sank from sight, whilst with the
flying spray there came a fetid odour to tell of the unsavouriness of
that unexpected bath.

Without pausing to see the completion of his work, Francesco stooped
over his prostrate servant.

"Have the beasts hurt you, Lanciotto?" he questioned. But before the
fellow could reply, one of those hinds had sprung upon the stooping
Count, and struck him with a dagger between the shoulder-blades.

A woman's alarmed cry rang out, for Valentina was watching the affray
from the steps of the hall, with Gonzaga at her elbow.

But Francesco's quilted brigandine had stood the test of steel, and the
point of that assassin's dagger glanced harmlessly aside, doing no worse
hurt than a rent in the silk surface of the garment. A second later
the fellow found himself caught as in a bond of steel. The dagger was
wrenched from his grasp, and the point of it laid against his breast
even as the Count forced him down upon his knees.

In a flash was the thing done, yet to the wretched man who saw himself
upon the threshold of Eternity, and who--like a true son of the
Church--had a wholesome fear of hell, it seemed an hour whilst, with
livid cheeks and eyes starting from his head, he waited for that poniard
to sink into his heart, as it was aimed. But not in his heart did the
blow fall. With a sudden snort of angry amusement, the Count pitched the
dagger from him and brought down his clenched fist with a crushing force
into the ruffian's face. The fellow sank unconscious beneath that mighty
blow, and Francesco, regaining the whip that lay almost at his feet,
rose up to confront what others there might be.

From the tank, standing breast-deep in that stinking water, his head
and face grotesquely masked in a vile green slime of putrid vegetation,
Ercole Fortemani bellowed with horrid blasphemy that he would have his
aggressor's blood, but stirred never a foot to take it. Not that he was
by nature wholly a coward; but inspired by a wholesome fear of the
man who could perform such a miracle of strength, he remained out of
Francesco's reach, well in the middle of that square basin, and lustily
roared orders to his men to tear the fellow to pieces. But his men
had seen enough of the Count's methods, and made no advance upon that
stalwart, dauntless figure that stood waiting for them with a whip
which several had already tasted. Huddled together, more like a flock of
frightened sheep than a body of men of war, they