;
let me go."

She put back her lifted hand under her cloak. Can Grande saw the round
head of the Babe asleep. For five minutes after her disappearance no
one spoke.

Francesco was the first. He groaned, "God have mercy upon me a sinner,"
between his hands. Then Baldinanza began to swear by all devils in
Christendom and Jewry, not blasphemously, but in sheer desperate search
for a little courage. Can Grande shook his head like a water-clogged
hound, as if to get the ring of that hollow voice out of his ears. The
first to rise was the eldest o