sneered. "And you perform it like a petulant boy or a
peevish woman."

"I perform it, Madonna, as best seems to me, for it happens that I am
Duke of Babbiano," he answered sullenly. "I do not fear any Pope's son
that ever stepped. The alliance with Urbino is all but completed. Let
that be established, and if Valentino shows his teeth--by God we'll show
ours."

"Aye, but with this difference, that his are a wolf's teeth, and yours a
lamb's. Besides, this alliance with Urbino is all incomplete as yet. You
had been better advised to have sent away the envoy with some indefinite
promise that would have afforded you respite enough in which to seal
matters with the house of Montefeltro. As it is, your days are numbered.
Upon that message you have sent him Caesar will act at once. For my own
part, I have no mind to fall a prey to the invader, and I shall leave
Babbiano, and seek refuge in Naples. And if a last word of advice I may
offer you, it is that you do the same."

Gian Maria rose and came down from the dais, eyeing her in a sort of
dull amazement. Then he looked, as if for help, to Alvari, to Santi,
and lastly to Lodi, who had returned while Caterina was speaking. But no
word said any of them, and grave were the eyes of all.

"Poor-spirited are you all!" he sneered. Then his face grew dark and his
tone concentrated. "Not so am I," he assured them, "if in the past I may
have seemed it sometimes. I am aroused at length, sirs. I heard a voice
in the streets of Babbiano to-day, and I saw a sight that has put a
fire into my veins. This good-tempered, soft, indulgent Duke you knew
is gone. The lion is awake at last, and you shall see such things as you
had not dreamt of."

They regarded him now with eyes in which the gravity was increased by a
light of fearsome wonder and inquiry. Was his mind giving way under the
prodigious strain that had been set upon it that day? If not madness,
what else did that wild boasting argue?

"Are you all dumb?" he asked them, his eyes feverish. "Or do you deem
that I promise more than is mine to fulfil. You shall judge, and soon.
To-morrow, my lady mother, whilst you journey south, as you have told
us, I go north again, back to Urbino. Not a day will I now waste. Within
the week, sirs, by God's grace, I shall be wed. That will give us Urbino
for a buckler, and with Urbino comes Perugia and Camerino. But more than
that. There is a princely dowry comes to us with the Lady Valentina. How
t