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Updated: June 9, 2025
But this, sirs, I will promise you: I will ride with you to Babbiano, and I will seek to reason with my cousin. More will I do; I will seek at his hands the office of Gonfalonier, and if he grant it me; I will so reorganise our forces, and enter into such alliances with our neighbours as shall ensure, at least in some degree, the safety of our State."
If he refuses, and insists upon this wedding, abhorrent to Monna Valentina, why, then, my men shall hold him captive behind those walls until it be too late for him to reach his duchy in time to save the crown. In the meantime I will ride to Babbiano in his stead, and reluctant though I be to play the duke I shall accept the throne and silence the people's importunities.
For me, and for Lodi if he was not taken, there may be safety in flight. Into the territory of Babbiano I shall never again set foot whilst Gian Maria is Duke, unless I be weary of this world. But of the seventh yourself you heard old Lodi swear that the secret could not have transpired.
Whilst the bustle of preparation went on briskly in Urbino, Gian Maria, on his side, was rapidly disposing of affairs in Babbiano, that he might return to the nuptials for which he was impatient. But he had chanced upon a deeper tangle than he had reckoned with, and more to do than he had looked for.
But Cappoccio, who was nowise interested in the extent of Valentina's knowledge of the man, broke in impetuously: "Now we have heard what has passed between this new Provost here and his Highness of Babbiano.
"Nevertheless," put in Gonzaga feverishly, clinging to a slender hope, "let us hear it." "I beg that you will," said Valentina. Thus enjoined, Francesco pondered a moment. "Are you acquainted with the politics of Babbiano?" he inquired. "I know something of them." "I will make the position quite clear to you, Madonna," he rejoined.
"Yet he does not go the length of jesting with me." His eye carried a menace so eloquent that Gonzaga drew back, afraid; but Gian Maria clapped him on the shoulder in a friendly manner. "Be of good heart, Judas," he laughed, his pale face a-grin, "I shall find room for you in Babbiano, and work too, if you do it as well as this. Come; the men are here now.
They had a stout ally in Caesar Borgia, and he was marching upon Babbiano by then, so that Gian Maria must get him home perforce ere long. Their pay was good, he reminded them, and if the siege were soon raised they should be well rewarded. "Gian Maria threatens to hang you when he captures Roccaleone.
"You will tell him that what lances I have in Babbiano I intend to keep, that with them I may defend my own frontiers against his briganding advances. Messer da Lodi," he added, turning to Fabrizio and without so much as waiting to see if the envoy had anything further to say, "let this gentleman be reconducted to his quarters, and see that he has safe conduct hence until he is out of our Duchy."
He went white with fear and he leant against the low wall to steady the tell-tale trembling that had seized him. Then Francesco's voice, scornful and confident, floated up to his ears. "I ask you, my friends, would his Highness of Babbiano be disposed to the payment of a thousand gold florins if by bombardment he thought to break a way into Roccaleone? This letter was written yesterday.
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