"I never knew a cross-marked bullet to fail, excellency. He is stone dead."
"May he rest in peace," I answered; "he was a brave man, although my enemy."
"He is still enough now, your worship--and see! There is his horse grazing quietly. It will do excellently to replace the lost one."
He ran forward and secured the animal, whilst I had a final look at my dead beast. His neck was broken, and there was an end of him. Whilst Jacopo at my request was changing the saddles, I stirred up the ancient, who had lapsed into silence, and begged the favour of his informing me to whom I was indebted for the excitement of the night. Brico at first would not answer, but an inch of steel removed his sulkiness, and he told me all that I believe he knew, which was to the effect that he and some others had been hired by a great Florentine called Strozzi, to stop me at all hazards on my journey to Rome, and that the party was commanded by Ceci, who was to pay them two hundred crowns for their trouble. More he evidently did not know, and disregarding all his entreaties to loosen him, we rode off, wishing him a good night. Nevertheless I am afraid he suffered considerable discomfort.
"That rascal monk," said Jacopo as we jogged along, "has gone on ahead of us, and to-morrow, perhaps, will rouse the country in advance of us."
"Never fear, Jacopo," I answered, "he is no monk, as I well know, and his only chance was to escape as he did. He will hark back soon enough to Florence. Such hawks as he do not fly far from their eyries."
And in this I proved to be right, and the library scribe was never seen by me again.
So we kept to our way, deciding to rest by day on the banks of the Evola, to which we came in the early morning. Here we concealed our horses in the forest which fringed the banks, and the tireless Jacopo, leaving me to watch the cattle, proceeded on foot to a small hamlet he knew of, returning in about an hour with the materials for a substantial meal, and a small skin of wine. In order not to be taken by surprise by the neighing of our horses, which would assuredly discover us if other riders passed, we hobbled them in a secure place, and sought a safe retreat for ourselves, almost half way up the low hill which bounded the river at the point where we halted. Here we spent a restful day, the only incident being the passing of a fine body of men-at-arms across the Evola. From the double-headed lion on their standard I perceived they were part of the _condotta_ of Colleoni, a devoted adherent of the Borgia, and it was fortunate that we did not meet them or it would have gone hard with us, for I was known personally to Colleoni and most of his officers, the free-lance having changed sides after Fornovo, ostensibly because he said it was against his conscience to war with the Pope; but in reality being bribed by an immediate present of a fief in the Campagna, and the promise of the lordship of Bergamo, which, although his son obtained it, he himself never enjoyed. So much for the two-headed lion which crossed our path as we lay hidden in the shade of the trees. Our horses also being actively employed in cropping the rich turf in the hollow where they were tethered, behaved themselves excellently, with the result that the long line of men-at-arms passed on and out of sight, without doing us any harm.