He meant, at least, to set his last wits to the task. Somehow, he was darkly and unshakably convinced, this same Lion ring was the pivot upon which all his darling’s fortunes turned. That it was not really lost, but was being held concealed, by some jealous spirit or spirits, against the time most opportune for procuring the boy’s, and perhaps others’, destruction by its means, he felt sure. All Milan was not in one mind as to the disinterested motives of its Nathan. Tassino, Narcisso, the dowager of Casa Caprona, even the urbane Messer Ludovico himself, to name no others, could hardly be shown their personal profits in the movement. They might all, as the world’s ambitions went, be excused from coveting the stranger’s promotion. And there was no doubt that, at present, he was paramount in the eyes of the highest. That, in itself, was enough to make his sweet office the subject of much scepticism and blaspheming. Tough, wary work for the watch-dogs, Cicada pondered. That same evening he was walking in the streets, when a voice, Visconti’s, muttered alongside him:— ’Good Patch, hast been loyal so far to thy bargain. Hold to it for thy soul’s sake. There are adders in Milan.’ Then he bent closer, and whispered: ’A word in thy ear: is the ring found yet?’ The Fool’s hard features did not twitch. He shook his head. ’Marry, sir,’ answered he, as low, ’the mud is as close a confidant as I. I have not heard of its blabbing.’ ’So much the better,’ murmured the other, and glided away. But he left Cicada thinking. ’It was not for them, then, the conspirators, that Narcisso stole it. And yet he stole it—that I’ll be sworn. For whom? Why, for Monna Beatrice. For why? Why, for a purpose that I’ll circumvent—when I guess it. A passenger going by cursed him under his breath. The oath, profound and heartfelt, was really a psychologic note in the context of this history. Cicada heard it, and, looking round, saw, to his amazement, the form of the very monster of his present deliberations. Narcisso, the rancorous mongrel, having snarled his hatred of an old associate, who, he verily believed, had once betrayed him, slouched, with a heavier vindictiveness, on his way. The Fool, inspired, skipped into cover, and peeped. He knew that the coward creature, once secure of his distance, would turn round to sputter and glower. He was not wrong there, nor in his surmise that, finding him vanished, Narcisso would continue his road in reassurance of his fancied security. He saw him actually turn and glare; distinguished, as plainly as though he heard it, the villainous oath with which the monster flounced again to his gait. And then, very cautiously, he came out of his hiding, and slunk in pursuit. It could serve, at least, no bad purpose, he thought, to track the beast to his lair; and, with infinite circumspection, he set himself to the task.