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Palamede had a palace in the heart of Naples, and was Temple's equal in age and also in his great wealth. The two men became boon companions, associated in all kinds of wickedness and excess. At length Palamede married a beautiful girl named Olimpia Aldobrandini, who was also of the noblest lineage; but the intimacy between him and Temple was not interrupted.
He promised to tell me some day at length, but a sudden death prevented his ever doing so. The facts as he narrated them, and as I have little doubt they actually occurred, were these: Adrian Temple, after Jocelyn's departure, had made a confidant of one Palamede Domacavalli, a scion of a splendid Parthenopean family of that name.
"Baron de Sigognac," said the marquis, addressing him for the first time by his own name, "I will bear witness, upon my honour, before whomsoever you may choose to name, to the antiquity and nobility of your family. Palamede de Sigognac distinguished himself by wonderful deeds of valour in the first crusade, to which he led a hundred lances, equipped, and transported thither, at his own expense.
These valuable documents, with their strange old Gothic characters, scarcely decipherable save by experts, were carefully wrapped up in a piece of faded crimson silk, which looked as if it might have been part of the very banner borne by Palamede de Sigognac at the head of his hundred followers in the first crusade.
The Gagliarda was reached but never finished, for near the end of the second movement Palamede from behind drove a stiletto into his friend's heart. He had found out that day that Adrian had not spared even Olimpia's honour. I have endeavoured to condense into a connected story the facts learnt piecemeal from Sir John in conversation.
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