"From me?" he said, and his voice was very sweet. "From me, Graziosa?" "Ambrogio! Ambrogio!" cried the girl. "What do _you_ here?" Valentine would have spoken scornfully, but Visconti turned his eyes on her, and she dared not. The courtyard was full of armed men. "Ambrogio!" repeated the painter in dismay. "What does this mean?" Visconti laughed pleasantly, but his hand tightened on his sister's shoulder. "It means, thy daughter hath found a lover worthy of her in Visconti." Visconti! As in a flash the little painter saw explained a thousand things that had perplexed him. Visconti! His quickly working brain had grasped it and summed it up before Graziosa could even realize she heard aright. She stared there silent, with a piteous look upon her face. Visconti turned to his prisoners. "Take Isotta d'Este back to her prison," he said, curtly, and a group of soldiers advanced. Isotta clung to Valentine in an agony. "At last!" said Visconti, in her ear, "at last thy calm fails thee!" And then he stood aside watching, while she implored in turn Valentine and Agnolo to save her, in incoherent words of anguish. "I cannot bear it!" she cried. "I have borne it too long! O God, have pity on me! Have pity on me, I have not the courage to face it again. I have not the courage!" Visconti turned to her in a savage triumph of hate he scarcely troubled to conceal. "Find thy courage again, where thou found'st it before," he said. "Thy husband is not dead, although he leaves thee to pine in prison. He may remember thee even yet." Isotta sprang up at the taunt, wild-eyed. "Keep thy face away from me!" she shrieked. "Ye have slain him! Kill me too!" Then, seeing resistance useless, and those who would have saved her helpless, Della Scala's unhappy wife surrendered quietly; only, as she crossed the courtyard with her guard, and saw the tree-tops wave above the walls and the sky that was outside Milan, a cry rose that made the hardened soldiers wince. "Mastino! Oh, Mastino!" Visconti watched her out of sight, then turned again to Graziosa, his hand still on his sister's shoulder. "Graziosa," he murmured. But the girl made no answer; she was huddled on the bench that ran along the wall, looking out with frightened eyes. As he spoke she shuddered, and crouched closer to the wall. But Agnolo answered, and Visconti, serene in his pride, did not notice the painter's tone. "My daughter is dazed with her surprise, lord, as who would not be? Graziosa, speak to the Duke, speak to thy Ambrogio," and he gripped her hand fiercely. But Graziosa rose at his touch, and snatching her hand away, fled from the room, with one wild look toward Visconti. "Ye see, my lord, she is bewildered, she can scarce believe it true----" "It matter not for now," said Visconti. "Thy daughter loves _me_, painter, and none the less, I doubt not, that I am Duke of Milan; and she shall be my duchess, as I have vowed."