This Pusterla of Venegono, who now led the Countess Beatrice into her husband's presence, was a slight but vigorous and moderately tall man of not more than thirty, despite the grey that so abundantly mingled with his thick black hair. His shaven countenance was proud and resolute, with a high-bridged nose flanked perhaps too closely by dark eyes that glowed and flashed as in reflection of his superabundant energy of body and of spirit. Between himself and Facino there was esteem; but no other link to account for his sudden appearance as an escort to the Lady Beatrice. From the settle which he occupied, his ailing leg stretched upon it, the amazed Facino greeted them by a rough soldier's oath on a note of interrogation. The Countess, white and lovely, swept towards him. 'You are ailing, Facino!' Concern charged her murmuring voice as she stooped to receive his kiss. His countenace brightened, but his tone was almost testy. To discuss his ailments now was but to delay the explanation that he craved. 'That I ail is no matter. That you should be here ... What brings you, Bice, and with Venegono there?' 'Aye, we take you by surprise,' she answered him. 'Yet Heaven knows there would be no need for that if ever you had heeded me, if ever you had used your eyes and your wits as I bade you.' 'Will you tell me what brings you, and leave the rest?' She hesitated a moment, then swung imperially to her travelling companion. 'Tell him, Messer da Venegono.' Venegono responded instantly. He spoke rapidly, using gestures freely, his face an ever-shifting mirror of his feelings, so that at once you knew him for a brisk-minded, impulsive man. 'We are here to speak of what is happening in Milan. Do you know nothing of it, my lord?' 'In Milan? Despatches reach me weekly from his highness. They report nothing that is not reassuring.' The Countess laughed softly, bitterly. Venegono plunged on. 'Is it reassuring to you that the Malatesta of Rimini, Pandolfo, and his brother Carlo are there with an army five thousand strong?' Facino was genuinely startled. 'They are moving against Milan?' Again the Countess laughed, and this time Venegono laughed with her. 'Against it?' And he launched his thunderbolt. 'They are there at the express invitation of the Duke.' Without pausing for breath he completed the tale. 'On the second of the month the Lady Antonia Malatesta was married to Duke Gian Maria, and her father has been created Governor of Milan.' A dead silence followed, broken at last by Facino. The thing was utterly incredible. He refused to believe it, and said so with an oath. 'My lord, I tell you of things that I have witnessed,' Benegono insisted. 'Witnessed? Have you been in Milan? You?'