G. P. R. James

“ She found the great painter standing in the midst, and gazing at some fine pictures which ornamented the walls.
"Welcome, signor," she said--"most welcome to Imola. No other house must be your home while you are here than this, or my father's palace in the citadel."
"Your pardon, bright lady," said Leonardo, gazing at her, "my home is ever an inn, and I cannot sacrifice my liberty even to you."
"You are wise, maestro," answered Leonora, somewhat gravely. "No man should sacrifice his liberty to a woman, nor any woman to a man. ”

“ I fear that while we are enjoying ourselves here, and losing the love of the people, there are storms gathering in the north, which may break pretty hard upon us if we do not mind."
"I know it too well," replied Lorenzo; "I heard the facts first in Rome from Cardinal Borgia, and related the whole to the king."
"Ay, Cæsar Borgia! Cæsar Borgia!" said De Vitry. "I doubt much his good faith, and would sooner have him for an enemy than a friend."
"Why so, seigneur?" asked De Terrail. "I would always have men my friends if I can, my enemies only when I must." ”

“ Lorenzo! Lorenzo! you have made my misery! Pray God that you have not made your own too. What has become of good Leonardo's auguries? what of his dream, that by the features you could read the spirit? But it matters not. I will steel myself to meet you, should you come--to gaze upon this fair wife you have preferred to Leonora, and who, men say, is so light, and so unworthy of the man I thought you. Perhaps she may suit you better than I should have done; for God knows she cannot be more fickle than you are. Yes, the momentary madness is passing away. ”

“ When must you go hence?"
"I should set out by sun-down, father," replied Lorenzo; "the King of France must make a hasty march. Would to Heaven indeed it had been hastier, for the news we have is bad."
"Can you not remain behind?" said the monk; "you are an Italian, and not his subject, and it might serve many an excellent purpose if you could tarry here even for a few days."
"It cannot be, father," answered the young man; "were I to follow my own will, I would remain for ever by Leonora's side, but I am bound to King Charles by every tie of gratitude and honour. ”

“ Lorenzo fancied he comprehended, at least in a degree, the character which, in her youthful way, she strove to depict; but yet there was something in the look of Leonora's father which left a dark, unpleasant impression upon his mind. There are faces that we love not, but which afford no apparent reason for the antipathy they produce. There is often even beauty which we cannot admire--grace which affords no pleasure. There is, perhaps, nothing more graceful upon earth than the gliding of a snake, never for a moment quitting what the great moral painter called "the line of beauty." ”

“ Even here, under the banner of the king, is the only safety, the only hope of justice and security. I must not abandon one who can and will give aid and protection to all who serve him faithfully."
"But suppose this king were to die," said Antonio, "where would be your security then?"
"Founded more strongly than ever," answered Lorenzo; "the Duke of Orleans is more nearly related to me than King Charles, and I have always stood high in his favour. But there is no chance of King Charles dying. He is young, healthy, and destined, I trust, to a long life and a long reign. ”

“ But, Madame Blanche," he added, casting his right arm round her, "by my fay, I shall be jealous of this Lorenzo, if you are so eager for his coming."
"Out, false knight," she answered; "I defy you to be jealous of any man on earth. To make you jealous, is alas! beyond my power, for like a foolish girl, I have let you know too well how much I love you."
She spoke gaily, but the moment after she said, in a saddened tone:
"But poor Lorenzo! he is so unfortunate--so unhappy, De Vitry. I may well wish for my cousin's coming when I know that only with you and me he finds any consolation. ”

“ Since his departure from Florence he had heard nought of Leonora, and if it is terrible even in these days of comparative security and peace, to be without intelligence of those we love--if treacherous imagination brings forth from the treasury of Nemesis all the dangers and misfortunes which surround mortal life, and pile them up on the head of the beloved, how much more dreadful must it have been in those times, when real dangers, perils, and misfortunes without number dogged the steps of every-day life, and were as glaring and apparent as the sun at noon? ”

“ I remember rapping a fellow student's knuckles to prevent his putting his profane hand on a bunch of beautiful grapes, all covered with their vineyard bloom, when I was about to paint them. This young lovely girl--this Signora d'Orco, is like one of those grapes, rich in the bloom of innocence. There is the sweet fruit within--there is, or is to come the ardent wine of love and passion, but the bloom is there still. Oh, let it not be brushed away too soon, Lorenzo! Now listen: Rome is a place of horror and vice. In the chair of the Apostle sits the incarnation of every sin and crime. ”

“ There are many in the town that are sure of his innocence, but too few I fear--
"He is innocent! he is innocent!" cried Leonora, with her brow burning, and her cheek pale. "He is innocent as a babe. I will go down--I will return with you--I will see my father--I will save him or die with him."
"But, lady, they will let no one enter the town," said Leonardo; "they have trebled the sentries at the gates. All may come forth who will, but no one can return. ”

“ I do believe that there is no woman who does not wish to marry; and do you know, lady, that people wonder that you have never given your hand to any one."
"I!" exclaimed Leonora, with a start, and an expression almost of pain upon her face; "I marry any one! I wish to marry any one! to be the passive plaything of a rude boor--to be sported with at his will and pleasure--to have the sanctity of my chamber invaded by a coarse man! When I think of it, I cannot but marvel that any woman, with the feelings of a woman, can so degrade herself." ”

“ The well-known voice of Ramiro d'Orco spoke in its cold, calm accents.
"Young man," it said, "you should beware when you are well warned. My lord prefect, you have to die to-morrow. Make your peace with God, for there is no help for you on earth. You shall have a fair trial in our court, that all the world may know the proud Lorenzo Visconti has not been condemned unjustly, but is truly guilty of the murder of a poor defenceless woman--his own wife--and that history may record the fact among the famous deeds of the great house of Milan. ”

“ Eloise de Chaumont marvelled at Leonora's wonderful beauty--at the profusion of her jetty hair--at the softened lustre of her large, full, shaded eyes--at the delicate carving of the ever varying features--at the undulating grace, flowing, with every movement of her rounded, symmetrical limbs, into some new form of loveliness. She thought, "Well, she is beautiful, indeed! No wonder Lorenzo loved her. But, on my faith, she does not appear one to treat any man cruelly. ”

“ Look at our friend Ludovic of Milan; look at your friend Cardinal Cæsar; pope, prince, lawyer, doctor, friar, it is all the same thing. We have got into a few trifling bad habits here in Italy, what between Guelphs and Ghibelines, popes and emperors. Those who dare not draw a sword, unsheath a dagger; and those who wish not to spill blood, because people say it leaves a mark behind it, use poison, which leaves none. Buondoni, who came near killing you, was, I do believe, one of the best of all the rascals in Italy. He was always ready to peril his own life, and rather preferred it. ”

“ Sword and dagger most men wore in those days, but he wore neither lance nor shield, cuirass nor back-piece. He carried a little black velvet cap upon his head, with a long feather; and he rode in shoes of untanned leather, with long, sharp points, somewhat like a pod of mustard-seed.
"Are you sure you know the way, Master Tony?" asked De Vitry.
"I know the way right well, noble lord," replied the other; "but you do me too much honour to call me master. In Italy none is master but a man of great renown in the arts." ”

“ When you first came in, there was a rigidity about your look, as if you mastered some emotion. Now there is more light, as if there were emotion still. You must have suffered agitation lately. Forgive me. I am a rough, plain-spoken man, too apt to give counsel where it is not sought, and to note feelings people would wish concealed."
"You see too deeply and too well," replied Leonora; "but still I say, maestro, let us not converse on such things. The past is dead. The present, alas! has no life in it for me. Emotion is the most transient of all things with me. ”

“ Sacchi's face turned deadly pale, and he murmured:
"It will be too late--to-morrow--before to-morrow it will be done."
"What is that you mutter?" said De Vitry; "what do you mean will be done?"
"Why, my lord," replied the man, "my master--my master may have some grudge against the young lord Lorenzo. He is a man of quick action, and does not tarry long in his work. I know nought about it, so help me Heaven! but it is hard to put an innocent man's life in jeopardy for what may happen in a night. Better set off at once and stop the mischief rather than avenge it." ”

“ Now tell me how it fares with the Lady Leonora?"
"Oh, she is well, and gay as a sunbeam," replied Mardocchi; "the life and the delight of the city."
"Methinks if I had treated a lover so, first broke his heart and then driven him to wed without love, I should not be quite so happy," was Antonio's answer.
"It is strange," said the friar, in a natural tone; "but women are full of wild caprices." ”

“ We will do it, Mardocchi--we will do it; for, although there is a very palpable hint in Borgia's missive that no harm is to be done to the cousin of King Louis, yet, perhaps, we can so manage that he shall find means to harm himself. He has an army at his back to help Cæsar Borgia in carving out a principality from the heart of Italy; but the vicars of the Holy See, and I as the humblest of them, must reverently crave his Holiness to spare us the burden of the prefect's troops. We will receive him gladly with a noble train, but methinks we cannot admit an armed French force within our walls. ”

“ It is a new creed I have got, but I think it is a good one."
"Old creeds are best," replied Leonardo, seriously. "We can advance from one to another, as we can mount the steps of a temple to the holy of holies, but each step must be founded upon that which went before, and each must rest upon truth."
"Alas! where shall we find truth?" asked Leonora; and then she added, in a melancholy but sweet tone, "Let us not approach painful subjects, my good friend. We cannot meet without thinking of them. If we speak of them we shall think of them still more. ”

“ Poets and philosophers have attempted in vain to convey to the mind by figures and by argument the brevity of enjoyment, and the great master only came near the truth when he declared it was--
"Brief as the lightning in the collied night, That in a spleen unfolds both heaven and earth, And ere a man hath power to say--Behold! The jaws of darkness do devour it up." Enjoyment is the most brief of all things, for its very nature is to destroy time. Like the fabled monster of one of the Indian tribes--we drink up the waters in which we float, and leave ourselves at last on a dry and arid shore. ”

“ Then came some noise in the courtyard below--the clatter of horses feet and voices speaking; and then some steps upon the flight of stairs which led up to the grand apartments of the castle. All these sounds were so usual, however, that in themselves they could excite no emotion. But yet Leonora turned somewhat pale. There was something in the sound of the step of one of those who mounted the stairs which recalled other days to her mind. It might be heavier, firmer, less elastic, but yet it was very like Lorenzo's tread. Who ever forgets the footstep of one we have loved? ”

“ If you wait and watch, cunning will always show itself in its true colours. The face of a man's nature is always too big for any mask he can buy, and some feature will always be uncovered by which you can know the man. No one can cover his whole person with a veil; and if you cannot judge by the face, you can find him out by the feet."
"Well, well," said Lorenzo, somewhat impatiently; "open that window wide, Antonio. My head aches, and I feel half suffocated. Then just smooth my bed, and put out that winking lamp. I should not have my chamber look like the room of an hospital." ”

“ And yet, with time, the impression wears away; the spirit has spoken once its word of warning; if that word is not enough, it never speaks again. The snake has the power of fascinating the bird which, in the beginning, strove to escape from him; and we forget the monitor which told us our danger.
In an hour from that time Lorenzo was sitting at the same table with Ramiro d'Orco, listening well pleased to searching and deep views of the state of Italy, expressed, not indeed with eloquence, for he was not an eloquent man, but with a force and point he had seldom heard equalled. ”

“ But there is an innate modesty which requires no teaching of art, and Leonora answered:
"I pray you excuse me, sir; they are all men there without, and we should blush to obtrude ourselves upon the gaze of so many eyes."
As she spoke a warm glow came upon the face of Bianca Maria, but it was not her cousin's words that called it there. A shadow darkened the doorway, and the sound of a step well-known to the young girl's ear was heard, which brought the joyous blood from the heart to the cheek in a moment. ”