The Chronicles of Count Antonio. Anthony Hope

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СКАЧАТЬ Paul laid his finger on his brother's arm. "As the clock in the tower of the cathedral strikes three on the morning of the 15th of the month, do you, dear brother, be in your summer-house at the corner of the garden yonder; and I will come thither and tell you if he has believed and if he has come. For by then I shall have learnt from him his mind: and we two will straightway go rouse the guards and lead the men to their appointed station, and when he approaches the gate we can lay hands on him."

      "How can you come to him? For we do not know where he is hid."

      "Alas, there is not a rogue of a peasant that cannot take a letter to him!"

      "Yet when I question them, aye, though I beat them, they know nothing!" cried Valentine in chagrin. "Truly, the sooner we lay him by the heels, the better for our security."

      "Shall it be, then, as I say, my lord?"

      "So let it be," said the Duke. "I will await you in the summer-house."

      Paul, perceiving that his brother had no suspicions of him, and would await him in the summer-house, held his task to be already half done. For his plan was that he and Antonio should come together to the summer-house, but that Antonio should lie hid till Paul had spoken to the Duke; then Paul should go out on pretext of bidding the guard make ready the ambush, and leave the Duke alone with Antonio. Antonio then, suddenly springing forth, should slay the Duke; while Paul—and when he thought on this, he smiled to himself—would so contrive that a body of men should bar Antonio's escape, and straightway kill him. Thus should he be quit both of his brother and of Antonio, and no man would live who knew how the deed was contrived. "And then," said he, "I doubt whether the poor child, bereft of all parental care, will long escape the manifold perils of infancy."

      Thus he schemed; and when he had made all sure, and noised about the Duke's intentions touching his going to the spurs of Mount Agnino, he himself set forth alone on his horse to seek Antonio. He rode till he reached the entrance of the pass leading to the recesses of the hills. There he dismounted, and sat down on the ground; and this was at noon on the 13th day of the month. He had not long been sitting, when a face peered from behind a wall of moss-covered rock that fronted him, and Paul cried, "Is it a friend?"

      "A friend of whom mean you, my lord?" came from the rock.

      "Of whom else than of Count Antonio?" cried Paul.

      A silence followed and a delay; then two men stole cautiously from behind the rock, and in one of them Paul knew the man they called Bena, who had been of the Duke's Guard. The men, knowing Paul, bowed low to him, and asked him his pleasure, and he commanded them to bring him to Antonio. They wondered, knowing not whether he came from the Duke or despite the Duke; but he was urgent in his commands, and at length they tied a scarf over his eyes, and set him on his horse, and led the horse. Thus they went for an hour. Then they prayed him to dismount, saying that the horse could go no farther; and though Paul's eyes saw nothing, he heard the whinnying and smelt the smell of horses.

      "Here are your stables then," said he, and dismounted with a laugh.

      Then Bena took him by the hand, and the other guided his feet, and climbing up steep paths, over boulders and through little water-courses, they went, till at length Bena cried, "We are at home, my lord;" and Paul, tearing off his bandage, found himself on a small level spot, ringed round with stunted wind-beaten firs; and three huts stood in the middle of the space, and before one of the huts sat Tommasino, composing a sonnet to a pretty peasant girl whom he had chanced to meet that day; for Tommasino had ever a hospitable heart. But seeing Paul, Tommasino left his sonnet, and with a cry of wonder sprang to meet him; and Paul took him by both hands and saluted him. That night and the morning that followed, Paul abode with Antonio, eating the good cheer and drinking the good wine that Tommasino, who had charged himself with the care of such matters, put before him. Whence they came from, Paul asked not; nor did Tommasino say more than that they were offerings to Count Antonio—but whether offerings of free-will or necessity, he said not. And during this time Paul spoke much with Antonio privily and apart, persuading him of his friendship, and telling most pitiful things of the harshness shown by Valentine his brother to the Lady Lucia, and how the lady grew pale, and peaked and pined, so that the physicians knit their brows over her and the women said no drugs would patch a broken heart. Thus he inflamed Antonio's mind with a great rage against the Duke, so that he fell to counting the men he had and wondering whether there were force to go openly against the city. But in sorrow Paul answered that the pikemen were too many.

      "But there is a way, and a better," said Paul, leaning his head near to Antonio's ear. "A way whereby you may come to your own again, and rebuild your house that the Duke has burnt, and enjoy the love of Lucia, and hold foremost place in the Duchy."

      "What way is that?" asked Antonio in wondering eagerness. "Indeed I am willing to serve His Highness in any honourable service, if by that I may win his pardon and come to that I long for."

      "His pardon! When did he pardon?" sneered Paul.

      To know honest men and leave them to their honesty is the last great gift of villainy. But Paul had it not; and now he unfolded to Antonio the plan that he had made, saving (as needs not to be said) that part of it whereby Antonio himself was to meet his death. For a pretext he alleged that the Duke oppressed the city, and that he, Paul, was put out of favour because he had sought to protect the people, and was fallen into great suspicion. Yet, judging Antonio's heart by his own, he dwelt again and longer on the charms of Lucia, and on the great things he would give Antonio when he ruled the Duchy for his nephew; for of the last crime he meditated, the death of the child, he said naught then, professing to love the child. When the tale began, a sudden start ran through Antonio, and his face flushed; but he sat still and listened with unmoved face, his eyes gravely regarding Paul the while. No anger did he show, nor wonder, nor scorn, nor now any eagerness; but he gazed at the Prince with calm musing glance, as though he considered of some great question put before him. And when Paul ended his tale, Antonio sat yet silent and musing. But Paul was trembling now, and he stretched out his hand and laid it on Antonio's knee, and asked, with a feigned laugh that choked in the utterance, "Well, friend Antonio, is it a clever plan, and will you ride with me?"

      Minute followed minute before Antonio answered. At length the frown vanished from his brow, and his face grew calm and set, and he answered Duke Paul, saying, "It is such a plan as you, my lord, alone of all men in the Duchy could make; and I will ride with you."

      Then Paul, in triumph, caught him by the hands and pressed his hands, calling him a man of fine spirit and a true friend, who should not lack reward. And all this Antonio suffered silently; and in silence still he listened while Paul told him how that a path led privately from the bank of the river, through a secret gate in the wall, to the summer-house where the Duke was to be; of this gate he alone, saving the Duke had the key; they had but to swim the river and enter by this gate. Having hidden Antonio, Paul would talk with the Duke; then he would go and carry off what remained of the guard over and above those that were gone to the hills; and Antonio, having done his deed, could return by the same secret path, cross the river again, and rejoin his friends. And in a short space of time Paul would recall him with honour to the city and give him Lucia to wife.

      "And if there be a question as to the hand that dealt the blow, there is a rascal whom the Duke flogged but a few days since, a steward in the palace. He deserves hanging, Antonio, for a thousand things of which he is guilty, and it will trouble me little to hang him for one whereof he chances to be innocent." And Duke Paul laughed heartily.

      "I will ride with you," said Antonio again.

      Then, it being full mid-day, they sat down to dinner, Paul bandying many merry sayings with Tommasino, Antonio being calm but not uncheerful. And when the meal was done, Paul drank to СКАЧАТЬ