“I would I could,” the terrified hunchback began. But at that the Duke turned from him with a shrug of angry impatience, and clapping his hands together:
“Olá! Martino!” he called. Instantly the door opened, and the Swiss appeared. “Bring in your men and your rope.”
The captain turned on his heel, and simultaneously the fool cast himself at Gian Maria's feet.
“Mercy, your Highness!” he wailed. “Do not have me hanged. I am----”
“We are not going to hang you,” the Duke broke in coldly. “Dead you would indeed be dumb, and avail us nothing. We want you alive, Messer Peppino--alive and talkative; we find you very reserved for a fool. But we hope to make you speak.”
On his knees, Peppe raised his wild eyes to Heaven.
“Mother of the Afflicted,” he prayed, at which the Duke broke into a contemptuous laugh.
“What has the Heavenly Mother to do with such filth as you? Make your appeals to me. I am the more immediate arbiter of your fate. Tell me the name of that man you met in the woods, and all may yet be well with you.”
Peppino knelt in silence, a cold sweat gathering on his pale brow, and a horrid fear tightening at his heart and throat.
And yet greater than this horror they were preparing for him was the horror of losing his immortal soul by a breach of the solemn oath he had sworn. Gian Maria turned from him, at last, to his bravi, who now entered silently and with the air of men who knew the work expected of them. Martino mounted the bed, and swung for an instant from the framework of the canopy.
Gian Maria bade him, since that was so, remove the velvet hangings, whilst he despatched one of the men to see that the ante-chamber door was closed, so that no cry should penetrate to the apartments of the Valdicampo household.
In a few seconds all was ready, and Peppino was rudely lifted from his knees and from the prayers he had been pattering to the Virgin to lend him strength in this hour of need.
“For the last time, sir fool,” quoth the Duke, “will you tell us his name?”
“Highness, I cannot,” answered Peppe, for all that terror was freezing his very blood.
A light of satisfaction gleamed now in Gian Maria's eyes.
“So you know it!” he exclaimed. “You no longer protest your ignorance, but only that you cannot tell me. Up with him, Martino.”