"Ilaria!" he called. She started, took a step towards him, then paused. On her face he noted the same dazed, half-bewildered look which he had discovered thereon in the pageant. "Ilaria!" he called once more. His voice had still the same purity of tone as in his childhood. She came to him slowly, holding out both hands. "Take me away!" she whispered with a shudder. Then, from the deeper shadow of the wood, there stepped a form of remarkable elegance, advancing with the graceful, but assumed, demeanor of a man immured in his own conceit. He was tall, with a well-poised head of the purely Latin type. The face was long, but unusually handsome; of olive hue with regular features, that revealed many generations of aristocratic ancestry. The nostrils were delicately chiselled, the eyebrows high and narrow, the thin, cynical lips revealed the sensualist. There was nothing in the countenance of Raniero Frangipani to dismay the observer, until one looked at the eyes. They were narrow and intensely black, filled with a baleful brilliance that feared no man, yet revealed to view a soul utterly depraved. The Frangipani having changed his masque, was clothed in the richest apparel of the time. Long hose of crimson silk encased the legs, rising from soft shoes of the same color. A coat of black silk, embroidered with golden flowers, and the Broken Loaf, the emblem of his house, was confined at the waist with a golden belt, to which was affixed a poniard with an exquisitely jewelled hilt. He advanced with the graceful yet arrogant swing of the bred courtier, yet his handsome face was not pleasant to behold, as he turned to Francesco with an insolent air: "I think, Messer Villani, you will find the rose-garden more agreeable than the wood!" Francesco looked at him coldly. "I am here at the request of Madonna Ilaria," he replied quietly. "Indeed!" sneered the Frangipani, advancing a step closer. "Madonna Ilaria did not hint that she preferred the society of a marplot to that of a Frangipani!" Francesco made an impetuous step forward, feeling for his dagger. But Ilaria caught his arm and clung to it. The two were faintly visible in the starlight. The Frangipani regarded them for a moment with a contemptuous smile. "I crave your pardon," he then turned with an ironical bow to the girl. "I feared Messer Villani would be too fatigued after his journey in quest of an ancestor!" Francesco had turned pale at this palpable insult. There was no doubt that the Frangipani had spied upon him for reasons not difficult to surmise. But ere he could carry out his intent, but too plainly revealed in his set features, Ilaria had interposed herself between the two. "Leave us!" she turned to the Frangipani with a scorn in her voice that caused the latter to start, while she clung to Francesco's arm, hardly less pale than he.