"Thou didst care greatly?" said Tomaso, after a painful silence.
"He was a noble prince," replied his father. "I owe him everything; he made a friend of me, and I ever found him brave and generous, as strong as gentle, and most honorable--and he loved the Duchess, aye, he loved her. The Duchess still lives, a prisoner in Milan, but Della Scala----"
He sighed deeply, and rose as if to put from him the memory of the tragedy.
"But to return to thy deliverer," he said, "one Francisco di Coldra, thou say'st; he claims I know him. What manner of a man is he?"
As he spoke he moved with Tomaso to the door, and looked out into the dark. What kept Francisco and the Count?
"He is tall and strong," replied Tomaso, "with thick brown hair and heavy eyes; a handsome face, I think it, father, stern and sad. He is worn--as if from sickness. The Count thinks him better than he gives out; I know not."
Ligozzi was silent; his figure alone was visible.
"Seeing the case is as thou say'st, Tomaso," he remarked at last, "every moment of delay is dangerous, and thy friend is long."
Tomaso stepped into the open, and, to ease his impatience, brought forward the horses.
"I think they come," he cried joyfully in another moment. "It seems a dream, father, that thou shouldst be here to meet Francisco."
Ligozzi was still strangely silent. He drew back within the doorway. Hurried footsteps were heard, the crackling of fallen boughs, the swish of the flowering grass. Ligozzi saw a tall figure looming toward them through the dusk, a slighter one beside him.
Tomaso, from where he stood, eager and excited by the horses, cried out to them. Ligozzi, still farther back, bent down to Vittore, who stood beside him; seen by the dim light of the horn lantern, his face was strangely agitated.
"Has this Francisco half-closed eyes, and a ready, pleasant smile?" he asked.
"He has such eyes," he answered. "I have not ever seen him smile like that. Thou didst know him then, my uncle?"
"Yes," Ligozzi answered brokenly. "I think--I remember him--at Della Scala's court."
But here Tomaso, calling on him, re-entered the hut, followed by Francisco, whose stately presence seemed to make the mean place smaller still.
"My father," said the boy joyfully; "my father, saved from the taking of Verona, and come a long way in search of us!"