"Then I will go to her," she answered, "that she may see a face of love when she passes," and pushing them all aside, she resolutely entered the sick-chamber, signing to Maestro Gentile to follow her; but the protest from the group of learned men was less than she had feared, since the Queen was now so ill that nothing could cure or harm.
The fair young mother, fever flushed, with wandering eyes, lay tossing on the silken cushions of her low couch—broken words feebly struggling from the parted lips in pathetic tones, "Madonna—I am so tired—so tired—take me——"
There was no recognition in her eyes, as the Lady Beata leaned over her, startled at the words, her soul wrung with sympathy.
"Why can they do nothing?" she asked in low authoritative tones of the physician.
"The will is gone," he answered sorrowfully; "she hath lost all desire of life; she will not rally, being too weak for the effort, and having no consciousness to help herself."
There was a hunted, frightened look in Caterina's face; the words came again, more faintly—"tired—take me——"
"She shall not die until she hath known this joy which Heaven hath sent her!" the Lady Beata cried with conviction and a sudden sense of power. "We will save her—thou, Maestro Gentile—and I—who love her. Give her only some potion for her strengthening, I beseech thee, caro Maestro;—life is flickering—she must not die yet."
"There is no hope," he answered her again; but he gave the strengthening draught, for he could not resist her imploring eyes.
The Lady Beata had been moving noiselessly, throwing wide the curtains; a faint, pitying evening breeze stole into the chamber. She came now and knelt beside the couch.
"Bring the little Prince hither with all possible haste, from his chamber," she said without lifting her eyes from Caterina's face. "We must rouse her!"