ent, allowed a sigh to escape
her, and brushed an angry tear from her brown eyes. Then, with a sudden
movement that seemed to imply suppression of her mood, she walked to the
door by which she entered, and left the chamber.

She went down the long gallery, whose walls glowed with the new frescoes
from the wonder-working brush of Andrea Mantegna; she crossed her
ante-chamber and gained the very room where some hours ago she had
received the insult of Gian Maria's odious advances. She passed through
the now empty room, and stepped out on to the terrace that overlooked
the paradise-like gardens of the Palace.

Close by the fountain stood a white marble seat, over which, earlier
that day, one of her women had thrown a cloak of crimson velvet. There
she now sat herself to think out the monstrous situation that beset her.
The air was warm and balmy and heavy with the scent of flowers from the
garden below. The splashing of the fountain seemed to soothe her, and
for a little while her eyes were upon that gleaming water, which rose
high in a crystal column, then broke and fell, a shower of glittering
jewels, into the broad marble basin. Then, her eyes growing tired,
they strayed to the marble balustrade, where a peacock strode with
overweening dignity; they passed on to the gardens below, gay with early
blossoms, in their stately frames of tall, boxwood hedges, and flanked
by myrtles and tall cypresses standing gaunt and black against the deep
saffron of the vesper sky.

Saving the splashing of the fountain, and the occasional harsh scream
of the peacock, all was at peace, as if by contrast with the tumult that
raged in Valentina's soul. Then another sound broke the stillness--a
soft step, crunching the gravel of the walk. She turned, and behind her
stood the magnificent Gonzaga, a smile that at once reflected pleasure
and surprise upon his handsome face.

"Alone, Madonna?" he said, in accents of mild wonder, his fingers softly
stirring the strings of the lute he carried, and without which he seldom
appeared about the Court.

"As you see," she answered, and her tone was the tone of one whose
thoughts are taken up with other things.

Her glance moved away from him again, and in a moment it seemed as if
she had forgotten his presence, so absorbed grew the expression of her
face.

But Gonzaga was not easily discouraged. Patience was the one virtue
that Valentina more than any woman--and there had been many in his
young li