She raised that perfect ivory-coloured face, from which the habitual insolent languor had now all been swept; her deep blue eyes held nothing but entreaty and submission. 'That must depend upon the man who brings it.' 'To the best of his ability my Lord Facino has brought you both.' 'Facino! Facino!' she cried out in sudden petulance. 'Must you always be thinking of Facino?' He bowed a little. 'I hope so, madonna,' he answered with a grave finality. And meanwhile the profligate court of Gian Maria observed this assiduity of Facino's lady, and the Duke himself set the fashion of making it a subject for jests. It is not recorded of him that he made many jests in his brief day and certainly none that were not lewd. 'Facino's adoptive son should soon be standing in nearer relationship to him,' he said. 'He will be discovering presently that his wife has become by Messer Bellarion's wizardry his adoptive daughter.' So pleased was his highness with that poor conceit that he repeated it upon several occasions. It became a theme upon which his courtiers played innumerable variations. Yet, as commonly happens, none of these reached the ears of Facino. If any had reached them, it would have been bad only for him who uttered it. For Facino's attachment to his quite unworthy lady amounted to worship. His trust in her was unassailable. Judging the honesty of others after his own, he took it for granted that Beatrice's attitude towards his adoptive son was as motherly as became the wife of an adoptive father. This, indeed, was his assumption even when the Countess supplied what any other man must have accounted grounds for suspicion. The occasion came on an evening of early April. Bellarion had received a message by a groom to wait upon Facino. He repaired to the Count's apartments, to find him not yet returned, whereupon with a manuscript of Alighieri's Comedy to keep him company he went to wait in the loggia, overlooking the inner quadrangle of the Broletto, which was laid out as a garden, very green in those first days of April. Thither, a little to his chagrin, for the austere music of Dante's Tuscan lines was engrossing him, came the Countess, sheathed in a gown of white samite, with great sapphires glowing against the glossy black of her hair to match the dark mysterious blue of her languid eyes. She came alone, and brought with her a little lute, an instrument which she played with some expertness. And she was gifted, too, in the making of little songs, which of late had been excessively concerned with unrequited love, despair, and death. The Count, she informed Bellarion, had gone to the Castle, by which she meant, of course, the great fortress of Porta Giovia built and commonly inhabited by the late Duke. But he would be returning soon. And meanwhile, to beguile the tedium of his waiting, she would sing to him.