And I did
not doubt that she had good cause to warn me. I remembered with a shudder
her old-time habit of listening at doors. It was very probable that in
like manner had she now gathered information that entitled her to give me
such advice.
It was incredible. And yet I knew that it was true, and I cursed my
blindness and Cavalcanti's. What precisely Farnese's designs might be I
could not conceive. It was hard to think that he should dare so much as
Giuliana more than hinted. It may be that, after all, there was no more
than just the danger of it, and that her own base interests urged her to do
what she could to avert it.
In any case, her advice was sound; and perhaps, as she said, the removal of
Bianca quietly might be the means of helping Pier Luigi's unwelcome visit
to an end.
Indeed, it was so. It was Bianca who held him at Pagliano, as the blindest
idiot should have perceived.
That very night I would seek out Cavalcanti ere I retired to sleep.
CHAPTER VI
THE TALONS OF THE HOLY OFFICE
Acting upon my resolve, I went to wait for Cavalcanti in the little
anteroom that communicated with his bedroom. My patience was tried, for he
was singularly late in coming; fully an hour passed after all the sounds
had died down in the castle and it was known that all had retired, and
still there was no sign of him.
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