panion of Bayard _sans reproche_; this your fufilment
of your sworn devoir to women in distress? Then here is my answer," and
she dashed the bits of paper in my face, "for my garrison will prefer
annihilation rather than permit me to submit to such indignity."

"Believe me," I protested, "that, far from assisting in the framing of
those terms, I am in utter ignorance of their purport. Believe also that
though what I have hitherto heard has not prepossessed me in your
favour, I now count those charges as lying slanders, knowing that no
evil soul could inhabit so lovely a person."

Her lip curled scornfully. "I have listened to lovers' flatteries ere
this," she answered, "and know how little they are worth."

"By your pardon," I retorted, "I am a lover indeed, but none of yours.
It is because I love my good wife in Auvergne that I honour all women."

She had lifted her eyeglass as though to scan my face the more keenly to
know if I spoke the truth; but apparently my words alone convinced her,
and, feeling the discourtesy of such an act, she looked about the room
irresolutely and let the lorgnon fall without meeting my eyes.

"Good," she said at length, "I like you better for that word. 'Tis a
pity we must be enemies. Tell your master that I shall defend my
fortress to the last extremity. If I am so unfortunate as to be
conquered, demand that he appoint you my jailer, for to no one else will
I submit myself alive."

I have taken part in many sieges but never saw I a more gallant defence
than the one made by that doomed citadel. Its besiegers were quartered
within the town, fattening on the supplies which flowed in from the
country and sleeping warm at night, while the garrison of the castle
burned its carved wainscotings for fuel and daily buried some
famine-stricken sentry. Twice with blazing missiles Caterina's archers
set fire to the houses within range of her guns, striving by destroying
the homes of her own people to drive us from our shelter, and once in
the dead of night she made sortie and strove to cut her way through only
to be beaten back. She seemed more a deluding spirit of evil leading us
on to our own destruction than an ordinary mortal, and when Cesare gave
orders to bombard the castle it made our flesh creep to see her seated
nonchalantly upon the ramparts scanning the artillerymen through her
lorgnon, laughing when their shots went wild, and clapping her hands
when they tore off fragments of the para