CHAPTER VI.
Catherine in trouble.—"Libertà e Chiesà!" in Forlì.—The Cardinal Savelli.—The Countess and her Castellano perform a comedy before the lieges.—A veteran revolutionist.—No help coming from Rome.—Cardinal Legate in an awkward position.—All over with the Orsi.—Their last night in Forlì.—Catherine herself again.—Retribution.—An octogenarian conspirator's last day.
The corpse of the murdered man lay tranquilly on the pavement of that vast "Hall of the Nymphs," surrounded by the hangings of arras, and sideboards of plate "ten feet high," the produce of many a deed of rapine, oppression, and wrong; tranquilly and free, for some five minutes past now, from troublous thoughts of meat-taxes, empty coffers, Ordelaffi conspiracies, and revolutions, for the first time these four years! It lay near the great window, and the thick blood flowed slowly over the painted brick floor, making a dark stain, which Forlì tradition could still point out to curious strangers towards the end of the last century. The affrighted servant, who it seems was one Ludovico Ercolani, a butler, long in the service of the Riarii, had run from the hall, to carry the terrible tidings to the distant chamber of the Countess. And for a few short minutes the murderers, Checco d'Orsi and his accomplices, Giacomo Ronchi and Ludovico Pansecco, stood alone over their victim, with pallid faces and starting eyeballs, taking rapid counsel as to what was next to be done.[119]
LIBERTY! LIBERTY!
This ruffian Pansecco, one of the historians quietly remarks, had been employed by the Count on occasion of the Pazzi murders.
Those moments were anxious ones to the doers of the desperate deed, for all depended on the feeling, with which the populace might at the first blush regard it. Their anxiety was not of long duration, however. From the open window the three assassins cried to the people in the Piazza "Liberty! Liberty! The tyrant is dead! Forlì is its own mistress!" It was the evening hour at which every Italian, then as now, is out of doors enjoying the fresh air, and chatting with neighbours, sitting in groups in front of the druggists' shops—(a curiously universal and time-honoured habit in the provincial cities of Italy), or walking to and fro in the principal square; and the news, therefore, ran through the city with the quickness of lightning. In an instant the Piazza was crowded with citizens, crying, "An Orso! an Orso! Liberty! Liberty!" and the conspirators were safe—for the present.
The palace guard lost no time in providing for their own safety, by separating and mingling with the people. Ludovico d'Orsi, Checco's brother, a doctor of law and whilome senator at Rome, who had been guarding the stair leading to Catherine's apartments, went out into the Piazza to excite and direct the mob. But the Chancellor, who had been with the Count at the time of the murder, had meanwhile reached Catherine's room by another passage. Her younger children and their nurses, and a young sister of hers, named Stella, whom she was about to marry advantageously to a certain Andrea Ricci, were with her. And the confusion in that room, full of women and children, on the abrupt and breathless telling of such news may be easily imagined. But Catherine, with infinite promptitude of thought, ordered Ludovico to hasten, without losing a moment by lingering with them, to the castle; and to tell Feo, the governor, from her, to send off instant couriers to her brother, the Duke, at Milan, and to her husband's friend and ally, Bentivoglio, Lord of Bologna.
Catherine, and the women with her, barred the door behind him as best they might with heavy furniture and so forth. But he had hardly had time to get clear of the palace before Checco with half-a-dozen ruffians were thundering at the Countess's room, and in a very few minutes had forced an entrance. The chroniclers have noted that Orsi could not bring himself at that moment to face Catherine. He remained at the door, while the men he had brought with him made the women understand that they must come with them.
And thus the family of the murdered sovereign were marched through the crowded streets of the city to the Orsi palace, and there locked up as prisoners.