know the Grand Duke's
keen desire. We have talked of it before. And were it only a matter," he
shrugged his shoulders, "of the how--of ways and means in fact--there
need be no impossibility, your position being what it is. But I know
the feeling you entertain on the subject, Messer Blondel; and though I
do not agree with you, for we look at the thing from different sides, I
had no hope that you would come to it."

"Never!"

"No. So much so, that I had it in my mind to keep the condition to
myself. But----"

"Why did you not, then?"

"Hope against hope," the big man answered, with a shrug and a laugh.
"After all, a live dog is better than a dead lion--only you will not see
it. We are ruled, the most of us, by our feelings, and die for our side
without asking ourselves whether a single person would be a ducat the
worse if the other side won. It is not philosophical," with another
shrug. "That is all."

Apparently Blondel was not listening, for "The Duke must be mad!" he
ejaculated, as the other uttered his last word.

"Oh no."

"Mad!" the Syndic repeated harshly, his eyes still shaded by his hand.
"Does he think," with bitterness, "that I am the man to run through the
streets crying 'Viva Savoia!' To raise a hopeless _emeute_ at the head
of the drunken ruffians who, since the war, have been the curse of the
place! And be thrown into the common jail, and hurried thence to the
scaffold! If he looks for that----"

"He does not."

"He is mad."

"He does not," Basterga repeated, unmoved. "The Grand Duke is as sane as
I am."

"Then what does he expect?"

But the big man laughed. "No, no, Messer Blondel," he said. "You push me
too far. You mean nothing, and meaning nothing, all's said and done. I
wish," he continued, rising to his feet, and reverting to the tone of
sympathy which he had for the moment laid aside, "I wish I might
endeavour to show you the thing as I see it, in a word, as a philosopher
sees it, and as men of culture in all ages, rising above the prejudices
of the vulgar, have seen it. For after all, as Persius says,

Live while thou liv'st! for death will make us all,
A name, a nothing, but an old wife's tale.

But I must not," reluctantly. "I know that."

The Syndic had lowered his hand; but he still sat with his eyes averted,
gazing sullenly at the corner of the floor.

"I knew it when I came," Basterga resumed after a pause, "and therefore
I was loth to speak to you."

"Yes."