The sword decides

“Ye always loved him,” he said.

Konrad of Gottif was silent, but his breast heaved under the shining armor, and his hand tightened convulsively on his sword hilt.

“Let her go,” continued the King. “I—I would not see her again. Let her be banished to Naples—let God decide——”

“A coward’s decision, Ludovic of Hungary! Let the sword decide!”

“My God!” answered the King thickly. “Ye forget your station.”

“And you yours,” said Konrad of Gottif bitterly. “But ye are one for the women to manage—a man might speak to ye in vain, while ye would respond to the flutter of a lady’s hand. I—I—have not moved ye?”

There was a soft sound of silk as the King stirred in his place.

“No!” he answered sternly.

The other smiled sourly.

“Mind ye of a little princess at your mother’s court who once had some influence with ye?”

Ludovic stared at him.

“She crossed the seas with me,” continued Konrad grimly. “By your mother’s desire—to move ye if I failed.” He turned toward the door. “Shall she come in?”

“Carola of Bohemia!” cried Ludovic. “Carola of Bohemia here?”

Konrad’s bitter smile deepened as he marked the success of his last move. The change in the King’s voice and face, his half movement from the wall.

“Come,” he said quietly. “We will see if we of Hungary cannot set a woman against the Neapolitan enchantress.”

The King put his hand to his ermine collar and drew himself up, as if he would make some motion to stay the other, but Konrad of Gottif had opened the door.

“Princess!” he said.

A light footstep sounded without. In a second she was within the room, and Konrad had closed the door behind her. She wore a heavy traveling mantle, the hood pushed back from her black hair, and clasped with a great emerald at the base of her white throat. She looked at the King with eyes as dark as his own. The rich color of her lips and cheeks had faded, and she trembled exceedingly.

Ludovic glanced from her to Konrad.

“You put some fine tricks upon me,” he said hotly.

Carola of Bohemia crossed the room and went on her knees by the King’s side and took his hand. “Ludovic!” she said. “You will deal with this Queen, and you will return, Ludovic—for Andreas, for Hungary—home?”

He strove to free his hand, to raise her up. The sudden sight of her face made him weak before her. She would not loose her hold on him. She spoke again, low, insistent:

“For the sake of the time we danced and sang and laughed in Buda—we three. The time when you loved me a little, Ludovic! For the sake of his mother, who cannot sleep thinking of him—alone—alone in his grave! For the sake of the people who wait for you in Hungary—for the glory of the eagles—for—for——”

She broke off abruptly, and rose in front of the bookcase. She looked at Ludovic and he at her. The golden light glittered over her plain attire and burned a green flame in the jewel at her throat.

“You will do it?” said Carola of Bohemia. “I have always known you were—magnificent! You will do this—magnificently!”

The King, looking at her steadily, with gleaming eyes, held out his hand, but before he could speak——

“Hush!” said Konrad of Gottif, and the door opened.

Carola put her hand in his. It was a page in Giovanna’s livery who entered.

“The Queen bid me say she waits,” he said to the King. “And the matters will not brook delay.”

Ludovic of Hungary, still looking at the woman whose hand he held, answered:

“Tell her I come.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX.
THE ECLIPSE

The sick, cloying smell of the lilies troubled Ludovic. As he closed the door, his eyes slowly, reluctantly, sought the slight figure of the Queen, and the hot resolution that had brought him there, full of loathing for her, died within him. Many things had combined to rouse him to the full limit of his hate: Konrad’s urgings, aroused thoughts of Andreas, a conviction of her guilt, and the sight of Carola of Bohemia.

This, perhaps, most of all, though unconfessed to himself: Maria had slighted him, Sancia repulsed him, but Carola had crossed the seas to throw herself at his feet and beseech him to do it “magnificently.” His wounded pride could salve itself with that consideration—to her he was still a hero.

These things had brought him fiery to the Queen’s chamber, to redeem himself, to punish her—for the murder of his brother and the fooling of himself. He had brought the casket with him, meaning to fling the accusation at her and deal judgment, even as Konrad of Gottif would have done.

But the close, sick atmosphere of the room, her still figure, unnerved him instantly. He let the seconds slip by and could not speak.

Giovanna turned her head. She sat by the wall of her bedchamber; her page stood beside her. A low table, scattered with parchments, was close to her, and behind her a bright tapestry, worked with pheasants and unicorns. She wore a pale blue velvet gown that was gathered about her closely as she sat, slightly hunched together in the deep, massive chair. Her bedroom door was open, and from it could be heard the soft voices of women.

“How long you have been!” said Giovanna to the King. She looked tired, and as if she was cold, though the Italian sunshine was strong in the room.

Ludovic crossed to the table.

“Ye are very pale,” said the Queen. A passion of impatience shone in her eyes. Her little hands were clenched in her lap. “And is this a moment to be silent? Ye know that des Beaux has left Naples, and there is a rising in Sicily?”

Her words gave Ludovic a curious shock. So—her mind ran on nothing but politics, ambition. Always her kingdoms…

“Send away the boy,” he said heavily.

Giovanna motioned the page away instantly, keeping her intense eyes on the King.

“Come,” she breathed ardently. “You were to make me Queen and keep me Queen. I want money—men. These Lombard loans are due.” She pointed to the parchments on the table. “And the infamous interest to the Genoese——”

Ludovic moved away from her. She paused to watch him. He closed her bedchamber door and bolted it on the women within.

“Well, we are private now,” she continued. “What will you do for me?”

“I am considering,” said Ludovic. He kept his eyes from the Queen and stared at the tall lilies in the window, and their vivid shadows in the square of the sunshine.

Giovanna rose.

“What has happened?” she demanded. “Why will you not look at me? You have heard of Maria—do you blame me for that?”

Still he was silent.

“We will hang my fair cousin for this insult,” continued the Queen rapidly. “And shut his widow in a convent, and ye shall have her lands, Ludovic—only—help me.”

He turned to gaze at her. The heavy auburn hair hung in a gold net in the nape of her slender neck. Her violet eyes, shadowed underneath, were frantic with impatience, her underlip swollen where she had torn it with her teeth.

“Help you?” he echoed.

“Yesterday ye held a different language,” she answered hotly. “What has come to ye to-day, Ludovic of Hungary?”

His fingers tightened over the casket concealed in the silk folds of his houppeland.

“This action of Carlo’s has raised you another enemy,” he said, striving to gain time—to probe her.

“I know,” she replied desperately. “He must go——”

Swiftly he turned on her.

“Can ye bring a prince of the blood to execution for what he has done?”

Giovanna sank into her great chair.

“Perhaps not by daylight,” she said; “but there are other means.”

“Such as—murder?” demanded Ludovic.

At his tone she blanched with terror. “No! No! Ludovic—why are you so strange to-day?” In her agitation she again rose. And again sat down.

When she changed from her cold talk of state affairs to womanly trembling, she seemed very young and piteous. Ludovic could not nerve himself. He sat down opposite and hid his face with his hand.

“Are you ill?” she said, distracted. “Are you grieving for Maria?”

“No, no,” he answered. He was trembling, and she marked it. During all these months she had never seen him overcome—never otherwise than gay and bold. She beat her hands together.

“Do you, also, fail me—when I was looking to your strength—your courage?”

As he sat motionless, with averted face, she rose and came round to him.

“You said yesterday,” she whispered, her fine hands fell to his shoulders, her velvet gown touched his knee, “that you loved me,” she finished, speaking like a child.

As she touched him, the deadly sickness of utter cowardice smote Ludovic. He lifted a ghastly face, distorted from its beauty into a mere mask, but he could not move or speak—only sit there, cold to the heart, listening to the trembling beat of his pulses.

Her hands tightened on his shoulder.

“Why did you kiss me yesterday?” she demanded, “to look so on me to-day?”

With an inarticulate sound, he pushed her off and staggered up, meaning to face her standing, but his feet would not bear him. He had to lean against the wall.

He put his hand to his damp forehead and groaned. She stood looking at him, her head strained forward.

The rank scent of the lilies was overpowering. The dazzle of the sunlight on the floor, in her hair, seemed to sear his eyes. He tried to shape the words he wished to brand her with, but his tongue would not obey him.

Giovanna smoothed down the soft folds of her dress with a curious, slow gesture.

“What am I to think of ye, Ludovic?” she asked.

With an effort that shook him, he turned and set the casket on the table, among her parchments. With a trembling hand he pointed to it.

She picked it up quietly, traced the motto with her finger, and read it aloud:

“Remember thy later end, and thou shalt not sin for ever.”

Then she raised her head and laughed coolly, at which his blood was stirred to answer her:

“Open and see—your damnation,” he said, and he put his hand to the sword he had brought to slay her.

She lifted the lid, then dropped the casket from between her hands, leaving them out as if she still held it, while she turned a blank face to him.

“Ye—are—my brother’s—” Ludovic choked into silence. Her eyes were unbearable. He struggled with himself, cursing her that he was weak. Her hands fell to her side. His ragged voice broke again into the stillness:

“Ye murdered Andreas!”

“No,” she said mechanically. “No.”

“The proofs lie at your feet.” He put shaking hands on the sword by his side, fumbling with it.

She looked down at the floor. The piece of brocade Raymond had cut from her gown lay by her hem.

“Found in his hand,” said Ludovic hoarsely.

“He was—clinging to you… I think… your hair too…”

“Whose word?” cried Giovanna clearly. “On whose word do ye judge me?”

He pointed to what lay on the floor between them.

“ ’Tis enough.”

“This?” She set her foot on the brocade. “Did you find it in his hand?”

She spoke steadily. The white color of her face had not changed.

“Sancia knows—and Maria,” breathed Ludovic. “And I know——”

“The women lie,” cried Giovanna. “Are you their tool?”

Her eyes held scorn. “You,” she repeated, “who have been my friend and desired to be my lover, who believed me when I came to you first—you to be moved by their malice, their jealousy?”

Incredulous of her calm, her poise, he stared at her and his hand fell from his sword—would guilt dare so to face it? “However she outbrave it, you must see then,” Konrad had said, and he saw nothing, only the same inscrutable eyes, the same even voice.

“They lie,” said Giovanna. “Sancia may cut a fragment from my robe to swear she found it in his hand, Maria may bring his letter to move you—but I am innocent!”

Ludovic stumbled into the chair and rested his head in his trembling hands. He strove to recall what there was against her. Before it had seemed obvious, a thing crying aloud. Now, as she said, what was it but the word of malice and jealousy?

Maria had refused to speak further. Sancia would not confirm it, and—“God forgive me!” she had said.

The Queen’s voice broke upon his tortured thoughts.

“If ye think I did this thing—take me before my peers at Avignon!”

“God guide me,” muttered Ludovic. “If I knew—if I was sure——”

She moved slowly toward the table, her long shadow, the shadow of the lilies were distinct on the polished boards. She took a crucifix from the wall and held it up in her two hands—by her dress lay her dead husband’s bloody curls.

“If I swore,” she said, “on this?”

He rose in his seat.

“Would you dare?”

She put her lips to the crucifix.

“I call Christ, God and all his angels to witness that I am innocent of the murder of Andreas, my husband.”

She put the crucifix down, and looked into Ludovic’s eyes.

“And may God bring instant judgment upon me if I lie!”

He could not challenge what she had said. He stood vanquished, not daring to disbelieve.

“Does that satisfy you?” she asked. She laughed as she had laughed when she read the motto on the casket. Ludovic moved away sharply to the window and leaned there.

“Do you believe me?” she said again.

A heavy silence filled the low chamber for slow seconds. Then she crept toward him, and for the third time:

“Do you believe me? You see, God does not strike me down.” She touched the edge of his sleeve, then drew away again. He looked at her sideways.

Certainly they had lied about her. Remembering the terrific oath she had taken and her calm, he could not but think they had spoken false. Yet it galled him to be the shuttlecock of these women’s words.

“I think ye have persuaded me,” he said slowly.

She had returned to her chair and sat there, one hand among her parchments.

“Ye can be just,” she answered. There was no warmth in his confession, nor in her acceptance. Again a dragging silence.

Ludovic, gazing at the floor, saw the vivid sunshine less vivid, the shadows fainter, and marveled dully and told himself it was deception.

The Queen spoke steadily: “Is this to come between us?”

He answered brokenly: “God wot, I am enmeshed with doubts…”

“Is this love?” said Giovanna. “Is this a King’s word, Ludovic?”

Beyond question, now, the shadows on the floor, the shadows cast by the Queen’s chair, the table, the lilies and the fallen casket were growing fainter. The King glanced swiftly at the sky. It was utterly cloudless.

“You will believe me, yet abandon me,” continued the Queen hoarsely. “You will neither love nor hate me—you will stand aside—the coward’s part!”

He hardly heard her. As she spoke the light was paling—not as when it fades into twilight, but with no softening of the shadows that remained clear and defined, yet faint, as if it was all looked at through thick glass. Slowly, yet unmistakably, the chamber was darkening. And it was early in the afternoon, while the sky was cloudless.

“What is happening?” whispered Ludovic. He thought she had bewitched him—that he was going mad, going blind.

Now she had noticed it.

“A storm comes on,” she cried, and sprang up, knowing that the sky was clear; that no storm was ever heralded by this.

The steady darkness gathered. The sunlight was like faint stains in the unnatural gloom. Man and woman looked at each other with unutterable terror.

One thing was plain to both.

The sun was going out like a dying lamp. On the stillness of their horror broke a wild clamor of fear—the women locked in the inner room beat on the door.

Ludovic mechanically crossed the chamber and drew the bolt.

The two women stumbled across the floor.

“The end of the world,” said one, and the other shrieked.

In a second they had fled through the outer door, leaving it swinging wide behind them. It was now so dark they could see each other only as vague shapes—the wild clang of bells from the three hundred churches rang through the room.

Giovanna had stood erect, rigid, since she first rose. Now she flung herself on her knees and threw out her hands toward Ludovic, who cowered against the wall. He could just see the pale oval of her face and the shape of her arms as they waved up and down.

A wild voice rose, beating down the bells—he could hardly believe it hers:

“I confess! I confess! God have mercy upon me!”

The blackness descended as a thick veil over his eyes. He cried out in the agony of his terror and helplessness. The last glimmer of the window disappeared, swallowed into the huge darkness. Still that voice continued:

“I have murdered—I have lied—I opened the door to them—I saw him slain at my feet, Ludovic! Kill me! Let me pay that God may have mercy on me! I am red with blood! Let not the world end before I atone!”

Outside other voices, shrieking, and the tramp of panic-stricken feet. Ludovic strove to cling to his senses. This was the end of the world. God had come at last to Judgment, and she—she was confessing.

“Ye murdered him?” he shouted. He could not see his own hand before him.

Her answer came as if from a great distance. “Yes—for the crown of Naples I murdered him—I lured him there—I conceived it—I saw it done—I had Count Raymond slain that he might not speak! Slay me! Slay me! Purge me with the sword before the Devil snatches me to Hell!”

There was a sound as if she dragged herself along the floor. Her words rang about him like the bells, bearing no meaning—he was striving to number his own sins. His lips formed a broken prayer.

She tore her dress, her hair, fighting against the darkness as if it were a living thing. Details of her crimes, dragged from her own soul at last, made the blackness thick with horror. Steadily words poured from her. Ludovic listened at length, and through even the terror of the judgment day, the monstrous thing she had done hurried his heart beats.

Her fiery confession, painted on the blackness as in pictures of blood, her husband’s miserable death, the fires of San Eligio, and the distorted head of her fellow murderer. His hand went to his sword. Even now, on the edge of eternity, that poor weapon could drink her wretched blood—her death would be one thing to him when he came before the judgment seat.

Still she spoke on, as if she told prayers to her beads, assailing his ears with her foul thoughts, her foul deeds.

“He knelt down by my bed. He was bleeding, bleeding—I felt I should like to slay him myself… he would not die… he was very pale… ah, they beat on the door! ‘Bind up my arm, cousin,’ he said… I ran and opened the door. He had no weapon—I opened the door—they rushed in——”

Up through the blackness rose Ludovic’s sword.

“Witch!” he howled. “Devil!” and came at her where he thought her voice rose from.

“Oh, I am blind!” she yelled. “He died in the light!”

His sword plunged. Something clung to his knees. He dropped his weapon in a shrieking terror, and stooped to grapple with her by his hands. With all the strength of his frenzy he caught hold of soft flesh and trailing hair, and flung it from him…

A vast sobbing filled the darkness as if a thousand women wept together. In his madness he thought her kindred devils echoed her. He felt her where she lay and trampled her… then by the silence he knew he had set his foot on her face… on her mouth.

He fled—where, he could not tell, or if he ran forward or round—if he was still in her chamber or not. He seemed to have gone a vast distance, and yet he listened for her sobbing, the steady patter of her confession.

He did not know why he fled. It was not in his mind to escape. Often he ran into objects, bruising himself; yet still he fled.

Presently a red light swung across his vision. He hid his face, thinking Hell had broken loose… someone passed him, walking steadily.

Ludovic looked up. It was a tall man in armor, holding a torch, whose rich glow picked out him and the wall behind him.

“Where is the Queen?” he said calmly.

“ ’Tis the end of the world,” answered Ludovic wildly, and he fled from the flicker of the torch into the darkness again.

Luigi of Taranto stood still a moment and listened. In the streets and in the gardens the people were gathered, thronging toward the churches. Their clamor pierced the thick walls, but in the palace was silence—it seemed empty.

The Prince of Taranto mounted steadily to the Queen’s room. The utter blackness had changed the aspect of the palace, but presently he found her open door.

“Giovanna!” he said.

He swept the torch round the stillness. Its flaring smoky light revealed her, flung across the floor, with her arms wide apart.

Her dress was torn, her hair tangled over her bare shoulders. Along her face was a little mark of blood. For a moment he could not believe that this half-naked, tattered woman was the grave and splendid Queen.

As he gazed at her, the bells ceased. Even the churches had lost hope. He looked up quickly. There was no alteration in the utter darkness.

He moved round the room, searching for some other means of light, looking at the Queen now and then over his shoulder. With the torch in his hand he was helpless to even lift her up, and there was no place to set it.

As he came to the door, one ran past with a lamp—a slim squire, wailing prayers.

Luigi of Taranto gripped him by the shoulder and dragged him into the room.

The youth shrieked in terror.

“Is there no courage left in Naples?” cried the Prince scornfully. “I am no devil, boy, but Luigi of Taranto.”

The Squire stared at him blankly.

“Help me with the Queen,” commanded the Prince of Taranto. He took the lamp from the youth’s passive hand, set it on the table, and gave him the torch to hold. Then he loosened his cloak and flung it over the Queen’s dishevelment.

The heavy clink of his armor and the cross lights of torch and lamp disturbed the black silence.

“Lift her up,” he said, and raised her head himself. The boy, stayed a little from his terror by the sight of one who retained his calm, obeyed. Between them they carried her into her bedchamber and laid her on her curtained bed.

“God wot, she is very little weight,” said Luigi of Taranto softly.

But the Squire lapsed fresh into his fears. “ ’Tis the world’s end!” he cried. “I should be in the church!”

The Prince of Taranto looked at him grimly.

“If it is the world’s end,” he said, “which I wot well it is not—being nothing but a sudden darkness, the Devil will claim his own, whether they be in churches or no—and as for God,” he smiled somberly, “He will find us here as well as in the streets——”

“Ye think—?” stammered the Squire.

Luigi of Taranto was putting back the twisted hair from the Queen’s white brow.

“I think,” he said, “I shall be King of Naples to-morrow!”

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN.
KONRAD OF GOTTIF’S WIFE

The evil glow of Vesuvius, against which the flames rose and leaped, the multitudes about him bearing torches, lanterns, candles, showed Ludovic that he was in the street.

He strove to draw himself aside from the surging throng. It was impossible, the King was swept along next the beggar on the tide of panic and despair. Now the clamor of the bells had ceased, the guiding sound of the crowd had gone, and with it their last hope. They took it that God had forsaken the wicked city, since even the churches were overcome. Fighting and shrieking among themselves, they swayed to and fro, trampling each other under foot, pressing themselves to death against the high houses. One, gibbering with fear, dropped his torch. It caught the wooden threshold of a dwelling and the whole leaped into soaring fire. In the glow of it they scrambled, drawn like moths to a candle, yelling for “Light! Light!” Some, laughing horribly, threw themselves in, and the flames closed over them as they called for “Light! Light!” Like a runner bending to the race the fire curled low before the wind and leaped from house to house, till all to the right of Ludovic was scarlet and all to the left black, while the sounds of broken timber and falling walls mingled with the sobbing of the flames.

And now the terror of fire mastered the terror of the dark. The crowd turned and rushed back to the Palazzo San Eligio.

A troop of soldiers on panic-stricken horses dashed past, hurling down and trampling the people in their way.

Ludovic knew them for some of his Hungarians, but they did not see him in the press.

Forced along in the shouting confusion with the flames urging them behind, Ludovic found himself opposite a building blazing with light.

Some one cried out that it was the Castel di Durazzo and that the Duke had drawn the bridge up. Ludovic thought in a sick way of Maria and struggled on. A wild thought had come to him. The dead would rise at Judgment Day. Andreas was buried in San Gonnaro—if he would be there to meet him.… He forced his way to the cathedral. Again a horseman clattered by with a troop behind him. The torchlight fell on the face of Luigi of Taranto riding in the direction of the palace.

Ludovic, abreast of the crowd, entered the church. Tumultuous prayers rose to the roof and the air was thick with incense; a hundred wax candles lit up jeweled altars and gorgeous tombs, soaring columns and splendid carvings.

The King made his way to the chapel beside the altar, where his brother lay, and fell across his gravestone face downward.

This corner was unlit and empty. Ludovic thought himself alone until voices broke across his swounding prayers. He looked up to see the whole church sway together, the columns spring up, the lights break into innumerable stars, the people reel in the incense smoke, and above it all the face of Carola of Bohemia.

He rose to meet it standing.

“Andreas!” he cried, and fell forward.

* * * * *

Ludovic of Hungary opened his eyes on neither Heaven nor Hell, but on the empty church of San Gonnaro, and the placid sunlight about his feet. He dragged himself up, sick, bruised, exhausted, and gazed about him.

The evening sun, pouring through the rich glass, glowed on the tall pillars, the quiet tombs, the splendor of the altars. Ludovic rose and staggered from the chapel into the body of the church. Though there were traces of confusion, benches overturned, articles of clothing, books scattered about, there was not one person left of the hundreds who had crowded there, deafening the ears of the priests.

For the sun had come forth again.

Ludovic leaned against one of the smooth pillars a long while, striving, with a numb brain, to retrace what had occurred.

Had he slain her—had he seen Luigi of Taranto riding by torchlight like a war god toward the palace with soldiers clattering after him?—had that man seized the moment?

Slowly, painfully, he made his way to the door, crept into the porch beneath the semicircle of saints and angels, and stared down upon the city.

The earth had not opened and swallowed it; neither had the sky rent apart and showered fire upon it. The white houses with their colored roofs, the vivid palaces, showed in the softened light of evening. Ludovic gazed at the purple shadows gratefully and drank in the sunshine with a shiver of pleasure.

Many people hurried past. Officials of Naples on horseback, endeavoring to restore order; thieves creeping by with booty snatched in the confusion; tradesmen rushing to protect their shops; dark companies of nuns and monks bearing the wounded to the hospices; solitary passers-by wandering with dazed countenances and idle feet.

None noticed the young man in the tattered silk houppeland who stood in the shadow of the porch with his sick head resting against the stone feet of San Gonnaro.

Once a number of Hungarians in red and blue swept by, and Ludovic called out to them, but they passed without hearing, and he could not marvel at it, for to himself his voice sounded very faint.

Presently, as he waited with tumultuous thoughts and quiet face, another rode by, shading his eyes with a mailed hand on which the sun glittered, and looking from left to right.

“Konrad!” said the King. He came out on to the steps and the horseman drew rein. It was Konrad of Gottif; his helmet hung at his saddle, and his horse was red from the spur.

“The King!” he said, and leaped to the ground. Ludovic descended the steps to meet him. Konrad, holding the bridle in one hand, spoke again. “Up and down have I sought for ye—know ye what has happened at the palace?”

Ludovic shook his head wearily.

“Luigi of Taranto has flung himself and all the men he could gather into the Castel del Nuovo, and they have taken the drawbridge up—” He looked at the King intently. “Swiftly now, my liege, or we lose Naples.”

“He will oppose me?” asked Ludovic with his hand to his head.

“He has threatened to drive us as dogs from Naples—he will marry the Queen.”

The color rose into Ludovic’s swarthy face. Had he not slain the Queen? He dare not speak of it for fear he was distraught.

“Give me your horse,” he said abruptly, and sprang into the saddle. “Now, where are my Hungarians?”

As curtly Konrad answered:

“We have mustered in the Grand Palazzo.”

Before he gathered up the reins, Ludovic put his hand furtively to his side. His sword was gone. He had left it in Giovanna’s chamber. Certainly she was not alive to marry Luigi of Taranto.

With Konrad of Gottif at his horse’s head, he rode to the Grand Palazzo.

The sight of his men, the sound of their shouts as they saw him, the banners of Hungary against the evening sky, the blazoned arms, the pomp and glitter, roused Ludovic into his former gayety. Fear and horror had fled like phantoms before the sun. He galloped along the line of his soldiers, smiling at them.

“Shall we lose Naples?” he flashed to Konrad. “No!” and he stopped before one of the knights.

“Give me your sword,” he said, and thrust it into his belt. “Now am I armed again! Glory to God!”

They shouted furiously for their King in the tattered silks, and Ludovic cast his sparkling eyes to where Carola of Bohemia sat on a white palfrey close to the straining banner poles that bore the Hungarian eagles.

Like the first star when the storm clouds have passed was her pale fair face to him. Giovanna, Maria, Sancia were but memories dim with horror, while she, with eyes that spoke of home—she who crossed the seas to him after he had left her for his Italian bride—she who had been a child with him. His weary senses dwelt with an exquisite pleasure on her gentle presence. He turned the white horse toward her, in anticipation of her sweet welcome.

As he came alongside her, he spoke, in his marvelous soft voice:

“Carola—were you frightened?”

She looked at him straightly. Above her head the flag made a strong, fluttering sound.

“My husband was with me,” she said simply. “Yet even then, my liege, was I a little afraid.”

A great faintness came over Ludovic. He felt as he had felt when he stood in the church porch and idly watched the crowd hurrying past.

“Your husband?” he repeated.

“Konrad of Gottif,” answered Carola. “We have been wed these two months.”

For a second the King was silent, then he laughed. “I give you joy”—then he flushed—“of the better man,” he added, “though ye might have had a throne.”

Then he rode up to Henryk of Belgrade, and his hazel eyes were the eyes of a soldier.

“I have done with the women, Henryk,” and he laid his hand on the other’s shoulder. “Now,” and his breath came quickly, “I play with Kingdoms.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT.
THE QUEEN’S SECOND HUSBAND

Giovanna lay in her great bed. Her head rested on a silk pillow with a heavy gold fringe, and the coverlet, striped green and purple, was drawn up to her pointed chin.

The room was shielded from the sun by purple velvet curtains and lit by red lamps on hanging chains. By the bedside sat Sancia di Renato with a great painted book on her knee and an ivory and jasper rosary in her hand; both, it seemed, forgotten, for she looked across the room with musing eyes, as if she traced pictures of her own on the dark walls.

From the next room drifted the scent of the lilies and pale gleams of sunshine, and from outside came heavy, unusual sounds, the metallic clink of hammers, the thud of wood on wood, men’s voices, eager and strained.

Presently Sancia rose, put aside the book and the rosary, and stood looking down at the Queen.

Giovanna opened her eyes.

“What are those noises?” she said. She had not spoken since Ludovic of Hungary had thrust her from his knees.

“The engines they bring into the palace,” answered Sancia softly, “and the masons fortifying the walls.”

“I have heard them for a long time,” said the Queen, and she closed her eyes again.

A sudden chatter of birds flying past fell across the hammer strokes, and Sancia shuddered.

“The Prince of Taranto is in the palace,” she whispered. “And you have been sick these many days.”

“Naples, Naples,” murmured the Queen, and did not open her eyes.

Sancia crept to the door of the antechamber. An old man sat half asleep before a table spread with bottles and glasses, and two women were spreading herbs and roots to dry in the sun.

“The Queen hath spoken,” whispered Sancia. “Will one tell the Prince?”

The physician roused himself with a start.

“Did I not say so?” he muttered, “on the third or seventh day, according as Jupiter is in conjunction with Mars—well, keep the sun off her——”

“And tell the Prince,” repeated Sancia. “He did most earnestly desire it.”

Softly she returned to the bed, took up her book and rosary, and sank into her old place.

The steady rise and fall of the hammers, the impression they created of sunshine and life outside this darkened sick chamber, the Queen’s low breathing, and the red flicker of the lamps, swayed her senses into dreaminess.

Suddenly Giovanna moved and the weary violet eyes opened again.

“Who rules in Naples?” she asked.

“You are the Queen,” said Sancia.

For a while she was silent as a child thinking over a problem, then she spoke again:

“Where is my cousin Ludovic?”

Sancia winced. Giovanna’s face and voice were so expressionless, it seemed she must have forgotten.

“He holds half Naples,” answered Sancia, in a low tone. “Against the Prince of Taranto—he fled hence in the great darkness—he——”

Giovanna did not notice the unfinished sentence.

“And Maria?” she whispered, turning her head on the pillow.

“She is the Duchess di Duras now.”

The Queen turned her head away again, as if she had not heard.

“It is surely the springtide,” she murmured, “for the hammer strokes sound so clearly and the flowers smell so sweet—like the violets round the villas at Baiae.” As she spoke one of the women came to the outer door.

“The Prince would see the Queen.”

Giovanna caught the words, softly as they were spoken. “Bring him to me,” she said. “Oh, aye, bring him here.” She sat up in bed. Her heavy silk nightgown, edged with fur, fell open at the throat, and her auburn hair twisted on to her shoulders. Then she dropped back against the pillows, with her frail white hands on the coverlet.

“She remembers nothing,” thought Sancia, and she said:

“Shall I bind up your hair, Madonna, and put some robe on you?”

“It was a beautiful dress,” whispered Giovanna; “with gorgeous embroideries on it—peacocks, apples and flowers. Do you remember the thirteenth day of September? But bring him up.”

Sancia shrank away from the bed. Outside a quick step sounded, and Luigi of Taranto appeared in the doorway. Over his armor he wore a loose scarlet robe and his heavy face was set and stern.

He crossed at once to the bed and held aside the curtains.

“Oh, you!” said Giovanna. “You!”

He lifted her hand from the shimmering coverlet.

“Do you know me?” he said earnestly.

A troubled look passed across her face.

“Yes,” she assented, but half fearfully.

He was silent a while, looking at her, and his gray eyes grew hard with calculation. The lamplight flickered in the black damascening of his armor, where it showed on the opening of his robe.

Sancia, standing against the wall, watched them—the great knight and the lady on the vast bed, his roughly shaped hand holding her fragile fingers.

“Listen,” said the Prince at length. “I have saved you from your enemies—do you understand, Giovanna?”

She nodded.

“Ludovic of Hungary, who is no great King after all,” and he smiled grimly, “I have already driven to the very gates of Naples. I seized the palace, and with it great quantities of his treasure. The people, hating the foreigner, are gathering round me again. Do you understand, Giovanna?”

“Yes,” she said faintly.

“And because of these things,” he continued, “I shall marry you, and the Pope shall recognize me as King of this land. And it is the only way for you, even if you mislike me, for you are in my power. But I swear by Christ, you need not mislike me, for I like you as well as ever I liked a woman, and, if you do not cross me, I will make life pleasant for you.” At the end of this speech he let go of her hand and leaned against the bedpost, frowning at her, and she turned her face to the pillow, while her long throat was caught with sobs.

“Fetch the notary,” said Luigi to Sancia, and when she had gone he bent over the Queen and touched her shoulder.

“My kingdom,” she moaned.

“Would ye rather Hungary had your kingdom?” he answered fiercely. “Ye shall rule it with me—for truly I like you well.”

At that she sat up and faced him, putting aside the tangle of her hair. Under the heavy silk her shoulders heaved.

“I slew my first husband,” she said wildly.

Luigi of Taranto looked at her somberly. “I knew it—always. Do you think I am afraid? I am not such an one as Andreas.”

She wrung her hands together.

“Oh, how I hated him! A boy—to snatch my crown from me! Yet it was black sin, and Ludovic—” She stopped as if her memory had suddenly failed her.

“Ludovic,” repeated the Prince. “What is he to you? He dallied round you. He has a fair face, God wot, yet I think he is a man of little worth, or he had settled this before—come, do you care for him?”

“For none,” she answered dully. “Least of all for him.” Then her face suddenly brightened. “Luigi, he was a fool, was he not? Finely I cajoled him, and then—ah, what has happened to me? I cannot think—” She sat up, with her fingers to her lips, staring at him.

“Listen to me,” he said. “I know—and some others. This King knows, does he not? But what I found on the floor in yonder chamber I burned. He has no proof. He came for his vengeance and has failed—by God, I think so—and I shall know how to deal with defamers of my wife. Once more, do ye understand me—that ye are safe?”

She turned her head away and would not speak, but when the notary entered with his parchments, she put her name to the marriage contract, and wrote it steadily beside her cousin’s signature, and, at his request, they brought her royal seal and she set that on it. But when they had gone she put her face in her hands and wept.

“Am I a footstool to your ambition?” she sobbed. Then, “Have I lost my kingdom?”

Luigi of Taranto stood watching her, frowning and biting his forefinger. On the other side of the bed Sancia waited, with a weary face.

“Will you arise?” he said at length. “I have the Legate in the chapel to marry us.”

She looked up at him with wild, wet eyes.

“I did read of a man once—’twas in a great clasped book—and he sinned, sinned, yet for nothing. And still he served the ends of others, sinning deeper, and when he came to die, he was poor and old. The Devil fetched him, and he said, I might have lived honorably—for ye are a bad paymaster.” The tears rolled slowly down her face, as she stared at him blindly.

“Ye are weak,” he said. “Where had ye been without me? At the mercy of Hungary’s tardy vengeance.”

She choked back her tears.

“Let me arise,” she said. “Help me.”

She laid her hand on his arm and rose, setting her bare feet on the green carpet of the bed steps. She sat so, with her hand to her forehead, and Sancia brought her scarlet velvet shoes.

Silent the Prince took them, and, kneeling, put them on the Queen’s feet, while Sancia folded a golden silk robe about her.

She sat quite still, until the Prince got onto his feet. Then she rose also, and tried to walk, but, being very weak, she fell against the hard armor on his breast, and lay there, silent for shame and rage at her helplessness.

He set her in a chair by the bed.

“Would you have your sister see you?” he asked. “For Carlo and I are in league.”

She shook her head. “It was black sin,” she said, “but I hated him. Why am I always driven into sin? I would be Queen. Queen! Why”—she flashed a desperate look on him—“did I not take his kisses because he would make me Queen? What was he to me—or any man?” She put her hand to her throat, gathering the silks together. “Did I not promise Maria to Raymond if he would make me Queen?”

“I will do that for you,” answered the Prince. “Will I not clear your kingdom of the invaders? Ludovic would not leave you your throne—now he knows.”

“Aye,” she cried feverishly. “He knows—and all the world beside! Yet, how I kept my secret—though it made me mad——”

“These things are not things to speak of,” he answered, and made to bend closer to her, but she held him off with a weak resistance by her feeble hand on his arm.

“Oh, you!” she said. “I never thought of you—you seemed to me an unambitious man.”

“God wot, I waited.”

“And now,” she answered, “ye snatch the greatest prize of all—my Kingdom!”

He moved away from her somberly.

“Bring her to the chapel,” he said to Sancia, and was gone.

Giovanna sat slackly, her long fingers playing with her hair.

“My cousin Luigi,” she murmured. “Why, I am very tired, and the flowers smell so sweet—if I could remember!”

Sancia crossed the room, with a pale gleam of yellow draperies in the gloomy light, and in her hand a girdle of plates of gold set with amethyst, that she clasped round the passive Queen.

As she was turning again, Giovanna caught her by the white wrists and held her with a sudden strength.

“Could we escape?” she whispered hurriedly. “If I could get among the people they might shout for me as they did when the old King died—I might be Queen again.”

“It is not possible,” answered Sancia. She thought she had never seen the Queen’s upturned face look so lovely as it did now, softened by tears.

The golden girdle heaved under Giovanna’s bosom. “What he said he would do for me! You—have you ever loved?”

“Let me free,” breathed Sancia. “Aye, I have loved and repented.”

“And been loved?” questioned the Queen.

“I know not,” shuddered Sancia, and dragged her hands away.

“Love! It is but a word!” cried Giovanna. “Nothing he did for me—nothing!” She leaned forward and clung to the other’s arm with cold fingers. Her voice changed and sank.

“I have lain so long—listening to the hammers, and I fancied they were building my tomb. See! they make it splendid! Let me lie with a crown on my head, and a scepter in my hand; under my feet a lion, and beside me a shield, thick with lilies of the Angevin Kings——”

She paused, then whispered:

“For, even if my soul is in Hell, let my body be housed magnificently with enamel, gems and carved angels. So I may lie a thousand years—a crowned Queen!”

“I deck you for a wedding, not a funeral,” answered Sancia quickly.

Giovanna let go of her.

“My wedding! When they married me before, I clenched my hand that I might not strike his proxy in the face, but the men stood close as gathered spears about me to see it done. These men—shall we be never better than their tools!”

She rose up, drawn to her full height, held her hand out and looked at it. “I took his ring from off that finger as they slew him outside my door,” she said passionately. “And shall my cousin Luigi bind me to slavery with another ring?”

“Much misery has distracted you,” answered Sancia, trembling. “Yet speak more quietly, or I, also, shall run mad.”

The fire died out of the Queen’s eyes. She sat down in a quiet silence and let Sancia dress her hair, put gold on her neck and arms, and fasten an ermine côtehardie over the yellow silk.

Leaning on Sancia’s arm, she came passively to the chapel at the end of the corridor. Soldiers were gathered round the entrance, and she looked at them strangely.

Luigi of Taranto stood by the little altar, with his hand on the gilded rails, talking to the Legate. The light from the rose window that glowed in overlapping petals of purple, gold, orange and Turkish blue, fell upon his close red hair and scarlet mantle, casting a dusky shadow behind him.

Into this glory of color, the Queen crept, holding her gown off her shoes.

The Legate turned to her: “Is this by your full consent, my liege?” he said, surveying her wisely through half-closed eyes.

The color slowly rose into her face. A wild thought of defying them shook her for a moment. Yet, if she did, they would drag her before the court at Avignon. She looked at her cousin’s quiet gray eyes, at his clasp of the altar rails. She moistened her lips, and said lifelessly:

“Yea.”

The chapel was full of nobles and their wives, bribed by some means to follow the Prince of Taranto. Her mad eyes swept the circle of their faces, then she sank on her knees on the violet cushion placed for her.

Luigi of Taranto knelt beside her. She heard his armor strike the flags. She looked at his hand, still clasped on the rails.

The pale notary unrolled his parchment, and commenced reading the marriage contract between the very illustrious Luigi, Prince of Taranto, and Giovanna d’Anjou, Queen of Naples, Jerusalem and Sicily. This was followed by the grand almoner’s reading of the apostolical letters (supplied on his own authority by the Legate, and yet lacking confirmation from Avignon) of His Holiness, which sanctioned the marriage and gave his well-beloved son and daughter his benediction. At that, the Legate put the Queen’s hand in her cousin’s, and he helped her to her feet as he rose himself.

“Before God and man,” Luigi said, in a strong voice, half turning, “this is my wife.”

“And this is my husband,” Giovanna replied dully.

The gathered witnesses began leaving the chapel. Giovanna took no heed of them. She was leaning against the wall, and, by the shimmering of the yellow silk above her broad girdle, it might be seen how pantingly her breath came. There were white roses on the altar, and she had picked up one from the steps. She looked at it now, then presently dropped it, on purpose, it seemed.

Luigi of Taranto, pausing in his conversation with the Legate, stooped, picked up the flower, and gave it her.

She took it, moved a little forward, and dashed it in his face with such force that the fine petals were scattered over his robe and armor, and the stem snapped in her hand.

There were many curious eyes watching her, upright, with a white face and furious, narrow glance, and him, gazing at her quietly and slowly, flicking the petals from his sleeve.

Then, suddenly, she turned from his steady eyes, put out her hands, and fell down by the wall as if an arrow had touched her heart.

“Take her away,” said the Prince.

In silence they took her up, two of the women at her head, and two of the men at her feet.

Luigi fell into his trick of biting his forefinger as he watched her carried out. One of the red shoes had been dropped, and he saw her white foot against her gown, and her white face against her hair, all stained red from the scarlet blazonry of the window.

After a little silence, he, also, left the chapel.

Without the door stood Sancia. First he passed her, but, looking back, retraced his steps and spoke to her.

“Do you not desire, Madonna, to return to Padua?”

“I am content here,” she answered.

“Ye have been very devoted to the Queen,” he said, as if he could not understand. “I would not keep you here when you are not of this Kingdom. Truly there will be great fighting, and, if you will, I can see you safely out of Naples.”

She lifted her lovely face, and fixed on him large, earnest eyes.

“What is my life to me?” she answered. “You know, I think, that I betrayed the Queen, who was my mistress and had not harmed me—God wot, I would a little make amends.”

“The Queen,” he said softly, “does not remember you, nor what you did. Something I learned—from Maria, I do think,” and he looked down at the ground, “we cannot judge one another. I—who have always known—do not rate her the less for this”—he broke off—“nay, if you will, depart in friendliness.”

“Let me stay,” she said.

He frowned. “Why, if you will.” He went from her heavily. At the end of the corridor he paused and listened.

Dull, thick sounds filled the palace. He flung himself down the stairs. Half-way, he met some running up.

“The Hungarians!” they cried.

He swept off the scarlet robe on to the stairs and shouted for his helmet.

Steadily came the noise of the catapult and battering ram, the distant cry of the enemy.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE.
THE BATTLE IN THE STREETS

The great engines of war, dragged by straining men and horses, the companies of heavy cavalry, blocked the streets about the Castel del Nuovo. The drawbridge was up and above the high outer wall. The gleam of the armed warders and the fine line of their spears might be seen as they moved to and fro. At the side rose the high bastions that enclosed the palace gardens, and over them waved the poplar trees, reflected in the moat below.

All was crowned by the standard of Anjou, floating against the cloudless blue from the highest watch tower in a flutter of gold and white.

Ludovic of Hungary, pressing forward, raised his visor and eagerly scanned the enemy’s ramparts. He had not brought his men as far as this unopposed. The populace had striven, with the rude weapons of a mob, to drive them back, and some of the nobles had made sorties upon them as they passed; but overwhelmingly strong in numbers and arms, the Hungarians had fought their way to the heart of the city with little loss.

Ludovic gazed at the castle where he had spent those months of pleasant idleness, Giovanna’s fool, and Maria’s scorn, the suitor of a tirewoman, and the dupe of a court of knaves. His blood was up. He vowed to bring it level with the ground, stone by stone, and hang Luigi of Taranto over the ruins.

There was nothing now to come between Naples and his wrath. He would lay it waste from end to end, sparing none. That great mysterious darkness which the astrologers had declared a portent of disaster, had passed from his mind. With the show of battle round him, it was not possible for him to be anything but elated. Splendid with his weapons, his horse, his swift victories over the Turks had won him the name of “The Triumphant” even in his early youth. The thought of these days came to him now, and nothing was good in his sight but the clangor of arms and the unfaltering decision of the sword.

With a company of knights, he rode up to the great gates that guarded the moat, and turning in his saddle, looked at his host gathered in the Grand Palazzo.

As some relief from the insupportable heat of the blazing sun on the plate armor, the gentlemen wore surcoats, mantles, and lambrequins of cloth, silk, and even fur, while their followers, the footmen, wore on their breasts the badge of their masters. So the whole army was a mass of color, like a vast mosaic, upon which the sun glittered from a purple sky, showing crests, banners, the smooth shapes of horses, while, brown and black between their studded harness, the rude carriages and monstrous shapes of the catapults and mortars, the bright tufts of the arrowheads in their quivers on the backs of the bowmen, and on all that array of scarlet and silver, embroidery and feathers learned by Hungary from the East and at once fierce and splendid.

The drawbridge gates were unguarded, and the castle made no sign when the Hungarian cavalry took them at a gallop, and the engineers, under the shouted commands of the King, began to span the moat with scaling ladders, while some of the horsemen urged their steeds to swim the dark water.

Without any opposition the ladders were grappled to the masonry of the bastions, and the footmen swarmed across, a chain of eager figures. Then from the quiet ramparts descended a stream of living fire, boiling water, and hot stones, while from every loophole flew an arrow.

Men and ladders fell into the moat. Shrieks and groans rose from the invaders, and from the warders on the battlements cries of triumph. A great movement swept through the gathered army. The mortars, belching flame and turned full on the stubborn walls; fresh ladders were thrown across; regardless of those writhing in the water, others flung themselves against the castle, hurling fuses of gunpowder into the interstices of the stone. Arrows and missiles came in a second volley; the moat began to be full of struggling men and horses; they could not get the battering rams near enough to use them. Konrad of Gottif yelled with rage to see his men hurled like flies off the walls. Among the seething confusion, he next to the King was noticeable, spurring his horse to and fro.

Then there arose a great shout from the rear. A party of horsemen, bearing the lilies of Anjou as their device had rushed up one of the narrow streets and were attacking the Hungarians.

At that the castle was abandoned, and Ludovic flung himself on the new enemy. They were too near to use the arrows, so it became a hand-to-hand fight between the knights and lancers.

The leader of the Italians, calling on “Santa Maria,” came at Ludovic and his band of knights, spears shivered against the uplifted shields, crests were lopped off, mantles and surcoats rent; more than one man fell swooning from his horse, vanquished by the weight of his armor and the heat beating on his helm.

Many, too, were unhorsed in attempting to wheel round their cumbersome chargers to meet the unlooked-for attack, and Hungarians trampled their fellows down as they fell on the enemy.

From the ramparts the garrison of the castle watched, standing by the fires, where water and stones were heated in readiness for the next attack. For an hour the lilies strove with the eagles, and neither side gave way, though the dead became numerous and the living faint.

It was now full noon and the heat intolerable. Ludovic struggled in a great press of knights, and the leader of the Italians strove to get at him through the enclosing spears.

Henryk of Belgrade dropped from his horse with a spear thrust between the rivets of his armor. A companion of the King, unlacing his helmet for air, had his head swept off at the bare throat, and his blood scattered over Ludovic’s white horse.

The King ground his teeth and swung up his sword. “At the King!” shouted the Italian to his men, and he pointed with his gold gauntlet to Ludovic, conspicuous by the crown studded with gems on his helmet and the peacock feathers rising high above it. The Hungarians again rallied, again fell back, yet stubbornly, and Ludovic’s clear voice, strained by a very fury of fighting, urged them on.

Then there was a quick sound of grinding chains, the new thunder of hoofs, a fresh battle cry.

“St. Luigi for Anjou!”

And Luigi of Taranto, at the head of his men, made a sally over the lowered drawbridge into the heart of the mêlée.

Wild cries of joy rose from the Italians; the Hungarians, hemmed in on each side, turned at bay, intrepid, without a sound.

Like the huge waves, foaming with the glitter of metal, they met, retreated with the sheer shock of the encounter, met again and grappled.

At last Ludovic found himself face to face with the knight who had brought up the Italians. He did not know who he was. His inlaid armor was dented, his crest gone, his surcoat torn to rags. Through the slit of his helmet his eyes flashed wrath, and Ludovic struck at him, hating him exceedingly. The weapon caught the shield and sparks flew; the King’s horse backed; the other swung his battle-ax; Ludovic caught it on his vambrace and winced with pain. His opponent shouted, came at him with the sword and cut the silken eagles from his breast. The King, transported with rage, brought down his weapon on the other’s helm.

The knight swayed for a moment, then gave a great groan. Ludovic, rising in his stirrups, felled him with his battle-ax.

“Who are you?” he shouted, and leaning forward, he caught the falling man by the throat and forced up his visor.

The smooth features, stained and pallid now, of Carlo di Durazzo were revealed.

“You!” cried Ludovic. “You bought your last follies dear!”

And with that he gave him the “coup de grace” with his studded mace and sent him with a split head backward into the moat, where the gold armor glittered for a moment in the dark water before the waves, thick with blood, closed over what had been Carlo di Durazzo, Duke di Duras, prince of the blood of Anjou, cousin to the Queen, light cavalier, shallow idler, and for a week husband of Maria d’Anjou, and a courageous knight, showing something of the Charles Martel blood in him, after all his softness.

Ludovic, swinging the wet mace, galloped among his men.

“The Duke di Duras is dead!” he shouted. “Up, Hungary. Serve his cousin of Taranto so!”

A groan rose from the Italians. One had seen the Duke slain and rushed to Luigi of Taranto with the news, and even that Prince could not repress a sound of wrath and sorrow. More than a young knight had fallen. The man who held Maria’s lands, his greatest folly, had died heirless, leaving confusion.

The personal followers of Carlo now fell back disheartened, nor could the Prince of Taranto urge them on. The Hungarians, seeing their advantage, pressed it. The Italians began to yield. Luigi, fearful for the castle, tried to make for the drawbridge, which he had commanded to be left down in case of retreat; but the enemy intercepted him with shouts of “Seize the bridge!”

A wild struggle ensued on the edge of the moat. The few men left in the castle and the women rushed onto the ramparts and hurled down stones and steaming water, but their missiles fell on friends as well as enemies, and Luigi of Taranto, his arm half broken by a paving stone flung by one of his own masons, shouted to them to desist. Above the sounds of battle his voice was not heard, and arrows, fire, and boiling water continued to fall on the struggling mass below.

The Prince of Taranto, holding back his curses to save his breath, but white with passion to think that he had ever left the castle, gripping his reins in his maimed right arm and wielding his sword with his left, strove, as valiantly as a man may, to hold the bridge against the rush of the Hungarians.

But Ludovic, exalted by the death of Carlo and the breaking of his ranks which followed, cheered on his men to gigantic exertions. Horse and foot went down before the Hungarian cavalry. The bowmen slipped in the blood of the knights; many were flung backward into the moat. One company of lances broke and fled.

Luigi of Taranto shouted to those within the castle to raise the drawbridge, but they did not understand, and it never occurred to them to cut off the sole retreat of the Italians. But Luigi was thinking of the Queen and the treasure. If he could save them he would gladly lose any man he possessed. Now the spirit of fury, of revenge, rose higher in the ranks of Hungary. Konrad of Gottif had whispered “Andreas!” and the name shuddered from knight to knight.

Imprecations on the witch, the devil, who had slain their prince, mingled with their war cries: “Andreas! Andreas!”

And Luigi of Taranto was beaten back. Konrad of Gottif struck his horse down. On foot among the slain, he tried to rally his men, shouting out that the Queen was within unprotected. But her name had no power to stir them. One even fled, saying:

“I fight no more for the devil!”

With thunderous yells of triumph, the Hungarians swept up to the drawbridge. The King, spurring the white horse over the dead, was galloping through when the Prince of Taranto, still surrounded by a circle of faithful swords, leaped forward and seized the blood-stained bridle.

“Not while I live!” he said.

Ludovic looked down at him.

“Ah, cousin,” he said, his visor was up and his hazel eyes danced merrily, “you play the losing game!”

But Luigi of Taranto, with all his great strength, was holding back the horse. He began to speak when Konrad of Gottif struck at him with his battle-ax. A shriek arose from both Italian and Hungarian as the Prince of Taranto fell back fainting among his little knot of men, and the white charger plunged across the drawbridge, while a great wail rose from the women on the ramparts when they saw the peacock plumes glitter under the archway of the courtyard.

The mere handful who opposed them were struck down at once in their furious onslaught. In the courtyard the knights flung themselves from their horses and came running into the palace, sword in hand. The desperate last bowshots wounded a few, but could not stop them. The pages and grooms in the outer chambers were quickly overcome. Headlong, with Ludovic before them, they rushed into the banqueting hall.