'Nay, Master. Ask of me anything else, but I cannot let you work till you have mended somewhat,' replied Francesco.
'Where have you put my sketches?' he demanded, angrily.
'I have locked them in the attic.'
'Give me the key.'
'Nay, Master, what can you do with the key?'
'Give it me this instant.'
Francesco hesitated; the invalid's eyes flashed with wrath. Not to excite him, the young man gave the key. Leonardo hid it under his pillow and seemed satisfied. His recovery after this was more rapid than could have been hoped. In the beginning of April he was able again to play chess with Fra Guglielmo.
One night Francesco, sleeping on his customary bench by the Master's side, started up in alarm, for he could not hear Leonardo's usually heavy breathing. The night-light had been extinguished; he relit it hastily, and found the invalid's bed empty; he waked Villanis and they visited all the rooms on that floor, but Leonardo was not there. Francesco was going downstairs, when he remembered the sketches hidden in the attic. He hastened thither and found the door unlocked. Leonardo, half-dressed, was seated on the floor before an old box, which he was using as a table. By the light of a tallow candle he was writing, while he muttered rapidly as if delirious. His glowing eyes, his matted hair, his brows violently contracted, his sunken helpless mouth, his whole appearance was so strange and alarming to Francesco that for a few minutes he dared not enter.
Suddenly Leonardo snatched up a pencil and drew it across a page of figures so violently that it broke. Then he looked round, saw his pupil, rose and tottered towards him.
'I told you, Francesco,' he said quickly and bitterly, 'that I should soon make an end. Now I have finished. So have no fear, I shall not work any more. 'Tis enough. I have grown old and dull; more dull than Astro. I know nothing at all. What I have known I forget. Is it for me to think of wings? To the devil even with the wings!'