For some time Valentino was partly forgotten, but he was still in the Vatican as late as January 15, 1504, and was planning to go to Ferrara, although Alfonso d’Este was by no means anxious to have him. Just what was to be done with him was a puzzling question. It was finally decided to send him to Civitavecchia in the custody of the Cardinal of Santa Croce, and the Pope told the Venetian orator that he wished to make one more attempt to reach a settlement in order that he might be able to justify himself in the eyes of the world for the steps he would be compelled to take against Valentino if the latter failed to keep the promises he had made to him. January 18th, through the mediation of Don Diego de Mendoza, the Spanish ambassador, it was arranged that Caesar should give the countersigns of all the castles still remaining to him, and that he himself should go to Ostia in the custody of the Cardinal of Santa Croce and then, when the strongholds were surrendered, he should be allowed to depart for France. There was some delay in carrying out the agreement, due to recent events in Forli and Imola, but February 14, 1504, the Duke set out for Ostia, and in taking leave of him his Holiness “caressed him and promised him his support.” The Pope was suffering from the gout, which appears to have been essentially a papal disease at that time, and had remained in bed the greater part of the day. Valentino, accompanied by a few of his own people and Francesco del Rio, the Pope’s treasurer, set out for Ostia the same night. According to Giustinian, while there he was closely guarded, and consequently greatly annoyed. The commissioners, who had been furnished the new countersigns, had in the meantime again gone to Romagna, but they did not succeed in securing possession of the strongholds, for the warders of Cesena and Bertinoro, distrusting the Pope’s promises, dispatched messengers to Rome to tell him they would surrender the strongholds if he would release the Duke, but in case he was not willing to set Valentino free “they could not honourably relinquish the castles,” on hearing which his Holiness fell into a violent passion and shouted at them: “You want to brazen it out. Away with you! If you don’t give them up peaceably I will make you. You wanted to surrender them to the Venetians, but they would not have them!” And he drove the messengers from the room. Mottino, who was to take Caesar to France on one of his galleys, had been directed by the Holy Father not to leave port, even after the strongholds had been surrendered to the Pope’s representatives, until he received specific orders to do so. The Cardinal of Santa Croce, however, when messengers brought the news that Cesena and Bertinoro had been surrendered, did not wait for definite orders from the Pope to set his prisoner free, but let him go February 26th, after obtaining his written promise never to take part in any war against the Holy Father or any of his kinsmen.