"By my life, I have a mind to send you first, head foremost," replied the commander, sharply, but the next moment he burst into a good-humoured laugh, saying, "Well, what is to be done? The stream seems deep and strong. We did you wrong, Antonio. Now lead us right, at all events."
"You did yourself wrong, and your own eyesight, my lord," answered the man, "for, if you had looked at the tracks on the road, you would have seen that all the ox-carts for the last month have turned off where I would have led you. You have only now to go back, again."
"A hard punishment for a light fault," replied De Vitry. "Why told you me not this before, my good sir."
"Because, my lord, I have always thought St. Anthony, my patron, was wrong in preaching to fishes which have no ears. But we had better speed, sir, for it is touching upon evening, and night will have fallen before we reach Sant' Angelo. There you will find good quarters in the Borgo for your men; and, doubtless, the noble signor in the castle will come down at the first sound of your trumpets, and ask you and your prime officers to feast with him above. He is a noble lord, and loves the powers that be. Well that the devil has not come upon earth in his day, for he would have entertained him royally, and might have injured his means in honour of his guest."
De Vitry burst into another gay laugh, and, turning his horse's head, gave orders for his band to retrace their steps, upon which, of course, the young men commented as they would, while the old soldiers obeyed without question, even in their thoughts.
Night had long fallen when they reached Sant' Angelo a place then of much more importance than it is now, or has been for two centuries. But Antonio had been mistaken in supposing that De Vitry and his principal officers would be invited to lodge within the castle. The lord thereof was absent, knowing that the route of the King of France must be close to his residence. He was well aware that the attachment professed toward the young monarch by persons more powerful than himself was all hollow and deceptive, and that inferior men, in conflicts of great interests, always suffer, whose party soever they espouse. But he knew, too that unexplained neutrality suffers more than all, and he resolved to absent himself from his lands on the first news of the arrival of the King of France in Italy, that he might seem to favour neither him nor his opponents, and yet not proclaim a neutrality which would make enemies of both.
The castle, indeed, would at once have opened its gates, had it been summoned; but De Vitry, knowing the king's anxiety to keep on good terms with all the Italian nobles of Lombardy, contented himself with lodgings in the humble inn of the place, and hunger made his food seem as good as any which the castle could have afforded. The supper passed gaily over; the men were scattered in quarters through the little borough; wine was with difficulty procured by any but the officers, and sober perforce, the soldiery sought rest early. De Vitry and one or two others sat up late, sometimes talking, sometimes falling into fits of thought.
Antonio, in the meantime, had not even thought of rest. He had carefully attended to his horse, had ordered him to be fed, and seen him eat his food, and he stood before the door of the inn, gazing up at the moon, as if enjoying the calm sweetness of the soft Italian nights, but in reality meditating a farther ride as soon as all the rest were asleep. It was in the shadiest corner of this doorway that the man had placed himself, and yet he could see the full nearly-rounded orb without coming under her beams. As so often happens, two processes seemed going on in his mind at once; one suggested by objects present, and finding utterance in an occasional murmured sentence or two, the other originating in things past, and proceeding silently.
"Ay, Madam Moon," he said; "you are a curious creature, with your changes, and your risings, and your settings, and your man with his dog and lantern. I wonder what you really are. You look like a great big ducat nailed upon the sky, or a seal of yellow wax pendent from the charter of the heavens. I could almost fancy, though, that I can see behind you on this clear night. Perhaps you are but the big boss of a sconce, put up there to reflect the light of the sun. You will soon be up there, just above the watch-tower of the castle, like a ball upon a gate-post. Hark! there are people riding late. By my faith! if they be travellers coming hither, they will find scanty lodging and little to eat. These gormandizing Frenchmen have gobbled up everything in the village, I warrant, and occupied every bed. On my faith, they will find themselves too confident some day: not a sentry set except at the stables; no one on guard; the two or three officers in the dining-hall. They think they have got Italy at their feet; they may discover that they are mistaken before they leave it. These horsemen are coming hither. Who can they be?"
While these thoughts had been occupying one part of the man--I know not how better to express it--and had more or less clothed themselves in words, another train, more nearly allied to feeling, had been proceeding silently in the deeper recesses of his bosom. There was something which made him half sorry that he had been prevented from proceeding further before nightfall, half angry with him who had been, partly at least, the cause of the delay. "I do not believe," he thought, "that the big bravo can reach the villa before morning. He had not set out when we came away, and yet I should like to see the young lord to-night. I have a great mind to get upon my horse's skin at once and go on. But then, a thousand to one, De Vitry would send after and stop me; and if I were to meet Buondoni and his people, I should get my throat cut, and all my news would escape through the gash. If I could persuade this dashing French captain to lend me half a dozen men now, I might do something; but their horses are all tired with carrying the cart-load of iron each has got upon his shoulders. Hark! these travellers are coming nearer. Perhaps they may bring some news from the Villa Rovera. They are coming from that side."