"Why should I be jealous of the insolent joy that shone in the eyes of that bandit?" he said to himself in dire distress. "Have I any business even to consider the question whether his strange manner caused the princess pleasurable or painful emotion? What have she and I in common? What am I to her? Pier-Angelo's son! And he, this bold-faced adventurer, is her mainstay and her savior. He will soon have a claim upon her gratitude--perhaps upon her esteem and affection; for it rests only with him to acquire them. He loves her, and if he is not mad he will find some way or other to make her love him. But how can I earn any title to her distinction? Of what consequence are the embryotic products of my art in comparison with the energetic assistance which she demands? It seems to me that she looks upon me as a child, since, instead of calling me to her aid, and entrusting to me some mission of importance to her interests and her personal safety, she does not even consider me capable of defending my own life. She considers me so weak or so timid that in this hour of our common danger she has sought the intervention of a stranger--an ally more dangerous than useful, it may be. O my God! how far she is from looking upon me as a man! Why did she not simply say to me: 'Your father and I are threatened by an enemy. Drop your brushes, take a dagger; defend your father or avenge me!' Fra Angelo reproached me for my indifference; but, instead of correcting it, they actually treat me like a child whom they pity, and whose life they save without troubling themselves about his heart!" While he abandoned himself to these melancholy reflections, Michelangelo felt as if his heart were breaking, and finding in front of him the sprig of cyclamen, which was still living in its Venetian glass, he let a scalding tear fall upon it. XXX THE FALSE MONK Mila had been so astonished and alarmed by the appearance of the Piccinino that she could not possibly sleep. The fact that alarmed her most was that she no longer heard conversation in the adjoining room, and that she could not make sure that her brother was there. She was unwilling to go to bed, and, after a few moments, as her reflections served only to increase her terror, she rose and opened another door of her chamber which opened on an outer gallery, or rather a dilapidated corridor sheltered by an awning, and ending in a staircase which served as a means of communication between her room and those of the other occupants of the house. Mila had never opened that door at night, but this time she went out on the gallery, having fully determined to seek refuge with her father and to sit in his chamber until daylight. But she had barely taken three steps when a new cause of alarm brought her to a standstill. A man was leaning against the wall of the gallery as motionless as a robber on the watch.