Suddenly his hold over Pisa ominously slackened.
The Pisans cared little for Pope or Antipope; they were fanatic for liberty. They detested Agnese Mantegazza and her bastard with a Tuscan hatred for the Visconti, treacherous alike to God and man. One day in 1405, while Messer Gabriel’ Maria was absent in Genoa, some Florentine soldiers made a raid on Pisa. The citizens, not without reason, suspected their tyrant of selling them to the Florentines,—old neighbours and rivals yet more odious than the Milanese. They rose as one man fighting for death or liberty in the streets. No sooner had they driven back the Florentines than they rushed on the Fortress, surging through the narrow corridors, till, in the heart of the palace, they came on Madonna Agnese. A man raised his harquebuss and shot her through the heart. Her son was absent in Genoa. For the moment the Pisans were quit of the Visconti.
The news of the revolt of Pisa flew swiftly to Genoa. The bereaved Tiranetto dispossessed and orphaned, repaired to Boucicaut as to the Lieutenant of his liege-lord, the King of France, asking aid because, as the Chronicle reminds us, “seigneur doibt au besoing secourir son vassal qui le requiert à son aide.”
Boucicaut was dismayed at this first result of his new acquisition. To reduce Pisa by arms would be a ruinous affair. The Marshal comforted as best he could the vassal of his master, and promised to go and reason with the rebels. Forth, therefore, he went from Genoa to a very beautiful place called Porto Venere, in the neighbourhood of Pisa. There a deputation of the insurgents awaited him, and for a long while he harangued them as to the virtues of the dead Madonna Agnese and the merits of the kind and amiable young man whom they had banished.
The Pisans listened respectfully while “moult leur dict de belles paroles,” but when the sermon was over they replied that never should Messer Gabriel’ be their lord again, rather would every man of them be hewn in pieces; but, they went on to say, the Marshal Boucicaut himself should be welcomed and honoured by all the citizens of Pisa, if he would accept her as his fief. “Never,” cried the Marshal, “could I draw such a profit from a friend’s misfortune” (“car ce n’est mie l’usaige des François d’user de tels tours”). And he fell again to praising Messer Gabriel’, but all in vain, for the last word of the Pisans was that, if the Marshal himself would not accept the city for his own, then they prayed him to meet them at Leghorn another day, and there they would give themselves directly to the King of France, accepting a French governor for their waiter, even as the Genoese had done ten years before.
Boucicaut went home, sore perplexed between his duty to his liege and his duty to his vassal. He had gone to Porto Venere to plead the cause of Gabriel’ Maria: and he had supplanted the young man, as it seemed. On the other hand, since it was clear that the Pisans would never re-admit their Tiranetto, and since the city was the fief of France, how could he honourably forbid them to give themselves entirely to their lawful suzerain? And the vision grew in him of a great Mediterranean State, French, supporting French interests in the East—a terror to the Saracens and the men of Barbary, a lamp of Christendom, faithful to the True Obedience, reclaimed for ever from the heresy of the Elect of Rome.
Arrived in Genoa he sent for Messer Gabriel’, and told him the case; “de quoy feult moult dolent Messire Gabriel,” who doubtless wished that he had sent to Porto Venere, a spokesman less eloquent and less engaging. But Boucicaut persuaded him that since he could not hope to leave the city for himself, ’twas better to entrust it to the King of France—who would recompense so generous a vassal with lands as good elsewhere—than to let it fall into the power of an enemy or a neighbour. Gabriel’ Maria agreed—as he must perforce agree—and Boucicaut set out again to meet the rebels at Leghorn.
But the Pisans had never meant to give themselves another master. To gain time, they had played with Boucicaut and had flattered his weak side. They said that on second thoughts they preferred that, before they gave themselves to the King of France, the men of Messer Gabriel’, who were still in the strong places of Pisa, should be expelled the city, and a garrison of French and Genoese sent thither in their stead. The request appeared the less unreasonable as Gabriel’ Maria was himself the King’s vassal, and the Pisans might suspect that their mutual suzerain would only confirm the power of the rejected Tiranetto. Boucicaut agreed, returned to Genoa, and arranged for the exchange of garrisons.
This done the Pisans sent to say the Fortress needed revictualling. Boucicaut, eager to ingratiate his new subjects, despatched his nephew, some gentlemen of his household, with many gentlemen and citizens of Genoa; and a great galley heaped with provisions. The ship sailed down the coast and up the Arno into Pisa; at the quay the embassy descended. They were immediately overpowered by an ambush of Pisans, who seized upon the welcome cargo of the ship, and carried off the crew and the passengers into a dark and villainous prison, using their sufferings as a means to extract higher ransom from the King’s Lieutenant.
Thus amply provisioned at Boucicaut’s expense, the Pisans began to feel secure of liberty. They sent to Florence, offering her four of their castles if she would help them to regain Leghorn, where at the moment Boucicaut and Gabriel’ Maria were esconced, and to revenge themselves on both these men. But the Florentines returned a dilatory answer, for they were, in truth, pursuing a more fruitful negotiation.