"Remember I have told you to beware of enemies," she went on, gathering up her reins. "Any one may be an enemy--even I. Keep silent." She was gone like a flash, flogging her horse unmercifully. It was three days after this that Matteo broke in upon Hugh as he conned over certain memoranda of counsels which he had writ down for Villehardouin. "Who think you hath just arrived?" cried the jongleur. "Who?" "The Young Alexius--Alexius Angelos." "And who is he, Matteo?" "Who but Dandolo's lure--or I never saw a hawk flown! Nay, put down your parchments. This is most important. It means much to us. It tells us why that fat-faced wolf Michael Comnenus hath been hanging about Dandolo. It tells us how Dandolo intends to swing the Crusade towards Constantinople." "Tell, then, Messer Oracle," said Hugh, laughing. "Be serious," adjured Matteo. "This Alexius--the young Alexius they call him that he may be distinguished from his uncle, the Emperor who reigns in Constantinople--is the son of the Emperor Isaac, brother of this Emperor Alexius, whom Alexius blinded and cast into prison. The Young Alexius was imprisoned with his father, but he escaped. He is come now, I will warrant you, to appeal to the Crusade to put his father back on the throne, promising in return the support of Byzantium for a descent upon the Holy Land." "That is fair enough," said Hugh slowly. "But I had thought Dandolo intended no such legalised expedition." "Oh, the old eagle talked to us in an unguarded moment as he really felt, but he is far too cautious to move in such a matter without ample justification." Matteo laughed. "Can you not imagine the twitter the Pope and all his Holy Cardinals will be in?" continued the jongleur. "A Crusade which they preached being used to put a new Emperor on the throne of the schismatic Eastern Empire! I will wager you, Hugh, more than one fat priest dies of the swelling sickness." "You seem to mock at religion," Hugh reproached him. "Not so, Hugh," answered Matteo, laughing again. "But I have seen much of the world and of priests, and a-many of them do not merit their priesthood. In the Holy Land they quarrelled over every shrine that should have been sacred, until their bickering was a scandal. But let be. We must be off to the Parliament, which is summoned to meet in the lists. The Lord Marshal and all have gone. I came hither that you might know of it." In the lists outside the Hungarian Gate were gathered all the men of consequence who had embarked upon the Crusade, and on the hills around stood thousands of the common men and Venetian seamen of the fleet. At one end three thrones had been set up, and the eyes of the throng were centred upon the three men who occupied them. In the centre sat Dandolo, waxen of feature, impassive as ever. On his right was a gangling lad of eighteen or nineteen, sallow-faced, lank-haired, with shifty, uncertain eyes.