'If you did that!' The Regent interrupted angrily. 'How would it look, do you suppose? A vagrant rogue, the associate of a bandit was closeted yesterday with me, and so far received my countenance that he was bidden to court. It would disclose a plot, indeed. It would be said that I plotted to fashion evidence against my nephew. Do you think that I have no enemies here in Casale and elsewhere in Montferrat besides Barbaresco and his plotters? If Spigno had lived, it would have been different, or even if we had Barbaresco and the others and could now wring the truth from them under torment. But Spigno is dead and the others gone.' Bellarion deemed him bewildered by his own excessive subtleties. 'Does Barbaresco's flight give no colour to my tale?' he asked quietly. 'Only until some other tale is told, as told it would be. Then what of the word of a rascal like yourself? And what of me who depend upon the word of so pitiful a knave?' 'Your highness starts at shadows.' Bellarion was almost contemptuous. 'In the end it may be necessary to tell my tale if I am to save my neck.' The Regent's look and tone made Bellarion feel cold. 'Your neck? Why, what does your neck matter?' 'Something to me, however little to your highness.' The Regent sneered, and the hard eyes grew harder still. 'You become inconvenient, my friend.' Bellarion perceived it. The Regent feared lest investigation should reveal that he had actually fostered the conspiracy for purposes of his own, using first Count Spigno and then Bellarion as his agents. 'Aye, you become inconvenient,' he repeated. 'Duke Gian Galeazzo would never have boggled over dealing with you. He would have wrung this precious neck by which you lay such store. Do you thank God that I am not Gian Galeazzo.' He took the cloak from his left arm. From within its folds he let fall at Bellarion's feet a coil of rope; from his breast he drew two stout files which he placed upon Bellarion's stool. 'If you remove one of those bars, that should give you passage. Attach the rope to another, and descend by it at dusk. When you touch ground, you will be outside the walls. Go your ways and never cross the frontiers of Montferrat again. If you do, my friend, I promise you that you shall be hanged out of hand for having broken prison.' 'I should deserve it,' said Bellarion. 'Your highness need have no anxiety.' 'Anxiety, you dog!' The Regent measured him with that cold glance a moment, then swung on his heel and left him. Next morning, when it was learnt that the prisoner had escaped, wild and varied were the speculations in Casale to explain it, and stern, searching, and fruitless the inquiry conducted by the governor of the prison. None was known to have visited Bellarion save only the Marquis Theodore, and only one person was so mad as to suppose that the Regent had made possible the evasion.