“I will direct him to stand behind your chair, and since he doesn’t speak, your highness will neither see nor hear him and with a little effort can imagine him a hundred miles away.”
“Do you know, my friend, I find one thing very evident in all this, you distrust me.”
“My lord, the day after to-morrow is Pentecost.”
“Well, what is Pentecost to me? Are you afraid that the Holy Spirit will come as a tongue of fire to open the doors of my prison?”
“No, my lord; but I have already told you what that damned magician predicted.”
“And what was it?”
“That the day of Pentecost would not pass without your highness being out of Vincennes.”
“You believe in sorcerers, then, you fool?”
“I—-I mind them no more than that——” and he snapped his fingers; “but it is my Lord Giulio who cares about them; as an Italian he is superstitious.”
The duke shrugged his shoulders.