The red spot mounted to Rienzi’s brow. He gazed hard at Brettone, who stated the news to him, and a natural suspicion shot across his mind.
“How!—escaped!” he said. “Is it possible? Enough of such idle skirmishes with these lordly robbers. Will the hour ever come when I shall meet them hand to hand? Brettone,” and the brother of Montreal felt the dark eye of Rienzi pierce to his very heart; “Brettone!” said he, with an abrupt change of voice, “are your men to be trusted? Is there no connivance with the Barons?”
“How!” said Brettone, sullenly, but somewhat confused.
“How me no hows!” quoth the Tribune-Senator, fiercely. “I know that thou art a valiant Captain of valiant men. Thou and thy brother Arimbaldo have served me well, and I have rewarded ye well! Have I not? Speak!”
“Senator,” answered Arimbaldo, taking up the word, “you have kept your word to us. You have raised us to the highest rank your power could bestow, and this has amply atoned our humble services.”
“I am glad ye allow thus much,” said the Tribune.
Arimbaldo proceeded, somewhat more loftily, “I trust, my Lord, you do not doubt us?”
“Arimbaldo,” replied Rienzi, in a voice of deep, but half-suppressed emotion; “you are a lettered man, and you have seemed to share my projects for the regeneration of our common kind. You ought not to betray me. There is something in unison between us. But, chide me not, I am surrounded by treason, and the very air I breathe seems poison to my lips.”
There was a pathos mingled with Rienzi’s words which touched the milder brother of Montreal. He bowed in silence. Rienzi surveyed him wistfully, and sighed. Then, changing the conversation, he spoke of their intended siege of Palestrina, and shortly afterwards retired to rest.
Left alone, the brothers regarded each other for some moments in silence. “Brettone,” said Arimbaldo at length, in a whispered voice, “my heart misgives me. I like not Walter’s ambitious schemes. With our own countrymen we are frank and loyal, why play the traitor with this high-souled Roman?” (The anonymous biographer of Rienzi makes the following just remark: “Sono li tedeschi, come discendon de la Alemagna, semplici, puri, senza fraude, come si allocano tra’ taliani, diventano mastri coduti, viziosi, che sentono ogni malizia.”—“Vita di Cola di Rienzi”, lib. ii. cap. 16.)