“Silence him!” I bade the men who followed us in. “Then, half of you remain here to guard the stairs; the rest attend us.” The house was vast, and it remained silent, so that it did not seem that the clown's scream when he went over had been heard by any. Up the broad staircase we sped, guided by the light of the lanthorn, which Falcone had picked up--for the place was ominously in darkness. Cavalcanti kept pace with me, panting with rage and anxiety. At the head of the stairs we came upon a man whom I recognized for one of the Duke's gentlemen-in-waiting. He had been attracted, no doubt, by the sound of our approach; but at sight of us he turned to escape. Cavalcanti reached forward in time to take him by the ankle, so that he came down heavily upon his face. In an instant I was sitting upon him, my dagger at his throat. “A sound,” said I, “and you shall finish it in Hell!” Eyes bulging with fear stared at me out of his white face. He was an effeminate cur, of the sort that the Duke was wont to keep about him, and at once I saw that we should have no trouble with him. “Where is Cosimo?” I asked him shortly. “Come, man, conduct us to the room that holds him if you would buy your dirty life.” “He is not here,” wailed the fellow. “You lie, you hound,” said Cavalcanti, and turning to me--“Finish him, Agostino,” he bade me. The man under me writhed, filled now by the terror that Cavalcanti had so cunningly known how to inspire in him. “I swear to God that he is not here,” he answered, and but that fear had robbed him of his voice, he would have screamed it. “Gesu! I swear it--it is true!” I looked up at Cavalcanti, baffled, and sick with sudden dismay. I saw Cavalcanti's eye, which had grown dull, kindle anew. He stooped over the prostrate man. “Is the bride here--is my daughter in this house?” The fellow whimpered and did not answer until my dagger's edge was at his throat again. Then he suddenly screeched--“Yes!” In an instant I had dragged him to his feet again, his pretty clothes and daintily curled hair all crumpled, so that he looked the most pitiful thing in all the world. “Lead us to her chamber,” I bade him. And he obeyed as men obey when the fear of death is upon them. CHAPTER X. THE NUPTIALS OF BIANCA An awful thought was in my mind as we went, evoked by the presence in such a place of one of the Duke's gentlemen; an awful question rose again and again to my lips, and yet I could not bring myself to utter it. So we went on in utter silence now, my hand upon his shoulder, clutching velvet doublet and flesh and bone beneath it, my dagger bare in my other hand.