And then her eyes grew lively, her expression cunning and vengeful. “I see it!” she exclaimed. “O, it is as clear as crystal. This is the Roman manner of using complaisant husbands.” “Madonna!” I rebuked her angrily--angry to think that anyone should conceive that Bianca could be so abused. “Gesu!” she returned with a shrug. “The thing is plain enough if you will but look at it. Here his excellency dares nothing, lest he should provoke the resentment of that uncompromising Lord of Pagliano. But once she is safely away--as Cosimo's wife...” “Stop!” I cried, putting out a hand as if I would cover her mouth. Then collecting myself. “Do you suggest that Cosimo could lend himself to so infamous a compact?” “Lend himself? That pander? You do not know your cousin. If you have any interest in this Madonna Bianca you will get her hence without delay, and see that Pier Luigi has no knowledge of the convent to which she is consigned. He enjoys the privileges of a papal offspring, and there is no sanctuary he will respect. So let the thing be done speedily and in secret.” I looked at her between doubt and horror. “Why should you mistrust me?” she asked, answering my look. “I have been frank with you. It is not you nor that white-faced ninny I would serve. You may both go hang for me, though I loved you once, Agostino.” And the sudden tenderness of tone and smile were infinitely mocking. “No, no, beloved, if I meddle in this at all, it is because my own interests are in peril.” I shuddered at the cold, matter-of-fact tone in which she alluded to such interests as those which she could have in Pier Luigi. “Ay, shrink and cringe, sir saint,” she sneered. “Having cast me off and taken up holiness, you have the right, of course.” And with that she moved past me, and down the terrace-steps without ever turning her head to look at me again. And that was the last I ever saw of her, as you shall find, though little was it to have been supposed so then. I stood hesitating, half minded to go after her and question her more closely as to what she knew and what she did no more than surmise. But then I reflected that it mattered little. What really mattered was that her good advice should be acted upon without delay. I went towards the house and in the loggia came face to face with Cosimo. “Still pursuing the old love,” he greeted me, smiling and jerking his head in the direction of Giuliana. “We ever return to it in the end, they say; yet you had best have a care. It is not well to cross my Lord Pier Luigi in such matters; he can be a very jealous tyrant.” I wondered was there some double meaning in the words. I made shift to pass on, leaving his taunt unanswered, when suddenly he stepped up to me and tapped my shoulder. “One other thing, sweet cousin. You little deserve a warning at my hands. Yet you shall have it. Make haste to shake the dust of Pagliano from your feet. An evil is hanging over you here.”