'We are like enough to find,' said the old man with a profound sigh; 'only we may not tell Don Faustino. If he hear of it he will dress my head without a comb; and he can do your worship a mischief, too, for he can raise the people and not let you finish your work. Well, well—we must pray the Lord to show us mercy! But in the meanwhile, my honoured benefactor, do not abandon me, but say a word for me to the judge.'
'What? anent the strip of land the miller would take from you?'
'That is it, master. The miller is a cunning rascal, and he knows how to catch the devil by the tail. I, you see, gave a heifer to the judge; but the miller gave him a lined cow. I fear me the judge will decide for the miller, because the suit is not yet concluded, and already the cow has a fine bull-calf. I pr'ythee, speak for me—father that you are to me. This which we do on the Hill of the Mill, I do only for your kindness. There is no other I would have let bring such a sin upon my conscience.'
'Be at ease, Grillo. I will speak for you; the judge is my friend. Now take your steps to the kitchen, and eat and drink. To-night we will go together to San Gervaso.'
The old man, with many reverences, went out, and Messer Cipriano betook himself to his little chamber near the storehouse. It was a museum of marbles and bronzes, hung on walls, arranged on benches. Medals and old coins were assorted on cloth-covered benches; and fragments of statues, not yet pieced together, were waiting in huge cases. Through his trade-agents in many countries he procured antiquities from all classic grounds; from Athens, Smyrna, Halicarnassus, Cyprus, Leucosia, Rhodes, from the remoter Egypt, from the heart of the Levant. The Master of the Guild of the Calimala glanced over his treasures, and then sank into profound consideration of customs-dues on the import of fleeces; and finally composed the letter to his factor at the Wool Fair in Montpellier.
II
Meantime, in the hinder-part of the warehouse, heaped with bales, and lighted only by the glimmer of a lamp before the image of the Madonna, three lads, Dolfo, Antonio, and Giovanni were gossiping together. Dolfo, Messer Buonaccorsi's clerk, a red-haired, snub-nosed, good-natured youth, was entering the number of ells of cloth which Antonio da Vinci, old for his years, with glassy eyes and thin, rough, black locks, was rapidly measuring with the Florentine measure, called a canna: Giovanni Boltraffio, a student of painting from Milan, a big boy of nineteen, but shy and awkward, with innocent, sad, grey eyes, and an irresolute expression, was sitting cross-legged on a made-up bale, and listening with all his ears.
'This is what we have come to,' cried Antonio excitedly; 'digging heathen gods out of the ground!' Then he added, dictating to Dolfo, 'of brown Scotch faced-cloth, 32 braccia,[1] 6 fingers, 8 nails.' Then, having folded the measured piece, he threw it into its place, and raising his finger with the gesture of a menacing prophet, in imitation of Fra Girolamo Savonarola, he cried, 'Gladius Dei super terram cito et velociter! In the island of Patmos San Giovanni had a vision: he saw the angel lay hold on the dragon, that old serpent, which is the Devil, and bind him a thousand years, and cast him into the bottomless pit, and shut him up, and set a seal upon him, that he should deceive the nations no more till the thousand years should be fulfilled. To-day Satan has been released from his prison; to-day the thousand years are at an end; the false gods, forerunners and followers of Antichrist, are creeping forth from under the seal of the angel back into the world for the temptation of men! Woe to those who live on the earth or on the sea!—Of thin, yellow, Brabant cloth, 17 braccia, 4 fingers, 9 nails!'
'How think you, then, Antonio?' asked Giovanni, with alarmed and eager interest; 'all these signs bear witness——'