"
"In that you lie!" screamed Cosimo, crimson now with rage, the veins at his
throat and brow swelling like ropes.
A silence followed. My father turned to Falcone, and held out his hand.
Falcone sprang to give him a heavy iron gauntlet. Holding this by the
fingers, my father took a step towards Cosimo, and he was smiling, very
calm again after his late furious mood.
"Be it so," he said. "Since you say that I lie, I do here challenge you to
prove it upon my body."
And he crashed the iron glove straight into Cosimo's face so that the skin
was broken, and blood flowed about the mouth, leaving the lower half of the
visage crimson, the upper dead-white.
Gonzaga sat on, entirely unmoved, and waited, indifferent to the stir there
was amid the Ten. For by the ancient laws of chivalry--however much they
might be falling now into desuetude--if Cosimo took up the glove, the
matter passed beyond the jurisdiction of the Court, and all men must abide
by the issue of the trial by battle.
For a long moment Cosimo hesitated. Then he saw ruin all about him. He--
who had come to this court so confidently--had walked into a trap. He saw
it now, and saw that the only loophole was the chance this combat offered
him. He played the man in the end. He stooped and took up the glove.
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