bit
of toffee to suck the day I'm hanged."
     "Oh, do let me find a cardboard box for it, at least, before you put it
in your pocket! You will be so sticky! Shall I put the chocolates in, too?"
     "No, I want to eat them now, with you."
     "But I don't like chocolate, and I want you to come and sit down like a
reasonable  human  being. We very likely  shan't have another chance to talk
quietly before one or other of us is killed, and------"
     "She d-d-doesn't like chocolate!" he murmured under his breath. "Then I
must be greedy all by  myself. This is a case of the hangman's supper, isn't
it? You are going to humour all my whims to-night. First of all, I  want you
to sit on this  easy-chair, and, as  you said I might lie down, I  shall lie
here and be comfortable."
     He threw himself down on  the rug at her feet, leaning his elbow on the
chair and looking up into her face.
     "How pale you are!" he said. "That's  because you take life sadly,  and
don't like chocolate----"
     "Do be serious for just five minutes! After all, it is a matter of life
and death."
     "Not even for two minutes, dear; neither life nor death is worth it."
     He had taken hold of both her hands and was stroking them with the tips
of his fingers.
     "Don't look so grave, Minerva! You'll make me cry in a minute, and then
you'll be sorry. I do wish you'd smile again; you have such a d-delightfully
unexpected  smile. There  now, don't scold me, dear! Let us eat our biscuits
together,  like  two  good  children, without  quarrelling  over them  --for
to-morrow we die."
     He  took  a  sweet  biscuit from the  plate and  carefully  halved  it,
breaking the sugar ornament down the middle with scrupulous exactness.
     "This is a kind of sacrament, like what the goody-goody people have  in
church.  'Take, eat;  this is my body.'  And we must d-drink the wine out of
the   s-s-same  glass,  you   know--yes,  that   is   right.   'Do  this  in
remembrance----'"
     She put down the glass.
     "Don't!" she said, with almost a sob.  He looked up, and took her hands
again.
     "Hush, then! Let us be quiet for a little bit. When one of us dies, the
other will  remember this.  We will  forget this loud, insistent  world that
howls about  our ears; we  will go away together, hand in hand;  we will  go
away into the secret  halls of death, and lie among the poppy-flowers. Hush!
We will be quite still."
     He laid  his  head  down against her  knee and covered his face. In the
silence she bent over him, her  hand on the black head.  So the time slipped
on and on; and they neither moved nor spoke.
     "Dear, it is almost twelve," she said at last. He raised his head.
     "We  have  only a  few  minutes  more; Martini will be  back presently.
Perhaps we shall never see each other again. Have you nothing to say to me?"
     He slowly rose and walked away to the other side of the room. There was
a moment's silence.
     "I have  one thing  to say," he began in  a  hardly audible voice; "one
thing--to tell you----"
     He stopped and sat down by the window, hiding his face in both hands.
     "You have been a long time deciding to be merciful," she said softly.
     "I have not seen  much mercy in  my life; and I thought--at  first--you
wouldn't care----"
     "You don't think that now."
     She  waited  a moment for him to speak and  then  crossed  the room and
stood beside him.
     "Tell  me the truth at last," she whispered. "Think, if  you are killed
and I  not--I should have to go through all my life and never know--never be
quite sure----"
     He took her hands and clasped them tightly.
     "If I am  killed----  You  see, when I went  to  South America----  Ah,
Martini!" He broke away with a  violent start and threw open the door of the
room. Martini was rubbing his boots on the mat.
     "Punctual  to  the  m-m-minute,  as  usual!  You're   an   an-n-nimated
chronometer, Martini. Is that the r-r-riding-cloak?"
     "Yes; and  two or three other things. I  have  kept  them  as dry  as I
could, but it's pouring with  rain. You will have a most uncomfortable ride,
I'm afraid."
     "Oh, that's no matter. Is the street clear?"
     "Yes; all  the  spies  seem to have  gone to bed.  I  don't much wonder
either, on such a villainous night. Is that coffee, Gemma? He ought to  have
something hot before he goes out into the wet, or he will catch cold."
     "It is black coffee, and very strong. I will boil some milk."
     She went into the  kitchen, passionately clenching her teeth and  hands
to keep from breaking down. When she  returned with the milk the Gadfly  had
put on the riding-cloak and was fastening the leather gaiters which  Martini
had  brought.  He  drank  a  cup  of  coffee,  standing,  and  took  up  the
broad-brimmed riding hat.
     "I think it's time to start, Martini; we must make a round before we go
to the barrier,  in case of anything.  Good-bye, for the present, signora; I
shall meet you  at Forli on  Friday, then, unless anything special turns up.
Wait a minute; th-this is the address."
     He tore a leaf out of his pocket-book and wrote a few words in pencil.
     "I have it already," she said in a dull, quiet voice.
     "H-have you? Well, there  it is, anyway. Come, Martini. Sh-sh-sh! Don't
let the door creak!"
     They  crept softly downstairs. When the street door clicked behind them
she went back  into the room and mechanically  unfolded the paper he had put
into her hand. Underneath the address was written:
     "I will tell you everything there."

        PART III: CHAPTER II.
     IT was market-day in Brisighella, and the country folk had come in from
the villages  and hamlets of the district with their pigs and poultry, their
dairy produce and droves of half-wild  mountain cattle. The market-place was
thronged with a perpetually shifting crowd, laughing, joking, bargaining for
dried  figs,  cheap  cakes, and  sunflower  seeds.  The  brown,  bare-footed
children  sprawled, face  downward, on  the  pavement in the hot sun,  while
their mothers sat under the trees with their baskets of butter and eggs.
     Monsignor Montanelli, coming out to wish the people "Good-morning," was
at once surrounded by  a clamourous  throng of  children, holding up for his
acceptance  great bunches of  irises and scarlet  poppies  and  sweet  white
narcissus  from the  mountain slopes.  His  passion  for  wild  flowers  was
affectionately tolerated  by  the people, as one of the little follies which
sit  gracefully  on very wise  men.  If anyone less  universally beloved had
filled his  house with weeds and grasses they would have laughed at him; but
the "blessed Cardinal" could afford a few harmless eccentricities.
     "Well, Mariuccia," he  said, stopping to pat one of the children on the
head;  "you have grown  since I saw you  last.  And how is the grandmother's
rheumatism?"
     "She's been better lately, Your Eminence; but mother's bad now."
     "I'm sorry to hear that; tell the mother to come down here some day and
see  whether Dr. Giordani can do anything for her. I will find  somewhere to
put her up; perhaps  the change  will do her  good.  You are looking better,
Luigi; how are your eyes?"
     He passed on, chatting with the mountaineers. He always remembered  the
names  and ages  of the children, their troubles and those of their parents;
and would stop to inquire, with sympathetic  interest, for the health of the
cow that fell sick at Christmas, or of the rag-doll that was crushed under a
cart-wheel last market-day.
     When he returned to the  palace  the marketing began.  A  lame man in a
blue shirt, with a shock of black hair hanging into his eyes and a deep scar
across the  left cheek, lounged up to  one of  the booths  and, in  very bad
Italian, asked for a drink of lemonade.
     "You're  not  from these  parts,"  said the  woman  who poured it  out,
glancing up at him.
     "No. I come from Corsica."
     "Looking for work?"
     "Yes; it will be hay-cutting time soon, and a gentleman that has a farm
near Ravenna came across to Bastia the other day and  told me there's plenty
of work to be got there."
     "I hope you'll find it so, I'm sure, but times are bad hereabouts."
     "They're worse in Corsica,  mother. I don't know what  we poor folk are
coming to."
     "Have you come over alone?"
     "No, my mate is with me; there he is, in the red shirt. Hola, Paolo!"
     Michele hearing himself called, came lounging up with  his hands in his
pockets. He made a fairly good Corsican, in spite  of  the  red wig which he
had  put on to  render himself  unrecognizable. As for the Gadfly, he looked
his part to perfection.
     They  sauntered through  the market-place together,  Michele  whistling
between  his  teeth,  and the  Gadfly trudging along with  a bundle over his
shoulder,  shuffling his  feet  on the  ground to render  his  lameness less
observable. They were waiting for  an emissary, to whom important directions
had to be given.
     "There's  Marcone, on  horseback,  at that  corner," Michele  whispered
suddenly.  The  Gadfly,  still carrying his  bundle,  shuffled  towards  the
horseman.
     "Do you happen to be wanting a hay-maker, sir?" he  said, touching  his
ragged cap and running one finger along the bridle. It was the signal agreed
upon,  and  the rider,  who from  his  appearance  might have been a country
squire's bailiff, dismounted and threw the reins on the horse's neck.
     "What sort of work can you do, my man?"
     The Gadfly fumbled with his cap.
     "I  can cut  grass, sir,  and  trim hedges"--he began;  and without any
break in his voice, went straight on: "At one in the morning at the mouth of
the round cave. You must have two good horses and a cart. I shall be waiting
inside the cave---- And then I can dig, sir, and----"
     "That  will do, I only want  a grass-cutter.  Have  you  ever  been out
before?"
     "Once,  sir.  Mind,  you  must come well-armed;  we may  meet  a flying
squadron.  Don't go by the wood-path; you're safer on the other side. If you
meet a spy, don't stop to argue with him;  fire at once---- I should be very
glad of work, sir."
     "Yes, I dare say, but I want an experienced grass-cutter. No, I haven't
got any coppers to-day."
     A  very  ragged beggar  had  slouched  up  to  them,  with  a  doleful,
monotonous whine.
     "Have pity on a poor blind man, in the name of the Blessed Virgin------
Get out  of this  place  at once; there's a flying squadron coming along----
Most  Holy Queen  of  Heaven,  Maiden  undefiled--  It's you they're  after,
Rivarez; they'll be here in two  minutes---- And so may  the  saints  reward
you----  You'll  have  to make a dash  for it; there are  spies  at all  the
corners. It's no use trying to slip away without being seen."
     Marcone slipped the reins into the Gadfly's hand.
     "Make haste! Ride out to the bridge and let the horse go;  you can hide
in the ravine. We're all armed; we can keep them back for ten minutes."
     "No. I won't  have you fellows taken. Stand together,  all of you,  and
fire after me in order. Move up towards our horses; there they are, tethered
by the  palace steps; and have  your knives  ready. We retreat fighting, and
when I throw my cap down, cut the halters and jump every man  on the nearest
horse. We may all reach the wood that way."
     They  had  spoken  in so  quiet  an  undertone  that even  the  nearest
bystanders had not  supposed their  conversation to  refer to  anything more
dangerous than grass-cutting. Marcone,  leading  his own mare by the bridle,
walked towards  the tethered horses, the Gadfly slouching along  beside him,
and the  beggar following them with an  outstretched  hand  and a persistent
whine. Michele came up whistling; the beggar  had warned him in passing, and
he quietly handed on the news to three countrymen who were eating raw onions
under a  tree. They immediately  rose and followed him;  and before anyone's
notice had been attracted to them, the whole seven were standing together by
the steps of the palace, each  man  with one hand on  the hidden pistol, and
the tethered horses within easy reach.
     "Don't  betray  yourselves till  I move," the  Gadfly  said softly  and
clearly. "They may not recognize us. When I fire, then begin in order. Don't
fire at  the men; lame their horses--then they can't follow us. Three of you
fire, while  the other  three  reload. If anyone  comes  between you and our
horses, kill him. I take the roan.  When I throw down my cap,  each man  for
himself; don't stop for anything."
     "Here they  come," said Michele;  and  the Gadfly turned round, with an
air of naive and  stupid wonder, as the  people suddenly broke off  in their
bargaining.
     Fifteen  armed  men  rode slowly into the marketplace. They  had  great
difficulty to get  past the throng of people at all, and,  but for the spies
at the corners of the square, all the  seven conspirators could have slipped
quietly away while the  attention  of the crowd was fixed upon the soldiers.
Michele moved a little closer to the Gadfly.
     "Couldn't we get away now?"
     "No; we're surrounded with spies, and one of them has recognized me. He
has just sent a man to tell the captain where  I am.  Our only  chance is to
lame their horses."
     "Which is the spy?"
     "The  first man I fire at. Are you all  ready? They have made a lane to
us; they are going to come with a rush."
     "Out  of  the way  there!" shouted  the captain. "In  the  name  of His
Holiness!"
     The crowd had drawn back, startled and wondering; and the soldiers made
a  quick  dash towards  the little group  standing  by the palace steps. The
Gadfly drew a pistol from his blouse and fired, not at the advancing troops,
but  at  the spy, who was  approaching the  horses, and who fell back with a
broken collar-bone. Immediately after the report, six  more shots were fired
in  quick succession,  as  the  conspirators  moved  steadily  closer to the
tethered horses.
     One  of the cavalry  horses stumbled  and plunged; another fell  to the
ground with a fearful cry. Then, through the shrieking of the panic-stricken
people, came  the loud,  imperious voice of  the officer in command, who had
risen in the stirrups and was holding a sword above his head.
     "This way, men!"
     He swayed  in the saddle and sank back; the Gadfly had fired again with
his deadly aim. A little  stream of blood was  trickling down  the captain's
uniform; but he steadied himself with a  violent effort,  and, clutching  at
his horse's mane, cried out fiercely:
     "Kill that lame devil if you can't take him alive! It's Rivarez!"
     "Another pistol, quick!" the Gadfly called to his men; "and go!"
     He flung down his cap. It was only just in time, for the swords of  the
now infuriated soldiers were flashing close in front of him.
     "Put down your weapons, all of you!"
     Cardinal  Montanelli had stepped suddenly  between the combatants;  and
one of the soldiers cried out in a voice sharp with terror:
     "Your Eminence! My God, you'll be murdered!"
     Montanelli only moved a step nearer, and faced the Gadfly's pistol.
     Five  of the conspirators were already on horseback and dashing  up the
hilly  street. Marcone sprang on to the back of his mare. In the  moment  of
riding away, he glanced back to see whether his leader was  in need of help.
The roan was close at hand, and in another instant all would have been safe;
but as the  figure  in  the  scarlet cassock  stepped  forward,  the  Gadfly
suddenly wavered and the hand with the pistol sank down. The instant decided
everything. Immediately he was surrounded and flung violently to the ground,
and  the weapon  was dashed  out of his hand by  a blow  from the  flat of a
soldier's sword. Marcone struck his mare's flank with the stirrup; the hoofs
of the cavalry horses were thundering  up the hill behind him;  and it would
have been worse than useless to stay and be taken too. Turning in the saddle
as he  galloped  away, to  fire  a  last shot  in the teeth  of  the nearest
pursuer, he saw the  Gadfly, with blood on his face, trampled under the feet
of horses and  soldiers  and spies;  and heard  the  savage  curses  of  the
captors, the yells of triumph and rage.
     Montanelli did not notice what had happened; he had moved away from the
steps, and was trying to calm the terrified people. Presently, as he stooped
over the wounded spy, a startled movement of the crowd made him look up. The
soldiers were crossing the square, dragging their prisoner after them by the
rope  with  which his  hands were  tied.  His  face was  livid with pain and
exhaustion, and  he panted fearfully  for breath; but he looked round at the
Cardinal, smiling with white lips, and whispered:
     "I c-cong-gratulate your Eminence."
     . . . . .
     Five days later Martini  reached Forli. He had received from  Gemma  by
post a bundle of  printed circulars, the signal agreed  upon in  case of his
being needed  in any special emergency; and, remembering the conversation on
the terrace,  he guessed the truth at once. All through the  journey he kept
repeating to himself that there was no reason for supposing anything to have
happened to the Gadfly, and  that  it was absurd to attach any importance to
the childish superstitions of so nervous and fanciful a person; but the more
he reasoned with himself  against  the  idea,  the more firmly  did  it take
possession of his mind.
     "I  have guessed what it is:  Rivarez is taken, of course?" he said, as
he came into Gemma's room.
     "He was  arrested last  Thursday, at Brisighella.  He  defended himself
desperately and wounded the captain of the squadron and a spy."
     "Armed resistance; that's bad!"
     "It makes no  difference; he  was too deeply compromised already for  a
pistol-shot more or less to affect his position much."
     "What do you think they are going to do with him?"
     She grew a shade paler even than before.
     "I think," she said; "that we must not wait to find out what they  mean
to do."
     "You think we shall be able to effect a rescue?"
     "We MUST."
     He  turned away and began to whistle,  with his  hands behind his back.
Gemma let  him think  undisturbed. She  was  sitting still, leaning her head
against the back of the  chair, and  looking out into vague  distance with a
fixed and  tragic absorption. When her  face wore that  expression, it had a
look of Durer's "Melancolia."
     "Have you seen him?" Martini asked, stopping for a moment in his tramp.
     "No; he was to have met me here the next morning."
     "Yes, I remember. Where is he?"
     "In the fortress; very strictly guarded, and, they say, in chains."
     He made a gesture of indifference.
     "Oh, that's  no  matter;  a  good file will  get  rid  of any number of
chains. If only he isn't wounded----"
     "He seems  to have been  slightly hurt, but  exactly how much we  don't
know. I think you had better hear the account of it from Michele himself; he
was present at the arrest."
     "How does he come not to have been taken too? Did he run away and leave
Rivarez in the lurch?"
     "It's not his fault; he fought as long as anybody did, and followed the
directions given him to the letter.  For that matter, so did they  all.  The
only  person who seems to  have forgotten, or  somehow made a mistake at the
last  minute,  is Rivarez himself. There's  something inexplicable about  it
altogether. Wait a moment; I will call Michele."
     She  went out  of the room, and presently came back with Michele  and a
broad-shouldered mountaineer.
     "This is  Marco," she said. "You have  heard of  him; he is one of  the
smugglers. He  has just got here, and perhaps will be  able to tell us more.
Michele, this is  Cesare Martini,  that I spoke to you  about. Will you tell
him what happened, as far as you saw it?"
     Michele gave a short account of the skirmish with the squadron.
     "I  can't  understand how  it  happened," he concluded. "Not one of  us
would have left him if we had thought  he would be taken; but his directions
were quite precise, and it never occurred to us, when he threw down his cap,
that he would wait to let them surround him. He was close beside the roan--I
saw  him cut  the tether--and I handed him  a loaded pistol myself  before I
mounted. The  only thing I can suppose is that he missed his footing,--being
lame,--in trying to mount. But even then, he could have fired."
     "No, it wasn't that," Marcone interposed. "He didn't  attempt to mount.
I  was the last one to go, because my mare shied at the firing; and I looked
round to see whether he  was  safe. He would have got off clear if it hadn't
been for the  Cardinal." "Ah!" Gemma  exclaimed softly; and Martini repeated
in amazement: "The Cardinal?"
     "Yes; he threw himself in front of the pistol-- confound him! I suppose
Rivarez must have been startled, for he dropped his pistol-hand  and put the
other one  up  like  this"--laying the  back of his left  wrist  across  his
eyes--"and of course they all rushed on him."
     "I can't make that out,"  said Michele. "It's not like  Rivarez to lose
his head at a crisis."
     "Probably he lowered  his pistol  for fear  of killing an unarmed man,"
Martini put in. Michele shrugged his shoulders.
     "Unarmed men shouldn't poke their noses into the middle of a fight. War
is war.  If  Rivarez had put a bullet into His Eminence, instead  of letting
himself be caught like a tame rabbit, there'd be one honest man the more and
one priest the less."
     He turned  away, biting  his  moustache.  His  anger was  very near  to
breaking down in tears.
     "Anyway," said Martini, "the  thing's done, and there's no use  wasting
time in discussing how it happened. The question now is how we're to arrange
an escape for him. I suppose you're all willing to risk it?"
     Michele did not even condescend to answer the superfluous question, and
the smuggler only remarked with a little  laugh: "I'd shoot my own  brother,
if he weren't willing."
     "Very well, then---- First thing; have you got a plan of the fortress?"
     Gemma unlocked a drawer and took out several sheets of paper.
     "I have  made  out  all  the  plans. Here is  the ground floor  of  the
fortress; here are the upper and lower stories  of the towers,  and here the
plan  of the  ramparts. These are  the roads leading to the valley, and here
are  the paths  and  hiding-places  in  the mountains,  and  the underground
passages."
     "Do you know which of the towers he is in?"
     "The east one, in the round room with the grated window. I  have marked
it on the plan."
     "How did you get your information?"
     "From a  man  nicknamed  'The Cricket,' a soldier of the guard.  He  is
cousin to one of our men--Gino."
     "You have been quick about it."
     "There's no time  to lose. Gino went into Brisighella at once; and some
of the  plans we already had. That list of hiding-places was made by Rivarez
himself; you can see by the handwriting."
     "What sort of men are the soldiers of the guard?"
     "That we have not  been able to find out yet; the Cricket has only just
come to the place, and knows nothing about the other men."
     "We  must  find out  from  Gino  what  the Cricket  himself is like. Is
anything known of the government's intentions? Is Rivarez likely to be tried
in Brisighella or taken in to Ravenna?"
     "That we don't know.  Ravenna, of  course,  is  the  chief  town of the
Legation  and  by law cases of importance  can be  tried  only there, in the
Tribunal of  First Instance.  But law  doesn't  count for  much in the  Four
Legations; it depends on the personal fancy of anybody who happens to be  in
power."
     "They won't take him in to Ravenna," Michele interposed.
     "What makes you think so?"
     "I   am  sure  of  it.  Colonel  Ferrari,  the  military   Governor  at
Brisighella, is uncle to the officer that Rivarez wounded; he's a vindictive
sort of brute and won't give up a chance to spite an enemy."
     "You think he will try to keep Rivarez here?"
     "I think he will try to get him hanged."
     Martini glanced  quickly at Gemma. She  was very pale, but her face had
not changed at the words. Evidently the idea was no new one to her.
     "He  can hardly do that without some formality," she said quietly; "but
he  might  possibly get up  a  court-martial  on some pretext  or other, and
justify himself afterwards by  saying that the  peace of the  town  required
it."
     "But what about the Cardinal? Would he consent to things of that kind?"
     "He has no jurisdiction in military affairs."
     "No, but  he has great influence. Surely the Governor would not venture
on such a step without his consent?"
     "He'll never  get  that," Marcone interrupted.  "Montanelli  was always
against  the  military commissions, and everything  of the kind. So  long as
they keep him in Brisighella nothing serious  can happen; the Cardinal  will
always  take the part  of any  prisoner. What I am afraid of is their taking
him to Ravenna. Once there, he's lost."
     "We  shouldn't let him get there,"  said  Michele.  "We  could manage a
rescue  on the road; but to  get  him out of the fortress  here  is  another
matter."
     "I think," said Gemma; "that it would be quite useless to wait for  the
chance  of his being  transferred  to Ravenna. We must  make  the attempt at
Brisighella, and we  have no time  to lose. Cesare, you and I  had better go
over  the  plan of the  fortress together, and see whether  we can think out
anything. I have an idea in my head, but I can't get over one point."
     "Come, Marcone," said Michele, rising; "we will leave them to think out
their  scheme. I have to go across to Fognano this afternoon, and I want you
to come with me. Vincenzo hasn't  sent those cartridges,  and  they ought to
have been here yesterday."
     When the two  men had gone, Martini went up  to Gemma and silently held
out his hand. She let her fingers lie in his for a moment.
     "You were always a  good friend, Cesare," she said at last; "and a very
present help  in  trouble. And  now let  us discuss plans."PART III: CHAPTER
III.
     "AND I once more most earnestly assure Your Eminence that your  refusal
is endangering the peace of the town."
     The  Governor tried to  preserve  the respectful  tone due  to  a  high
dignitary of the Church; but there was audible irritation in  his voice. His
liver was out of order, his wife was running up heavy bills, and his  temper
had been sorely tried  during  the  last three weeks. A sullen,  disaffected
populace,  whose  dangerous  mood  grew  daily  more  apparent;  a  district
honeycombed with plots  and bristling  with hidden  weapons;  an inefficient
garrison, of whose loyalty he was more than doubtful, and a Cardinal whom he
had pathetically described to his adjutant as the "incarnation of immaculate
pig-headedness," had already reduced him to the verge of desperation. Now he
was  saddled  with  the  Gadfly, an  animated quintessence  of the spirit of
mischief.
     Having begun by disabling  both the Governor's favourite nephew and his
most valuable spy, the "crooked Spanish devil" had followed up  his exploits
in  the market-place  by suborning the guards, browbeating the interrogating
officers, and "turning the prison into a bear-garden." He had now been three
weeks in the fortress, and the authorities of Brisighella were heartily sick
of   their  bargain.  They   had  subjected   him   to  interrogation   upon
interrogation;  and after employing,  to  obtain admissions from  him, every
device of  threat,  persuasion,  and stratagem  which their  ingenuity could
suggest, remained  just as wise as on the day of his capture. They had begun
to  realize that it  would perhaps have been better to send him into Ravenna
at  once. It was, however,  too late to  rectify the mistake.  The Governor,
when sending in to the  Legate his report of  the arrest,  had begged, as  a
special  favour, permission  to superintend personally the  investigation of
this case; and, his request having been graciously acceded to, he  could not
now withdraw without a humiliating confession that he was overmatched.
     The idea of settling the difficulty by a courtmartial had, as Gemma and
Michele had  foreseen,  presented  itself  to  him as the only  satisfactory
solution; and Cardinal Montanelli's stubborn refusal to countenance this was
the last drop which made the cup of his vexations overflow.
     "I  think,"  he said,  "that  if  Your  Eminence  knew  what I  and  my
assistants  have put up with from this  man you would feel differently about
the matter. I  fully understand  and respect  the conscientious objection to
irregularities in judicial proceedings; but this is  an exceptional case and
calls for exceptional measures."
     "There is  no case,"  Montanelli answered, "which  calls for injustice;
and to condemn  a civilian by  the judgment of a secret military tribunal is
both unjust and illegal."
     "The case amounts  to this, Your Eminence: The  prisoner is  manifestly
guilty of several capital crimes. He joined the infamous attempt of Savigno,
and the military commission  nominated by  Monsignor Spinola would certainly
have had  him  shot or  sent  to  the galleys then, had  he not succeeded in
escaping to  Tuscany. Since  that time  he has never ceased plotting.  He is
known  to be  an  influential  member  of one  of the most pestilent  secret
societies in the country. He is gravely suspected of having consented to, if
not inspired, the  assassination  of  no less than three confidential police
agents.  He has been caught-- one might almost say--in the act of  smuggling
firearms into the Legation. He has offered armed resistance to authority and
seriously wounded two officials in the discharge  of their  duty,  and he is
now a standing menace to the peace and order of the town. Surely,  in such a
case, a court-martial is justifiable."
     "Whatever the  man has done," Montanelli replied, "he has  the right to
be judged according to law."
     "The ordinary course of law involves delay, Your Eminence, and in  this
case every moment is precious.  Besides everything else,  I  am  in constant
terror of his escaping."
     "If  there is any danger of that, it rests with  you to guard him  more
closely."
     "I do my best, Your Eminence, but I am dependent upon the prison staff,
and the man  seems to have bewitched them all. I have changed the guard four
times within three weeks; I  have  punished the soldiers till I am tired  of
it,  and  nothing is  of  any use. I can't  prevent  their carrying  letters
backwards and forwards.  The  fools are in love with  him  as if he  were  a
woman."
     "That is very curious. There must be something remarkable about him."
     "There's a remarkable amount of  devilry--I beg pardon,  Your Eminence,
but really  this man is enough to try the patience of  a saint. It's  hardly
credible,  but I  have to  conduct  all the interrogations  myself,  for the
regular officer cannot stand it any longer."
     "How is that?"
     "It's difficult to explain. Your Eminence, but you would understand  if
you had once heard  the  way he goes on.  One  might think the interrogating
officer were the criminal and he the judge."
     "But  what is there so terrible that he can do? He can refuse to answer
your questions, of course; but he has no weapon except silence."
     "And a tongue like a razor. We are all mortal, Your Eminence, and  most
of  us have  made mistakes in  our time that we don't want  published on the
house-tops. That's only human nature,  and it's hard  on  a man to  have his
little slips of twenty years ago raked up and thrown in his teeth----"
     "Has  Rivarez brought  up  some  personal  secret  of the interrogating
officer?"
     "Well, really--the  poor fellow  got into  debt when  he was a  cavalry
officer, and borrowed a little sum from the regimental funds----"
     "Stole public money that had been intrusted to him, in fact?"
     "Of  course it  was very  wrong, Your Eminence; but his friends paid it
back at once, and the affair was hushed up,--he comes of a good family,--and
ever since then he has been irreproachable. How Rivarez found out about it I
can't conceive; but the first thing he did at interrogation was  to bring up
this old scandal--before the subaltern, too! And with as innocent  a face as
if he were saying his prayers! Of course  the story's all  over the Legation
by now. If Your Eminence would only be present at one of the interrogations,
I am sure you would realize---- He needn't know anything about it. You might
overhear him from------"
     Montanelli turned round and looked at  the Governor with  an expression
which his face did not often wear.
     "I  am  a  minister  of  religion," he  said; "not  a  police-spy;  and
eavesdropping forms no part of my professional duties."
     "I--I didn't mean to give offence------"
     "I think  we shall not get  any  good  out  of discussing this question
further. If you will send the prisoner here, I will have a talk with him."
     "I venture very respectfully to advise Your Eminence not to attempt it.
The  man is perfectly incorrigible. It  would be  both safer  and  wiser  to
overstep the letter of the law  for  this once, and get rid of him before he
does any more mischief. It is with great diffidence  that I venture to press
the point after what Your Eminence  has said; but after all I am responsible
to Monsignor the Legate for the order of the town------"
     "And I,"  Montanelli  interrupted,  "am  responsible  to  God  and  His
Holiness that there shall  be no underhand dealing  in my diocese. Since you
press me  in  the matter,  colonel, I take  my  stand upon my  privilege  as
Cardinal.  I  will  not  allow  a  secret  court-martial  in  this  town  in
peace-time. I  will receive the prisoner  here, and alone,  at ten to-morrow
morning."
     "As  Your   Eminence   pleases,"  the   Governor  replied   with  sulky
respectfulness; and went away, grumbling to himself: "They're  about a pair,
as far as obstinacy goes."
     He told no one of the  approaching interview till it  was actually time
to knock  off the  prisoner's chains and start  for the palace. It was quite
enough, as he remarked to his wounded nephew, to have this Most  Eminent son
of  Balaam's ass laying  down  the  law,  without running  any risk  of  the
soldiers plotting with Rivarez and his friends  to effect an escape  on  the
way.
     When  the  Gadfly,  strongly guarded, entered the room where Montanelli
was writing  at a table covered with papers, a sudden recollection came over
him, of a hot midsummer  afternoon  when he  had sat turning over manuscript
sermons  in  a study much like  this. The shutters had been  closed, as they
were here,  to keep out the  heat,  and  a fruitseller's  voice outside  had
called: "Fragola! Fragola!"
     He  shook the  hair  angrily back from his eyes and set his  mouth in a
smile.
     Montanelli looked up from his papers.
     "You can wait in the hall," he said to the guards.
     "May it please Your Eminence,"  began the sergeant, in a lowered  voice
and  with evident  nervousness, "the  colonel thinks  that  this prisoner is
dangerous and that it would be better------"
     A sudden flash came into Montanelli's eyes.
     "You  can wait in  the  hall,"  he  repeated quietly; and the sergeant,
saluting  and  stammering excuses with a frightened face, left the room with
his men.
     "Sit down, please,"  said the Cardinal,  when  the door was  shut.  The
Gadfly obeyed in silence.
     "Signor Rivarez," Montanelli began after a pause, "I wish  to ask you a
few  questions,  and shall  be very much obliged  to you if you will  answer
them."
     The Gadfly  smiled. "My ch-ch-chief occupation at  p-p-present is to be
asked questions."
     "And--not to answer them? So  I have heard; but these questions are put
by officials who are investigating your case  and whose  duty is to use your
answers as evidence."
     "And th-those of Your Eminence?" There was a covert insult in the  tone
more than in the words, and the Cardinal understood it at once; but his face
did not lose its grave sweetness of expression.
     "Mine," he said, "whether you  answer them or not,  will remain between
you and me. If they should trench upon your political secrets, of course you
will not answer. Otherwise, though we are complete strangers to  each other,
I hope that you will do so, as a personal favour to me."
     "I am ent-t-tirely at the service of Your Eminence." He said it with  a
little bow, and a face that would have taken the heart to ask favours out of
the daughters of the horse-leech.
     "First,  then, you  are said to have been  smuggling firearms into this
district. What are they wanted for?"
     "T-t-to k-k-kill rats with."
     "That is a terrible answer.  Are all your fellow-men rats in your  eyes
if they cannot think as you do?"
     "S-s-some of them."
     Montanelli leaned back in his chair and looked at him  in silence for a
little while.
     "What is that on your hand?" he asked suddenly.
     The Gadfly glanced at  his left hand. "Old m-m-marks from  the teeth of
some of the rats."
     "Excuse me; I was speaking of the other hand. That is a fresh hurt."
     The slender,  flexible  right hand was badly cut and grazed. The Gadfly
held  it up. The wrist was swollen,  and across it ran a deep and long black
bruise.
     "It is a  m-m-mere trifle, as you  see," he  said. "When I was arrested
the  other day,--thanks to Your Eminence,"--he  made another  little  bow,--
"one of the soldiers stamped on it."
     Montanelli took the wrist and examined it closely. "How does it come to
be in such a state now, after three weeks?" he asked. "It is all inflamed."
     "Possibly the p-p-pressure of the iron has not done it much good."
     The Cardinal looked up with a frown.
     "Have they been putting irons on a fresh wound?"
     "N-n-naturally, Your Eminence; that is what  fresh  wounds are for. Old
wounds are not much use.  They will only ache; you c-c-can't make them  burn
properly."
     Montanelli  looked at him again  in the same close,  scrutinizing  way;
then rose and opened a drawer full of surgical appliances.
     "Give me the hand," he said.
     The Gadfly, with a face as hard as beaten iron, held out the hand,  and
Montanelli,  after bathing the injured place, gently  bandaged it. Evidently
he was accustomed to such work.
     "I will speak about  the irons,"  he said. "And now I  want  to ask you
another question: What do you propose to do?"
     "Th-th-that is very simply answered, Your Eminence. To escape if I can,
and if I can't, to die."
     "Why 'to die'?"
     "Because if the Governor doesn't succeed in getting me shot, I shall be
sent to the galleys, and for me that c-c-comes to the same thing. I have not
got the health to live through it."
     Montanelli rested  his  arm  on  the table  and pondered silently.  The
Gadfly did not disturb him. He was leaning  back with half-shut eyes, lazily
enjoying the delicious physical sensation of relief from the chains.
     "Supposing,"  Montanelli  began  again,  "that you were  to  succeed in
escaping; what should you do with your life?"
     "I have already told Your Eminence; I should k-k-kill rats."
     "You would kill rats. That is to say, that  if I were to let you escape
from  here now,--supposing  I had the power to  do so,--you would  use  your
freedom to foster violence and bloodshed instead of preventing them?"
     The Gadfly raised his eyes to  the crucifix on the wall.  "'Not  peace,
but  a sword';--at l-least I  should be in good  company. For  my  own part,
though, I prefer pistols."
     "Signor Rivarez," said the  Cardinal  with unruffled composure, "I have
not insulted you as yet,  or  spoken slightingly of your beliefs or friends.
May I not expect  the  same courtesy from you, or do you  wish me to suppose
that an atheist cannot be a gentleman?"
     "Ah, I q-quite forgot.  Your Eminence places courtesy  high  among  the
Christian virtues. I remember your sermon in Florence, on the occasion of my
c-controversy with your anonymous defender."
     "That is  one  of the subjects about which I  wished  to speak to  you.
Would  you mind explaining to me  the  reason of the peculiar bitterness you
seem to feel against  me? If  you have  simply picked me out as a convenient
target, that  is  another  matter. Your methods of political controversy are
your own affair, and we are not  discussing politics now.  But I fancied  at
the time that  there was some  personal animosity towards  me;  and if so, I
should be  glad to know whether  I have ever  done  you wrong or in  any way
given you cause for such a feeling."
     Ever done him wrong! The Gadfly put up the bandaged hand to his throat.
"I  must  refer  Your Eminence to Shakspere," he said  with a  little laugh.
"It's as with  the  man who  can't  endure  a harmless,  necessary  cat.  My
antipathy is a priest. The sight of the cassock makes my t-t-teeth ache."
     "Oh, if  it is only that----" Montanelli dismissed the subject  with an
indifferent gesture.
     "Still,"  he  added, "abuse  is  one  thing and  perversion  of fact is
another.  When you stated,  in answer to my sermon, that I knew the identity
of the  anonymous writer, you made a mistake,--I do not accuse you of wilful
falsehood,--and stated what  was untrue. I am  to this day quite ignorant of
his name."
     The Gadfly put his head on one side, like an intelligent robin,  looked
at him for a moment gravely, then suddenly threw himself back and burst into
a peal of laughter.
     "S-s-sancta simplicitas! Oh, you, sweet, innocent, Arcadian people--and
you never guessed! You n-never saw the cloven hoof?"
     Montanelli stood  up.  "Am I to  understand,  Signor  Rivarez, that you
wrote both sides of the controversy yourself?"
     "It was a shame, I know," the Gadfly  answered, looking  up  with wide,
innocent blue eyes. "And you  s-s-swallowed everything whole; just as if  it
had been an oyster. It was very wrong; but oh, it w-w-was so funny!"
     Montanelli  bit his lip and sat down  again.  He had realized  from the
first  that the Gadfly was trying  to make  him lose  his  temper,  and  had
resolved to keep it whatever  happened; but he was beginning to find excuses
for the Governor's exasperation. A man who had been spending two hours a day
for  the last three  weeks in interrogating the  Gadfly might be pardoned an
occasional swear-word.
     "We will drop that subject," he said quietly. "What I wanted to see you
for particularly is this: My position here as Cardinal  gives me some voice,
if  I choose to claim my privilege,  in the question of what  is  to be done
with you. The only use to which I should ever put such a privilege would  be
to  interfere  in  case of  any  violence  to you which was not necessary to
prevent you from doing violence to others. I sent for you, therefore, partly
in order to ask whether you have anything  to complain of,--I will see about
the  irons; but perhaps there is something else,--and  partly because I felt
it right, before giving  my opinion, to see for myself  what sort of man you
are."
     "I have nothing  to complain of, Your Eminence. 'A la guerre comme a la
guerre.' I am  not  a schoolboy, to expect any  government  to pat me on the
head for s-s-smuggling firearms onto its  territory. It's only natural  that
they should hit as hard as they can.  As for what sort of man I am, you have
had a romantic confession of my sins once. Is not that enough;  or w-w-would
you like me to begin again?"
     "I  don't understand you,"  Montanelli said coldly, taking up a  pencil
and twisting it between his fingers.
     "Surely Your Eminence has  not forgotten  old Diego,  the pilgrim?"  He
suddenly  changed his voice and began to  speak as Diego:  "I am a miserable
sinner------"
     The pencil snapped in Montanelli's hand. "That is too much!" he said.
     The Gadfly leaned  his head back with a  soft  little  laugh,  and  sat
watching while the Cardinal paced silently up and down the room.
     "Signor  Rivarez,"  said  Montanelli, stopping at last in front of him,
"you have done a thing  to me  that  a  man  who was  born of a woman should
hesitate to do to his  worst enemy. You have stolen in upon my private grief
and  have made  for  yourself  a  mock and a jest  out  of  the sorrow  of a
fellow-man. I once more beg you to tell  me: Have I ever done you wrong? And
if not, why have you played this heartless trick on me?"
     The Gadfly, leaning back against the chair-cushions, looked up with his
subtle, chilling, inscrutable smile
     "It am-m-mused me, Your Eminence; you took it all so much to heart, and
it rem-m-minded me-- a little bit--of a variety show----"
     Montanelli, white to the very lips, turned away and rang the bell.
     "You can take back the prisoner," he said when the guards came in.
     After  they had  gone he  sat  down at  the table, still trembling with
unaccustomed indignation, and took  up a pile of reports which had been sent
in to him by the parish priests of his diocese.
     Presently he pushed them away, and, leaning on the table, hid  his face
in  both  hands. The Gadfly  seemed  to  have  left  some terrible shadow of
himself,  some ghostly  trail of  his  personality, to haunt the  room;  and
Montanelli sat trembling and cowering, not  daring to look up lest he should
see  the phantom presence that  he  knew  was not there. The spectre  hardly
amounted to a hallucination.  It was a mere fancy of overwrought nerves; but
he was  seized with  an unutterable dread  of its  shadowy  presence--of the
wounded hand, the smiling, cruel mouth, the mysterious eyes, like  deep  sea
water----
     He shook off the fancy and settled  to  his  work. All day long  he had
scarcely a free moment, and the  thing  did not trouble him; but  going into
his  bedroom late at night, he  stopped on the threshold with a sudden shock
of  fear.  What if  he should  see  it  in  a  dream?  He recovered  himself
immediately and knelt down before the crucifix to pray.
     But he lay awake the whole night through.

        PART III: CHAPTER IV.
     MONTANELLI'S  anger  did  not  make him neglectful of  his  promise. He
protested so  emphatically against the manner in  which  the Gadfly had been
chained  that the unfortunate Governor,  who  by now  was at  his wit's end,
knocked  off all the fetters in  the recklessness  of despair. "How  am I to
know," he grumbled to the adjutant, "what  His Eminence will object to next?
If he  calls  a simple  pair  of handcuffs  'cruelty,' he'll  be  exclaiming
against  the window-bars presently, or wanting me to feed Rivarez on oysters
and truffles. In my young days malefactors were malefactors and were treated
accordingly, and nobody thought a  traitor any better than a thief. But it's
the  fashion  to  be seditious nowadays; and His  Eminence seems inclined to
encourage all the scoundrels in the country."
     "I  don't see  what  business  he  has  got to  interfere at  all," the
adjutant  remarked. "He  is not  a Legate and has  no authority in civil and
military affairs. By law------"
     "What  is  the use of talking about  law?  You can't  expect anyone  to
respect  laws  after the Holy Father has opened the  prisons  and turned the
whole  crew of Liberal scamps loose  on us! It's a  positive infatuation! Of
course  Monsignor Montanelli will  give  himself  airs; he was  quiet enough
under His Holiness  the  late  Pope,  but he's  cock of the walk now. He has
jumped into favour all at once and can do as he pleases. How am  I to oppose
him?  He may have  secret authorization from the Vatican, for  all  I  know.
Everything's topsy-turvy now; you can't tell from day to day what may happen
next. In the good old times one knew what to be at, but nowadays------"
     The  Governor shook  his  head  ruefully. A  world  in which  Cardinals
troubled themselves over  trifles of prison discipline and  talked about the
"rights" of political offenders was a world that was growing too complex for
him.
     The Gadfly, for  his part, had returned  to the fortress in  a state of
nervous excitement bordering on hysteria. The  meeting  with Montanelli  had
strained his endurance almost to  breaking-point;  and his  final  brutality
about the variety show  had been uttered in sheer desperation, merely to cut
short  an  interview which,  in another five  minutes, would have  ended  in
tears.
     Called up for  interrogation in the afternoon of  the same day,  he did
nothing but go  into  convulsions  of laughter at every question put to him;
and  when  the Governor, worried  out of  all patience, lost his  temper and
began to swear,  he only laughed more  immoderately than  ever. The  unlucky
Governor fumed  and  stormed  and  threatened his refractory  prisoner  with
impossible punishments; but finally came, as James Burton had come long ago,
to the conclusion that  it was mere waste of breath and temper to argue with
a person in so unreasonable a state of mind.
     The  Gadfly was once  more taken back to his cell; and  there  lay down
upon the pallet, in the  mood of  black and hopeless depression which always
succeeded  to his boisterous fits.  He  lay  till  evening  without  moving,
without  even  thinking; he  had  passed, after the  vehement emotion of the
morning, into  a strange, half-apathetic state, in which his own misery  was
hardly  more to  him  than a dull  and mechanical  weight, pressing  on some
wooden  thing that had forgotten to be a  soul. In truth, it was  of  little
consequence how all ended; the one thing that mattered to any sentient being
was to be spared unbearable pain,  and whether  the relief came from altered
conditions or from the deadening of the power to feel, was a  question of no
moment. Perhaps he  would  succeed in escaping; perhaps they would kill him;
in any  case  he should never see the Padre again, and it was all vanity and
vexation of spirit.
     One of  the warders brought  in  supper, and the Gadfly looked  up with
heavy-eyed indifference.
     "What time is it?"
     "Six o'clock. Your supper, sir."
     He looked with disgust at the stale, foul-smelling, half-cold mess, and
turned his head away.  He was feeling  bodily ill as well as  depressed; and
the sight of the food sickened him.
     "You will be ill if you don't eat," said the soldier hurriedly. "Take a
bit of bread, anyway; it'll do you good."
     The man spoke with a  curious earnestness of  tone,  lifting a piece of
sodden bread from the plate and putting it down  again. All  the conspirator
awoke in the Gadfly;  he had guessed at once that there was something hidden
in the bread.
     "You can leave it; I'll eat  a bit by and by," he said  carelessly. The
door was open, and he knew that  the sergeant on the stairs could hear every
word spoken between them.
     When  the door  was locked on  him again, and he had satisfied  himself
that no one was watching at the spy-hole, he took up  the piece of bread and
carefully crumbled it away. In the middle  was the thing he  had expected, a
bundle of small  files. It  was wrapped  in a  bit of paper, on  which a few
words  were written. He smoothed  the paper out carefully and  carried it to
what little light there was. The writing was crowded into so narrow a space,
and on such thin paper, that it was very difficult to read.
     "The  door is unlocked, and there  is no moon.  Get the filing done  as
fast as possible, and come by  the passage  between  two and three.  We  are
quite ready and may not have another chance."
     He crushed the paper  feverishly in his hand. All the preparations were
ready, then, and he had only to file  the window bars; how lucky it was that
the chains were off! He  need not stop about filing them. How many bars were
there? Two, four; and each must be filed in two  places: eight. Oh, he could
manage that in the course of the night  if he made haste----  How had  Gemma
and  Martini  contrived  to  get  everything  ready  so  quickly--disguises,
passports,  hiding-places? They  must  have  worked  like cart-horses to  do
it---- And it  was her plan that had been adopted  after  all.  He laughed a
little to himself at his own foolishness; as if it mattered whether the plan
was hers  or not, once it  was a good one!  And yet he could not help  being
glad  that  it was  she  who had  struck  on the idea  of his  utilizing the
subterranean passage, instead  of letting  himself down by a rope-ladder, as
the  smugglers  had  at first  suggested.  Hers  was  the  more  complex and
difficult plan, but did not involve, as the other did, a risk to the life of
the sentinel on duty  outside the east wall. Therefore, when the two schemes
had been laid before him, he had unhesitatingly chosen Gemma's.
     The arrangement was that the friendly guard who went by the nickname of
"The  Cricket" should seize  the first opportunity of unlocking, without the
knowledge of his fellows, the iron gate leading from the  courtyard into the
subterranean  passage  underneath  the ramparts, and should then replace the
key  on its nail  in the guard-room. The Gadfly, on receiving information of
this, was to file through the bars of his window, tear his shirt into strips
and plait them  into a rope,  by means of which he could let himself down on
to the  broad east wall of the courtyard. Along this wall he was to creep on
hands  and knees while the sentinel was looking  in the opposite  direction,
lying  flat upon the masonry whenever  the  man turned  towards  him. At the
southeast corner was a half-ruined turret. It was upheld, to some extent, by
a thick growth of ivy; but great masses of crumbling stone had fallen inward
and lay in  the  courtyard, heaped against the wall. From this turret he was
to  climb down by the ivy and the heaps  of stone  into the  courtyard; and,
softly opening the unlocked gate,  to  make his way along the passage  to  a
subterranean  tunnel communicating with it.  Centuries  ago  this tunnel had
formed  a  secret  corridor  between   the  fortress  and  a  tower  on  the
neighbouring hill; now it was quite disused  and  blocked  in many places by
the falling  in of  the rocks.  No one but the smugglers  knew of  a certain
carefully-hidden hole  in the mountain-side which they had bored through  to
the tunnel; no one suspected that stores of forbidden merchandise were often
kept, for weeks  together, under the very ramparts of  the  fortress itself,
while  the customs-officers  were vainly searching the houses of the sullen,
wrathful-eyed mountaineers. At this hole the Gadfly  was to creep out on  to
the hillside, and  make his  way in the dark to a lonely spot where  Martini
and a smuggler would be waiting for him. The one  great difficulty was  that
opportunities  to unlock  the  gate after  the evening patrol  did not occur
every night, and the descent from the window could not be made in very clear
weather without too great a risk of being observed by the sentinel. Now that
there was really a fair chance of success, it must not be missed.
     He sat  down  and began to  eat some of the bread. It at least did  not
disgust him like the rest  of the prison  food, and he must eat something to
keep up his strength.
     He  had better lie down a bit,  too, and  try to get a little sleep; it
would not be safe to begin  filing  before ten  o'clock, and he would have a
hard night's work.
     And so,  after all, the Padre had been thinking of letting  him escape!
That was  like the  Padre. But he, for his part, would  never consent to it.
Anything rather than that! If he escaped, it should  be  his own  doing  and
that of his comrades; he would have no favours from priests.
     How hot  it was! Surely  it  must  be going to thunder; the air was  so
close and oppressive. He moved restlessly on the pallet and put the bandaged
right  hand  behind  his head for a pillow;  then drew it away again. How it
burned and  throbbed! And all the old wounds were  beginning to ache, with a
dull, faint persistence. What was the matter  with them? Oh, absurd! It  was
only the thundery weather. He would go to sleep and get a little rest before
beginning his filing.
     Eight bars, and all so thick and strong! How many  more were there left
to file? Surely not many. He must have been filing for hours,-- interminable
hours--yes, of course, that was what made his arm ache---- And how it ached;
right through to the very bone! But  it could hardly be the filing that made
his side ache so; and the throbbing, burning pain in  the lame leg--was that
from filing?
     He started up. No, he had not been  asleep;  he had  been dreaming with
open eyes--dreaming of filing, and it  was all still to  do. There stood the
window-bars, untouched, strong and firm as ever. And there was  ten striking
from the clock-tower in the distance. He must get to work.
     He  looked through the  spy-hole, and, seeing that no one was watching,
took one of the files from his breast.
     . . . . .
     No,  there  was  nothing  the  matter with him--  nothing!  It  was all
imagination. The pain in his side was indigestion, or a  chill, or some such
thing; not much wonder, after  three weeks of this insufferable prison  food
and air. As for the  aching  and throbbing all  over,  it was partly nervous
trouble and partly  want of exercise. Yes, that was it, no  doubt;  want  of
exercise. How absurd not to have thought of that before!
     He would sit down a  little bit, though, and let  it pass before he got
to work. It would be sure to go over in a minute or two.
     To sit still was worse than all. When he sat still he was at its mercy,
and  his face grew gray with  fear. No, he must  get up and set to work, and
shake it off. It should  depend upon his will to feel or not to feel; and he
would not feel, he would force it back.
     He stood up again and spoke to himself, aloud and distinctly:
     "I am not ill; I have no time to be ill. I have those bars to file, and
I am not going to be ill."
     Then he began to file.
     A quarter-past ten--half-past ten--a quarter to eleven---- He filed and
filed,  and  every  grating scrape  of  the iron was as  though someone were
filing on his body and  brain. "I wonder which will be filed through first,"
he said  to himself with  a little laugh; "I  or  the bars?"  And he set his
teeth and went on filing.
     Half-past  eleven. He was still filing, though the hand  was stiff  and
swollen and would hardly grasp the tool. No,  he  dared not stop to rest; if
he once  put the horrible  thing down he  should  never have  the courage to
begin again.
     The sentinel moved  outside  the door, and  the butt end of his carbine
scratched against the lintel.  The Gadfly stopped and looked round, the file
still in his lifted hand. Was he discovered?
     A little round pellet had been shot through  the spy-hole and was lying
on the floor. He  laid down the file and stooped to pick up the round thing.
It was a bit of rolled paper.
     . . . . .
     It was a  long way to go down and  down, with the  black  waves rushing
about him--how they roared----!
     Ah,  yes! He was only stooping down to pick up  the paper. He was a bit
giddy;  many people are when they stoop. There was nothing the  matter  with
him--nothing.
     He picked it up, carried it to the light, and unfolded it steadily.
     "Come  to-night,  whatever  happens;  the Cricket  will  be transferred
to-morrow to another service. This is our only chance."
     He  destroyed the paper as  he  had done the  former one, picked up his
file again, and went back to work, dogged and mute and desperate.
     One  o'clock. He had  been working for three hours now, and  six of the
eight bars were filed. Two more, and then, to climb------
     He began to recall the former occasions when these terrible attacks had
come on. The last had  been the one  at New Year;  and  he  shuddered  as he
remembered those five nights. But that time it  had not come on so suddenly;
he had never known it so sudden.
     He  dropped the file and flung out  both hands blindly, praying, in his
utter desperation, for the first time since he had been an  atheist; praying
to anything--to nothing--to everything.
     "Not to-night!  Oh,  let  me be ill  to-morrow!  I  will bear  anything
to-morrow--only not to-night!"
     He stood still for a moment, with both hands up to his temples; then he
took up the file once more, and once more went back to his work.
     Half-past one. He  had  begun  on  the last  bar.  His shirt-sleeve was
bitten to rags; there was blood on his lips and a red  mist before his eyes,
and the sweat poured from his forehead as he filed, and filed, and filed----
     . . . . .
     After sunrise Montanelli fell asleep. He was utterly worn out  with the
restless misery of the night and slept for a  little while quietly; then  he
began to dream.
     At first he dreamed vaguely, confusedly; broken fragments of images and
fancies  followed each other, fleeting  and incoherent, but  all filled with
the  same  dim  sense  of struggle and pain,  the same shadow of indefinable
dread. Presently he began  to dream  of  sleeplessness;  the old, frightful,
familiar  dream  that  had  been a  terror to him for years.  And even as he
dreamed he recognized that he had been through it all before.
     He  was wandering  about in a great  empty place,  trying  to find some
quiet spot where he could lie down and  sleep. Everywhere there were people,
walking up  and down;  talking, laughing, shouting; praying,  ringing bells,
and clashing metal  instruments  together. Sometimes  he would get away to a
little distance from the noise, and would lie down, now on the grass, now on
a wooden bench, now on some  slab of stone. He would shut his eyes and cover
them with both hands to keep out the light; and would say to himself: "Now I
will get to sleep." Then the crowds would come sweeping up to him, shouting,
yelling, calling him by name, begging him: "Wake up! Wake up, quick; we want
you!"
     Again: he was in a great palace,  full of gorgeous rooms, with beds and
couches and low soft lounges. It was night,  and he said  to himself: "Here,
at last, I shall find a quiet place to sleep." But when he chose a dark room
and lay down, someone came in with a lamp, flashing the merciless light into
his eyes, and said: "Get up; you are wanted."
     He  rose  and wandered  on, staggering and stumbling  like  a  creature
wounded to  death; and heard  the clocks strike one, and knew that  half the
night was  gone already--the precious night  that was so short.  Two, three,
four,  five--by six o'clock the whole town would wake up and there would  be
no more silence.
     He went  into  another  room and would have lain  down on  a  bed,  but
someone  started up from the pillows, crying out: "This bed is mine!" and he
shrank away with despair in his heart.
     Hour after hour struck, and still he  wandered on and  on, from room to
room, from house to house, from corridor to corridor. The horrible gray dawn
was creeping near and nearer;  the clocks  were striking five; the night was
gone and he had found no rest. Oh, misery! Another day --another day!
     He was in a long, subterranean  corridor, a low,  vaulted  passage that
seemed to have no end. It  was  lighted with glaring lamps and  chandeliers;
and through its grated  roof came the  sounds  of dancing  and  laughter and
merry music.  Up  there, in the world of the live people overhead, there was
some  festival, no doubt. Oh,  for  a place to hide and  sleep;  some little
place, were it even a grave! And as he spoke he stumbled over an open grave.
An  open grave, smelling of death and  rottenness---- Ah, what matter, so he
could but sleep!
     "This grave is mine!" It was Gladys; and she raised her head and stared
at  him over the rotting shroud. Then  he knelt down  and stretched  out his
arms to her.
     "Gladys! Gladys!  Have  a little pity on me;  let me  creep  into  this
narrow space and  sleep. I do not ask you for your  love; I  will not  touch
you, will not speak to you;  only let me  lie down beside you and sleep! Oh,
love, it is so long since I have slept! I cannot bear another day. The light
glares in upon my soul; the noise is  beating my  brain to dust. Gladys, let
me come in here and sleep!"
     And  he  would have drawn her  shroud  across  his eyes. But she shrank
away, screaming:
     "It is sacrilege; you are a priest!"
     On and on he wandered, and came out upon the  sea-shore,  on the barren
rocks where  the  fierce light struck down, and the  water  moaned  its low,
perpetual wail of unrest. "Ah!" he said; "the sea will be more merciful; it,
too, is wearied unto death and cannot sleep."
     Then Arthur rose up from the deep, and cried aloud:
     "This sea is mine!"
     . . . . .
     "Your Eminence! Your Eminence!"
     Montanelli awoke with a start. His servant was knocking at the door. He
rose mechanically  and opened  it,  and the  man saw how wild  and scared he
looked.
     "Your Eminence--are you ill?"
     He drew both hands across his forehead.
     "No; I was asleep, and you startled me."
     "I am very sorry; I thought I had heard you moving early this  morning,
and I supposed------"
     "Is it late now?"
     "It  is  nine o'clock, and the Governor has called. He says he has very
important business, and knowing Your Eminence to be an early riser------"
     "Is he downstairs? I will come presently."
     He dressed and went downstairs.
     "I  am afraid this is an unceremonious way to call upon Your Eminence,"
the Governor began.
     "I hope there is nothing the matter?"
     "There is  very  much  the matter.  Rivarez  has all  but  succeeded in
escaping."
     "Well, so long as he has not quite succeeded there is no harm done. How
was it?"
     "He  was  found in the courtyard, right against  the  little iron gate.
When the patrol  came  in  to inspect the  courtyard  at three  o'clock this
morning one of the men stumbled  over something on the ground; and when they
brought  the light  up they found Rivarez lying across the path unconscious.
They  raised an alarm  at once and called me up; and  when I went to examine
his  cell I found all the window-bars filed through and a rope made of  torn
body-linen hanging from one  of  them.  He had let himself down and  climbed
along the wall. The  iron gate, which leads  into the subterranean  tunnels,
was found to be unlocked. That looks as if the guards had been suborned."
     "But how did he come to be lying across the path? Did he fall from  the
rampart and hurt himself?"
     "That is what I thought at first. Your Eminence; but the prison surgeon
can't find any  trace of a fall.  The soldier who was on duty yesterday says
that Rivarez looked very ill last  night when he brought in the  supper, and
did not eat anything. But  that must be nonsense; a  sick man couldn't  file
those bars through and climb along that roof. It's not in reason."
     "Does he give any account of himself?"
     "He is unconscious, Your Eminence."
     "Still?"
     "He just half comes to himself from time to  time and  moans,  and then
goes off again."
     "That is very strange. What does the doctor think?"
     "He doesn't know what to think. There is no trace of heart-disease that
he can find to account for the  thing; but whatever is the matter  with him,
it is something  that must have come  on suddenly, just when  he  had nearly
managed to  escape. For my  part, I believe he was struck down by the direct
intervention of a merciful Providence."
     Montanelli frowned slightly.
     "What are you going to do with him?" he asked.
     "That is a question  I shall settle in a very few days. In the meantime
I have had a good lesson. That is  what comes of taking  off the irons--with
all due respect to Your Eminence."
     "I hope,"  Montanelli interrupted, "that you will at least  not replace
the fetters while he is ill. A man in the condition you  describe can hardly
make any more attempts to escape."
     "I shall take good  care he  doesn't," the Governor muttered to himself
as he went out. "His Eminence can go hang with his  sentimental scruples for
all I care. Rivarez is chained pretty  tight  now, and is  going to stop so,
ill or not."
     . . . . .
     "But  how can it have happened? To faint  away at the last moment, when
everything  was ready; when he  was at the very gate! It's like some hideous
joke."
     "I tell you," Martini answered, "the only thing I can think  of is that
one  of these attacks must  have  come on,  and that he  must have struggled
against  it  as  long  as his  strength  lasted and  have fainted from sheer
exhaustion when he got down into the courtyard."
     Marcone knocked the ashes savagely from his pipe.
     "Well. anyhow, that's the end of it; we  can't do anything for him now,
poor fellow."
     "Poor fellow!"  Martini  echoed, under his breath. He was beginning  to
realise that to him, too, the  world would look empty and dismal without the
Gadfly.
     "What does she  think?" the smuggler asked, glancing  towards the other
end of the room, where Gemma sat alone, her hands lying idly in her lap, her
eyes looking straight before her into blank nothingness.
     "I have not asked her; she has not spoken since I brought her the news.
We had best not disturb her just yet."
     She did not appear to be conscious of  their  presence, but  they  both
spoke with lowered voices, as  though they were looking at a corpse. After a
dreary little pause, Marcone rose and put away his pipe.
     "I will come  back this evening," he said; but Martini stopped him with
a gesture.
     "Don't  go yet;  I  want to speak to  you." He dropped  his voice still
lower and continued in almost a whisper:
     "Do you believe there is really no hope?"
     "I don't see  what hope there can  be now. We  can't attempt it  again.
Even if he were  well enough to manage his part of the thing, we couldn't do
our share.  The sentinels are all  being changed, on  suspicion. The Cricket
won't get another chance, you may be sure."
     "Don't  you think," Martini  asked suddenly;  "that,  when he recovers,
something might be done by calling off the sentinels?"
     "Calling off the sentinels? What do you mean?"
     "Well, it has occurred  to me that if I  were to  get in the Governor's
way when the  procession passes close by the fortress  on Corpus  Domini day
and  fire in  his face, all the sentinels  would come rushing to get hold of
me, and some of you fellows could perhaps help Rivarez out in the confusion.
It really hardly amounts to a plan; it only came into my head."
     "I doubt whether it  could  be managed," Marcone  answered with  a very
grave face.  "Certainly it would want a lot of  thinking out for anything to
come  of it.  But"--he  stopped  and  looked  at  Martini--"if it  should be
possible-- would you do it?"
     Martini was a  reserved  man  at  ordinary times;  but this was not  an
ordinary time. He looked straight into the smuggler's face.
     "Would I do it?" he repeated. "Look at her!"
     There was no  need for further explanations; in saying that he had said
all. Marcone turned and looked across the room.
     She had not moved since  their  conversation began. There was no doubt,
no fear, even  no grief in her face; there was nothing in it  but the shadow
of death. The smuggler's eyes filled with tears as he looked at her.
     "Make haste,  Michele!"  he said, throwing  open the verandah door  and
looking out. "Aren't you nearly done, you two? There are a hundred and fifty
things to do!"
     Michele, followed by Gino, came in from the verandah.
     "I am ready now," he said. "I only want to ask the signora----"
     He was moving towards her when Martini caught him by the arm.
     "Don't disturb her; she's better alone."
     "Let her  be!" Marcone added.  "We shan't do any good by  meddling. God
knows, it's hard enough on all of us; but it's worse for her, poor soul!"

        PART III: CHAPTER V.
     FOR a week the Gadfly lay  in a fearful state. The attack was a violent
one, and the Governor, rendered brutal by fear and perplexity, had not  only
chained him hand and foot, but had insisted on his being bound to his pallet
with  leather straps,  drawn so tight that  he could not move  without their
cutting into  the flesh.  He  endured  everything  with  his dogged,  bitter
stoicism till  the end  of the sixth day. Then his pride broke  down, and he
piteously entreated the prison doctor  for a dose  of opium. The  doctor was
quite willing to give  it; but the Governor, hearing of the request, sharply
forbade "any such foolery."
     "How do you know  what he wants it for?" he said.  "It's just as likely
as not that he's shamming all the time and  wants to  drug  the sentinel, or
some such devilry. Rivarez is cunning enough for anything."
     "My giving  him  a dose would hardly  help  him to  drug the sentinel,"
replied the doctor, unable  to  suppress a  smile.  "And  as for  shamming--
there's not much fear of that. He is as likely as not to die."
     "Anyway, I won't have it given. If a man wants to be tenderly  treated,
he  should  behave  accordingly.  He has thoroughly  deserved a little sharp
discipline. Perhaps it  will be a  lesson to him not to play tricks with the
window-bars again."
     "The  law does  not  admit of torture, though,"  the doctor ventured to
say; "and this is coming perilously near it."
     "The  law says  nothing  about  opium,  I  think,"  said  the  Governor
snappishly.
     "It is for you to decide, of course,  colonel; but I hope you will  let
the straps be taken off at any rate. They are a  needless aggravation of his
misery. There's no fear of his escaping  now. He  couldn't stand if you  let
him go free."
     "My good sir, a doctor may make a mistake like other people, I suppose.
I have got him safe strapped now, and he's going to stop so."
     "At  least, then, have the straps a  little loosened.  It  is downright
barbarity to keep them drawn so tight."
     "They will stop exactly as they are; and I will  thank you, sir, not to
talk about barbarity to me. If I do a thing, I have a reason for it."
     So  the  seventh night passed  without  any  relief,  and  the  soldier
stationed  on  guard at the  cell door crossed himself, shuddering, over and
over again,  as  he listened  all  night  long to  heart-rending moans.  The
Gadfly's endurance was failing him at last.
     At six  in  the  morning  the  sentinel, just before  going  off  duty,
unlocked  the  door  softly  and  entered  the  cell.  He knew that  he  was
committing  a serious breach  of discipline, but could not bear  to go  away
without offering the consolation of a friendly word.
     He found the Gadfly lying still, with closed eyes  and parted  lips. He
stood silent for a moment; then stooped down and asked:
     "Can I do anything for you, sir? I have only a minute."
     The  Gadfly  opened  his  eyes. "Let  me alone!"  he  moaned.  "Let  me
alone----"
     He was asleep almost before the soldier had slipped back to his post.
     Ten  days afterwards the Governor called again at the palace, but found
that the Cardinal had gone  to visit a sick  man  at Pieve d'Ottavo, and was
not expected home till the  afternoon. That evening, just as he  was sitting
down to dinner, his servant came in to announce:
     "His Eminence would like to speak to you."
     The Governor, with  a hasty glance into the looking glass, to make sure
that his uniform  was in order, put on his most dignified air, and went into
the reception room, where Montanelli was sitting, beating his hand gently on
the arm of  the  chair and looking  out of the  window with an  anxious line
between his brows.
     "I heard that you called to-day," he said, cutting short the Governor's
polite speeches with a slightly imperious manner which  he never  adopted in
speaking to the country folk. "It was probably on the business about which I
have been wishing to speak to you."
     "It was about Rivarez, Your Eminence."
     "So I  supposed.  I  have been thinking the matter over  these last few
days.  But before  we go into that, I should  like to hear whether  you have
anything new to tell me."
     The Governor pulled his moustaches with an embarrassed air.
     "The fact is, I came to know whether Your Eminence had anything to tell
me. If you still have an objection to the course I proposed taking, I should
be  sincerely glad of your advice in the matter; for, honestly, I don't know
what to do."
     "Is there any new difficulty?"
     "Only  that next Thursday  is  the 3d of  June,  --Corpus  Domini,--and
somehow or other the matter must be settled before then."
     "Thursday  is Corpus Domini,  certainly;  but  why must it  be  settled
especially before then?"
     "I am exceedingly sorry, Your Eminence, if I  seem to oppose you, but I
can't undertake to be responsible for the peace  of  the town  if Rivarez is
not got rid  of before then. All the roughest set in the hills collects here
for that day, as Your Eminence knows, and it is more than probable that they
may  attempt  to break  open the fortress gates and take him out. They won't
succeed; I'll take care of that, if I have to sweep them from the gates with
powder  and  shot.  But we are very likely  to have something  of that  kind
before  the  day is over.  Here in  the  Romagna there is bad  blood  in the
people, and when once they get out their knives----"
     "I think  with a little  care we can  prevent  matters going as far  as
knives. I have always found the people of this district easy to get on with,
if they are reasonably treated. Of course, if you  once begin to threaten or
coerce  a  Romagnol  he becomes  unmanageable. But have you  any reason  for
supposing a new rescue scheme is intended?"
     "I heard, both this morning and yesterday, from confidential agents  of
mine,  that a great many rumours are circulating all over  the district  and
that the  people are evidently up  to  some mischief or other. But one can't
find  out the details; if one  could it would be easier to take precautions.
And for my part, after the  fright we  had the other day, I prefer to  be on
the safe side. With such a cunning fox as Rivarez one can't be too careful."
     "The last  I  heard about  Rivarez was that he was too ill  to move  or
speak. Is he recovering, then?"
     "He seems much better now, Your  Eminence. He certainly has  been  very
ill--unless he was shamming all the time."
     "Have you any reason for supposing that likely?"
     "Well, the doctor  seems convinced that  it was all genuine; but it's a
very  mysterious kind  of  illness.  Any way, he  is  recovering,  and  more
intractable than ever."
     "What has he done now?"
     "There's  not much  he can  do,  fortunately,"  the Governor  answered,
smiling as  he  remembered  the  straps.  "But  his  behaviour is  something
indescribable. Yesterday  morning I went into  the  cell to  ask  him a  few
questions; he  is  not well enough yet to come  to me for interrogation--and
indeed, I thought it best not to run any risk of the people seeing him until
he recovers. Such absurd stories always get about at once."
     "So you went there to interrogate him?"
     "Yes, Your Eminence. I hoped he would be more amenable to reason now."
     Montanelli looked  him  over  deliberately,  almost as if he  had  been
inspecting a new and disagreeable animal. Fortunately, however, the Governor
was fingering his sword-belt, and did not see the look. He went on placidly:
     "I have not subjected him to any particular severities, but I have been
obliged to  be  rather strict  with  him--especially as  it  is  a  military
prison--and  I thought  that perhaps  a little  indulgence might have a good
effect. I offered to relax the discipline considerably if he would behave in
a reasonable manner; and how does  Your  Eminence suppose he answered me? He
lay  looking at  me  a minute, like a wolf in a  cage, and  then said  quite
softly: 'Colonel, I can't get up and  strangle you; but  my teeth are pretty
good; you had better take your throat a little further off.' He is as savage
as a wild-cat."
     "I  am not surprised to hear it," Montanelli  answered quietly. "But  I
came to ask you  a question.  Do  you  honestly believe that the presence of
Rivarez in the prison here constitutes a  serious danger to the peace of the
district?"
     "Most certainly I do, Your Eminence."
     "You  think that,  to prevent the risk of bloodshed,  it  is absolutely
necessary that he should somehow be got rid of before Corpus Domini?"
     "I can only repeat that if he is here on Thursday,  I do not expect the
festival to pass over without a fight, and I think it likely to be a serious
one."
     "And you think that if he were not here there would be no such danger?"
     "In that case, there would either be no disturbance at all, or at  most
a little shouting and stone-throwing. If Your Eminence can find some way  of
getting  rid  of  him,  I  will  undertake that  the  peace shall  be  kept.
Otherwise, I expect most serious trouble.  I am convinced  that a new rescue
plot is  on hand, and  Thursday is the  day  when we may expect the attempt.
Now, if  on  that very morning they suddenly  find  that  he is  not  in the
fortress  at  all, their plan fails of itself,  and they have no occasion to
begin fighting.  But if we  have to repulse them, and  the daggers once  get
drawn  among such throngs of people, we are likely to  have the place  burnt
down before nightfall."
     "Then why do you not send him in to Ravenna?"
     "Heaven knows, Your Eminence, I should be thankful to do it! But how am
I to prevent the people rescuing him on the way?  I have not soldiers enough
to resist  an armed attack;  and all  these mountaineers have got knives  or
flint-locks or some such thing."
     "You still persist, then, in wishing for a court-martial, and in asking
my consent to it?"
     "Pardon me, Your Eminence; I ask you only one thing--to help me prevent
riots  and  bloodshed.  I  am  quite  willing  to  admit  that  the military
commissions, such as  that of Colonel Freddi, were  sometimes  unnecessarily
severe, and irritated  instead  of subduing the people; but I think that  in
this  case a court-martial  would be a wise measure  and  in the  long run a
merciful one. It would prevent a riot, which in  itself would  be a terrible
disaster, and which  very  likely  might  cause  a  return  of  the military
commissions His Holiness has abolished."
     The Governor finished his little speech with much solemnity, and waited
for the Cardinal's  answer. It was a long time coming; and when it came  was
startlingly unexpected.
     "Colonel Ferrari, do you believe in God?"
     "Your   Eminence!"   the   colonel   gasped   in   a  voice   full   of
exclamation-stops.
     "Do you  believe in God?"  Montanelli repeated, rising and looking down
at him with steady, searching eyes. The colonel rose too.
     "Your  Eminence, I am a Christian man,  and have never yet been refused
absolution."
     Montanelli lifted the cross from his breast.
     "Then swear on the  cross of  the Redeemer Who died  for you, that  you
have been speaking the truth to me."
     The  colonel stood still and  gazed at it  blankly. He could not  quite
make up his mind which was mad, he or the Cardinal.
     "You have asked me," Montanelli went on, "to give my consent to a man's
death. Kiss the cross, if you dare, and tell me that you believe there is no
other way to prevent greater bloodshed. And remember  that if  you tell me a
lie you are imperilling your immortal soul."
     After a little pause, the Governor  bent down  and put the cross to his
lips.
     "I believe it," he said.
     Montanelli turned slowly away.
     "I  will  give you  a  definite answer to-morrow. But first I must  see
Rivarez and speak to him alone."
     "Your Eminence--if I might suggest--I am  sure you will regret it.  For
that  matter,  he sent  me a message yesterday, by the guard, asking to  see
Your Eminence; but I took no notice of it, because----"
     "Took no notice!"  Montanelli repeated. "A  man  in  such circumstances
sent you a message, and you took no notice of it?"
     "I am sorry if Your Eminence is displeased. I did not wish  to  trouble
you over a mere impertinence like that; I know Rivarez well enough by now to
feel sure that he only wanted to insult you. And,  indeed, if you will allow
me to say so,  it would be most imprudent to go near him alone; he is really
dangerous--so much so, in fact, that I have thought it necessary to use some
physical restraint of a mild kind------"
     "And  you  really think there is much danger to be apprehended from one
sick and  unarmed man, who  is  under physical  restraint  of  a mild kind?"
Montanelli spoke  quite gently, but the colonel felt the  sting of his quiet
contempt, and flushed under it resentfully.
     "Your Eminence  will do as you think  best," he said  in  his  stiffest
manner. "I only  wished to  spare you the pain  of hearing  this man's awful
blasphemies."
     "Which  do you think the more grievous  misfortune for a Christian man;
to  hear a blasphemous  word uttered,  or  to  abandon a  fellow-creature in
extremity?"
     The Governor stood erect and stiff, with his official face, like a face
of wood. He was deeply offended at Montanelli's treatment of him, and showed
it by unusual ceremoniousness.
     "At what time does Your Eminence wish to visit the prisoner?" he asked.
     "I will go to him at once."
     "As Your Eminence pleases.  If you  will kindly  wait a  few moments, I
will send someone to prepare him."
     The Governor had come down from his official pedestal in a great hurry.
He did not want Montanelli to see the straps.
     "Thank you; I  would rather see  him  as he is, without  preparation. I
will  go straight  up to the fortress. Good-evening, colonel; you may expect
my answer to-morrow morning."PART III: CHAPTER VI.
     HEARING the cell-door  unlocked, the Gadfly turned away  his  eyes with
languid indifference. He supposed that it  was only the Governor, coming  to
worry him with another  interrogation. Several  soldiers mounted  the narrow
stair,  their carbines  clanking against the wall; then  a deferential voice
said: "It is rather steep here, Your Eminence."
     He  started convulsively,  and  then shrank  down, catching  his breath
under the stinging pressure of the straps.
     Montanelli came in with the sergeant and three guards.
     "If Your  Eminence  will  kindly wait  a  moment,"  the  sergeant began
nervously, "one of my men will bring a chair.  He has just gone to fetch it.
Your Eminence will excuse us--if we  had been expecting  you, we should have
been prepared."
     "There  is no need for any preparation. Will you kindly leave us alone,
sergeant; and wait at the foot of the stairs with your men?"
     "Yes, Your Eminence. Here is the chair; shall I put it beside him?"
     The Gadfly was lying with closed eyes; but he felt that Montanelli  was
looking at him.
     "I think he is  asleep, Your Eminence," the sergeant was beginning, but
the Gadfly opened his eyes.
     "No," he said.
     As the  soldiers  were  leaving  the cell they were stopped by a sudden
exclamation from Montanelli; and, turning back, saw that he was bending down
to examine the straps.
     "Who has been doing this?" he asked. The sergeant fumbled with his cap.
     "It was by the Governor's express orders, Your Eminence."
     "I had no idea of this, Signer Rivarez," Montanelli said  in a voice of
great distress.
     "I told Your Eminence," the Gadfly answered, with his hard smile, "that
I n-n-never expected to be patted on the head."
     "Sergeant, how long has this been going on?"
     "Since he tried to escape, Your Eminence."
     "That is, nearly a week? Bring a knife and cut these off at once."
     "May it please  Your Eminence, the doctor wanted  to take them off, but
Colonel Ferrari wouldn't allow it."
     "Bring a  knife at once." Montanelli had not raised his  voice, but the
soldiers  could  see  that he  was  white with  anger. The  sergeant  took a
clasp-knife from his pocket, and bent  down to cut the arm-strap. He was not
a skilful-fingered  man; and he jerked  the  strap  tighter  with an awkward
movement, so that  the  Gadfly winced and  bit his  lip in spite of all  his
self-control. Montanelli came forward at once.
     "You don't know how to do it; give me the knife."
     "Ah-h-h!" The Gadfly stretched out his arms with a long, rapturous sigh
as the  strap fell off. The next instant  Montanelli had  cut the other one,
which bound his ankles.
     "Take off the irons, too, sergeant; and then come here. I want to speak
to you."
     He stood by the window, looking on, till the  sergeant  threw  down the
fetters and approached him.
     "Now," he said, "tell me everything that has been happening."
     The sergeant, nothing loath, related  all that  he knew of the Gadfly's
illness, of the "disciplinary measures," and  of  the doctor's  unsuccessful
attempt to interfere.
     "But I think,  Your Eminence," he added, "that  the colonel  wanted the
straps kept on as a means of getting evidence."
     "Evidence?"
     "Yes, Your Eminence; the day before yesterday I heard him offer to have
them taken off if he"--with a glance at the Gadfly--"would answer a question
he had asked."
     Montanelli clenched  his  hand  on the window-sill,  and  the  soldiers
glanced at  one another:  they  had  never  seen  the gentle Cardinal  angry
before.  As  for the  Gadfly,  he had  forgotten  their  existence;  he  had
forgotten  everything except  the  physical  sensation  of  freedom.  He was
cramped in every limb; and now stretched, and turned, and twisted about in a
positive ecstasy of relief.
     "You can go  now,  sergeant," the Cardinal  said. "You  need  not  feel
anxious  about having committed  a breach of discipline; it was your duty to
tell me when I asked you. See that no one disturbs  us. I will come out when
I am ready."
     When  the  door  had closed  behind  the  soldiers,  he  leaned on  the
window-sill and looked for  a while at the  sinking sun,  so as to leave the
Gadfly a little more breathing time.
     "I have heard," he said presently, leaving the window, and sitting down
beside  the pallet, "that  you wish to speak to me  alone. If you  feel well
enough to tell me what you wanted to say, I am at your service."
     He spoke very coldly,  with  a stiff,  imperious  manner that  was  not
natural to him. Until the straps were off, the Gadfly was  to him  simply  a
grievously wronged and tortured human being; but  now he recalled their last
interview, and the deadly insult with which it had closed. The Gadfly looked
up, resting  his head  lazily on one arm. He possessed  the gift of slipping
into graceful  attitudes; and when his face was in  shadow no one would have
guessed through what deep waters he  had been passing. But, as he looked up,
the clear evening light showed  how haggard  and colourless he was,  and how
plainly  the  trace of the last few days was stamped  on  him.  Montanelli's
anger died away.
     "I am  afraid  you have  been  terribly ill," he said.  "I am sincerely
sorry  that I did  not  know  of all  this. I  would have put  a stop  to it
before."
     The Gadfly shrugged his shoulders. "All's fair in war," he said coolly.
"Your  Eminence  objects   to  straps   theoretically,  from  the  Christian
standpoint; but it is hardly fair  to expect the colonel to see that. He, no
doubt,  would  prefer  not to try them on his own skin--which is j-j-just my
case.  But that is a matter of p-p-personal convenience. At this moment I am
undermost--  w-w-what would you have? It is  very  kind  of  Your  Eminence,
though, to call  here; but  perhaps that was  done  from  the  C-c-christian
standpoint, too. Visiting prisoners--ah, yes! I forgot.  'Inasmuch as ye did
it unto one of  the l-least of these'--it's not very complimentary, but  one
of the least is duly grateful."
     "Signor Rivarez," the Cardinal interrupted,  "I  have come here on your
account--not on my own. If  you  had not been 'undermost,' as you call it, I
should never have spoken to  you again after what you said to me  last week;
but you have the double privilege of a prisoner and a sick man,  and I could
not refuse  to come. Have you anything to say to  me, now I am here; or have
you sent for me merely to amuse yourself by insulting an old man?"
     There was  no answer. The Gadfly  had turned. away, and  was lying with
one hand across his eyes.
     "I am--very sorry to trouble you," he said at last, huskily; "but could
I have a little water?"
     There was a jug of water  standing  by  the window, and Montanelli rose
and fetched  it. As  he slipped  his  arm  round the  Gadfly to lift him, he
suddenly felt the damp, cold fingers close over his wrist like a vice.
     "Give  me your hand--quick--just a moment," the Gadfly  whispered. "Oh,
what difference does it make to you? Only one minute!"
     He sank down,  hiding his face  on Montanelli's arm, and quivering from
head to foot.
     "Drink  a little  water,"  Montanelli said after a  moment. The  Gadfly
obeyed silently;  then lay back  on the pallet with closed eyes.  He himself
could  have  given  no  explanation  of  what  had   happened  to  him  when
Montanelli's hand had touched his cheek; he only  knew that in all his  life
there had been nothing more terrible.
     Montanelli drew his chair closer to the pallet and sat down. The Gadfly
was lying quite motionless, like a corpse, and his face was livid and drawn.
After a long silence, he opened his eyes, and fixed their haunting, spectral
gaze on the Cardinal.
     "Thank you," he said. "I--am sorry. I think --you asked me something?"
     "You are not fit to talk. If there is anything you want to say to me, I
will try to come again to-morrow."
     "Please  don't go, Your Eminence--indeed, there is nothing  the  matter
with me. I--I have been a little upset these  few  days; it was  half  of it
malingering, though--the colonel will tell you so if you ask him."
     "I prefer to form my own conclusions," Montanelli answered quietly.
     "S-so does the colonel. And  occasionally, do you know, they are rather
witty.  You w-w-wouldn't think it to look at him; but s-s-sometimes he  gets
hold of an or-r-riginal idea. On Friday night, for instance--I think it  was
Friday, but I got a  l-little  mixed  as  to time towards the end--anyhow, I
asked  for a d-dose of opium--I remember that quite distinctly;  and he came
in here and said I m-might h-h-have it if I would tell him who un-l-l-locked
the  gate. I  remember his saying:  'If it's  real, you'll consent;  if  you
don't, I  shall  look  upon it as a  p-proof  that  you  are  shamming.'  It
n-n-never oc-c-curred to  me  before  how  comic that  is; it's one  of  the
f-f-funniest things----"
     He burst into a sudden fit of harsh, discordant laughter; then, turning
sharply on  the silent Cardinal,  went  on, more  and  more  hurriedly,  and
stammering so that the words were hardly intelligible:
     "You  d-d-don't  see  that  it's   f-f-funny?  Of   c-course  not;  you
r-religious  people   n-n-never  have  any  s-sense  of  humour--you  t-take
everything   t-t-tragically.    F-for   instance,    that   night   in   the
Cath-thedral--how solemn you were! By the way --w-what  a path-thetic figure
I must have c-cut as the pilgrim! I d-don't believe you e-even  see anything
c-c-comic in the b-business you have c-come about this evening."
     Montanelli rose.
     "I came to hear what  you have  to say; but I think  you  are  too much
excited to say it to-night. The doctor  had better give you  a sedative, and
we will talk to-morrow, when you have had a night's sleep."
     "S-sleep? Oh,  I  shall  s-sleep  well enough, Your Eminence,  when you
g-give your  c-consent to  the  colonel's plan--an  ounce  of  l-lead  is  a
s-splendid sedative."
     "I  don't  understand  you,"  Montanelli said,  turning  to him  with a
startled look.
     The Gadfly burst out laughing again.
     "Your  Eminence,  Your  Eminence,  t-t-truth  is  the  c-chief  of  the
Christian virtues!  D-d-do  you th-th-think I d-d-don't  know  how hard  the
Governor has been trying to g-get your  consent to a  court-martial? You had
b-better by  half  g-give  it, Your  Eminence; it's  only  w-what  all  your
b-brother prelates would do in your  place.  'Cosi fan  tutti;' and then you
would  be doing s-such  a lot  of good,  and  so l-little harm! Really, it's
n-not worth all the sleepless nights you have been spending over it!"
     "Please  stop laughing  a minute," Montanelli interrupted, "and tell me
how you heard all this. Who has been talking to you about it?"
     "H-hasn't the colonel e-e-ever told you I  am a  d-d-devil--not a  man?
No? He has t-told me so often enough! Well, I am devil enough to f-find  out
a little bit  what p-people are thinking about. Your  E-eminence is thinking
that I'm a conf-founded nuisance, and you wish s-somebody else had to settle
what's to  be done with me, without disturbing  your s-sensitive conscience.
That's a p-pretty fair guess, isn't it?"
     "Listen to me," the  Cardinal said, sitting down again beside him, with
a very  grave face.  "However  you  found out  all this, it  is  quite true.
Colonel Ferrari fears another rescue attempt on the  part of  your  friends,
and wishes to  forestall it in--the way you  speak of. You see,  I  am quite
frank with you."
     "Your  E-eminence was  always  f-f-famous for truthfulness," the Gadfly
put in bitterly.
     "You know,  of  course," Montanelli went  on, "that legally  I  have no
jurisdiction in temporal matters; I am a bishop, not a legate. But I  have a
good deal of influence in  this district; and the colonel will not, I think,
venture to  take so  extreme a course unless he can get,  at least, my tacit
consent to it. Up till now I have unconditionally opposed the scheme; and he
has been trying very hard to conquer my objection by assuring me that  there
is  great danger of an armed attempt on Thursday when the crowd collects for
the procession --an  attempt which probably would end in bloodshed.  Do  you
follow me?"
     The Gadfly was staring absently out  of the window. He looked round and
answered in a weary voice:
     "Yes, I am listening."
     "Perhaps  you  are really  not well  enough  to stand this conversation
to-night. Shall I come back in the morning? It is a very serious matter, and
I want your whole attention."
     "I would rather get it over now," the Gadfly answered in the same tone.
"I follow everything you say."
     "Now,  if it  be true," Montanelli  went  on,  "that there  is any real
danger of riots  and bloodshed on account  of you, I am taking upon myself a
tremendous responsibility in opposing the colonel; and I believe there is at
least some truth in what he says. On the other hand, I am  inclined to think
that his judgment is warped, to a certain extent, by his personal  animosity
against you, and that  he probably  exaggerates the danger. That seems to me
the more  likely since I have seen this shameful  brutality."  He glanced at
the straps and chains lying on the floor, and went on:
     "If I  consent,  I kill you;  if  I refuse, I run  the  risk of killing
innocent persons.  I  have considered  the matter earnestly, and have sought
with all my heart for a way  out  of  this  dreadful alternative. And now at
last I have made up my mind."
     "To  kill  me  and s-save the  innocent  persons, of  course--the  only
decision a Christian man could possibly come to. 'If thy r-right hand offend
thee,' etc. I  have  n-not the honour to be the right hand of Your Eminence,
and  I  have offended you; the c-c-conclusion is plain. Couldn't you tell me
that without so much preamble?"
     The Gadfly spoke with  languid  indifference and contempt, like  a  man
weary of the whole subject.
     "Well?"  he added after a little pause.  "Was that the  decision,  Your
Eminence?"
     "No."
     The Gadfly  shifted his  position,  putting both hands behind his head,
and looked at  Montanelli with half-shut eyes.  The Cardinal, with his  head
sunk down as in deep thought, was softly  beating one hand on the arm of his
chair. Ah, that old, familiar gesture!
     "I have decided," he said, raising his head at last, "to do, I suppose,
an utterly unprecedented thing. When I heard that you had asked to see me, I
resolved to come here  and tell you everything, as I have done, and to place
the matter in your own hands."
     "In--my hands?"
     "Signor Rivarez, I have not come to you as cardinal, or as  bishop,  or
as judge; I have come to you as one man to another. I do not ask you to tell
me  whether you  know  of  any  such  scheme  as  the colonel apprehends.  I
understand quite  well that, if you do, it is your secret  and you  will not
tell  it. But I  do ask  you to put yourself in my place. I am  old, and, no
doubt, have not much longer  to  live. I would  go  down to my grave without
blood on my hands."
     "Is there none on them as yet, Your Eminence?"
     Montanelli grew a shade paler, but went on quietly: "All my life I have
opposed  repressive measures  and  cruelty wherever I have  met with them. I
have always  disapproved of capital  punishment  in all its  forms;  I  have
protested earnestly  and repeatedly  against the military commissions in the
last reign, and have been out  of favour on account of doing so. Up till now
such influence  and power as I have possessed  have always been employed  on
the side o