And, indeed, from the palace of Stephen Colonna, torches began to blaze, and armed men were seen rapidly advancing to the spot.
“Go home in peace, and if, tomorrow, or any day more suitable to thee, thou wilt meet me alone, and lance to lance, as is the wont of the knights of the empire; or with band to band, and man for man, as is rather the Roman custom; I will not fail thee—there is my gage.”
“Nobly spoken,” said Montreal; “and, if ye choose the latter, by your leave, I will be one of the party.”
Martino answered not; he took up the glove, thrust it in his bosom, and strode hastily away; only, when he had got some paces down the street, he turned back, and, shaking his clenched hand at Adrian, exclaimed, in a voice trembling with impotent rage—“Faithful to death!”
The words made one of the mottoes of the Orsini; and, whatever its earlier signification, had long passed into a current proverb, to signify their hatred to the Colonna.
Adrian, now engaged in raising, and attempting to revive Irene, who was still insensible, disdainfully left it to Montreal to reply.
“I doubt not, Signor,” said the latter, coolly, “that thou wilt be faithful to Death: for Death, God wot, is the only contract which men, however ingenious, are unable to break or evade.”
“Pardon me, gentle Knight,” said Adrian, looking up from his charge, “if I do not yet give myself wholly to gratitude. I have learned enough of knighthood to feel thou wilt acknowledge that my first duty is here—”
“Oh, a lady, then, was the cause of the quarrel! I need not ask who was in the right, when a man brings to the rivalry such odds as yon caitiff.”
“Thou mistakest a little, Sir Knight,—it is but a lamb I have rescued from the wolf.”