Tito shook his head slightly.
"Thou dost not know what our southern women are made of," he answered. "They love with a different love from your cold northerners, and yet the northern blood from their mother has given to both a prudence which may be dangerous to our plan."
Roger muttered something that sounded like a curse.
"We will be a match yet for their prudence and their caution. Men have vanished from Oxford ere now, or have been found dead in the streets, and none have been the wiser for it. The Chancellor shakes his head; the other clerks clamour against the townsfolk, and perhaps a citizen is slain in reprisal; and then the matter is forgotten. What has been before can be again. Her lover dead, and pretty Linda will soon forget her fancy; or, mourning for him, she will be the more easily persuaded—and once we are sure of her, we can commence our plan, and wealth and renown will flow in upon us. We have all in readiness save the high priestess of the mysteries!"
"Hist, hist! have a care what thou dost say!" whispered Tito, in some alarm. "There is peril as well as profit in our plan. The black art finds scant favour in the eyes of the Church. Men have perished at the stake ere now for dabbling even as deeply as we have done. Have a care what thou dost speak in the open streets."
"Tush! none can hear," quoth Roger, with some contempt; "but as to the other matter, we must watch our chance and use it well. Men talk of the joustings which will soon take place if this horrid rain will but cease, which is rotting the corn in the fields, and bringing famine to our doors. When man meets man in full tilt in the jousting-field, it cannot be a very hard matter to run a lance into his eye, or even to pierce his heart. Moreover there be other chances, if eyes are kept open. Leave yon upstart to me, and I will soon find a way of wiping off my score against him. I have played that game before now. I shall play it the more skilfully for the practice I have had."
"Well, well, do as thou wilt; only be cautious, for we want none of the Chancellor's prison, and he watches over the lives and liberties of the clerks with jealous eye. Well enow should I like to see him cleared out of the path. I have no love for him, and he stands in the way of our cherished plan."
"He shall not stand so long," muttered Roger between his teeth; and then the two men moved away along the dark and unsavoury lane, whilst a head, which had been thrust out awhile ago from an upper window, was now drawn in, and Linda Balzani pressed her two hands to her throbbing brow.
"What devils men can be!" she whispered. "What devilry is this that they are desiring to practise, and in which I am to be their tool? Heaven send me strength and courage to thwart their evil schemes! O Hugh, my love, my love! they shall not hurt thee if I can save thee. Twice warned is thrice armed. I will save thee from their cruel malice, or I will die with thee!"