you.  These concern, in particular, certain misappropriation of grain and stores, and an excessive severity of rule, of which complaints have reached him.  From this you will gather that out of a spirit of self-defence, if not to earn the reward which we have bound ourselves to pay you, it is expedient that you should not fail us.  The occasion of the Duke’s visit to Cesena will be, of all, the most propitious for our purpose.  Have your arbalister posed, and may God strengthen his arm and render true his aim to the end that Italy may be rid of a tyrant.  I commend myself to your Excellency, and I shall anxiously await your news.

“Vitellozzo Vitelli.”

Here indeed were my hopes realised.  A plot there was, and it aimed at nothing less than the Duca Valentino’s life.  Let that letter be borne to Cesare Borgia at Faenza, and I would warrant that within a dozen hours of his receipt of it he would so dispose that all who had suffered by the cruel tyranny of Ramiro del’ Orca would be avenged, and those who were still suffering would be relieved.  In this letter lay my own freedom and the salvation of Madonna Paula, and this letter it behoved me at once to become possessed.  It was a safer far alternative than that dagger of his.

A moment I stood pondering the matter for the last time, then stepping sideways and forward, so that I was again beside him, I put out my hand and swiftly whipped the letter from the table.  Then standing very still, to prevent the slightest rustle, I remained a second or two observing him.  He snored on, undisturbed by my light-fingered action.

I drew away a pace or two, as lightly as I might, and folding the letter I thrust it into my girdle.  Then from my open doublet I drew the sheet that Mariani had supplied me, and, advancing again, I placed it on the table in a position almost identical with that which the original had occupied, saving that it was removed a half-finger’s breadth from his hand, for I feared to allow it actually to touch him lest it should arouse him.

Holding my breath, for now was I come to the most desperate part of my undertaking, I caught up one of the tapers and set fire to a corner of the sheet.  That done, I left the candle lying on its side against the paper, so as to convey the impression to him, when presently he awakened, that it had fallen from it sconce.  Then, without waiting for more, I backed swiftly away, watching the progress of the flames as they devoured the paper and presently reached his hand and scorched it.

At that I dropped again on all fours, and having gained the corner of the buffet, I crouched there, even as with a sudden scream of pain he woke and sprang upright, shaking his blistered hand.  As a matter of instinct he looked about to see what it was had hurt him.  Then his eyes fell upon the charred paper on the table, and the fallen candle, which was still burning across one end of it, and even to the dull wits of Ramiro del’ Orca the only possible conclusion was suggested.  He stared at it a moment, then swept that flimsy sheet of ashes from the table with an oath, and sank back once more into his great leathern chair.