The timid Princess was so fluttered and bewildered that she lost all presence of mind, and stood in uncomprehending wonder, while Monica pushed authoritatively into the house, and beckoned the knight to bring Agnes and lay her on a sofa, when she and old Elsie busied themselves vigorously with restoratives.

The Lady Paulina, as soon as she could collect her scattered senses, recognized in Agostino the banished lord of the Sarelli family, a race who had shared with her own the hatred and cruelty of the Borgia tribe; and he in turn had recognized a daughter of the Colonnas.

He drew her aside into a small boudoir adjoining the apartment.

“Noble lady,” he said, “we are companions in misfortune, and so, I trust, you will pardon what seems a tumultuous intrusion on your privacy.  I and my men came to Rome in disguise, that we might watch over and protect this poor innocent, who now finds asylum with you.”

“My Lord,” said the Princess, “I see in this event the wonderful working of the good God.  I have but just learned that this young person is my near kinswoman; it was only this morning that the fact was certified to me on the dying confession of a holy Capuchin, who privately united my brother to her mother.  The marriage was an indiscretion of his youth; but afterwards he fell into more grievous sin in denying the holy sacrament, and leaving his wife to die in misery and dishonor, and perhaps for this fault such great judgments fell upon him.  I wish to make atonement in such sort as is yet possible by acting as a mother to this child.”

“The times are so troublous and uncertain,” said Agostino, “that she must have stronger protection than that of any woman.  She is of a most holy and religious nature, but as ignorant of sin as an angel who never has seen anything out of heaven; and so the Borgias enticed her into their impure den, from which, God helping, I have saved her.  I tried all I could to prevent her coming to Rome, and to convince her of the vileness that ruled here; but the poor little one could not believe me, and thought me a heretic only for saying what she now knows from her own senses.”

The Lady Paulina shuddered with fear.

“Is it possible that you have come into collision with the dreadful Borgias?  What will become of us?”

“I brought a hundred men into Rome in different disguises,” said Agostino, “and we gained over a servant in their household, through whom I entered and carried her off.  Their men pursued us, and we had a fight in the streets, but for the moment we mustered more than they.  Some of them chased us a good distance.  But it will not do for us to remain here.  As soon as she is revived enough, we must retreat towards one of our fastnesses in the mountains, whence, when rested, we shall go northward to Florence, where I have powerful friends, and she has also an uncle, a holy man, by whose counsels she is much guided.”