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THE CHRONICLES OF COUNT ANTONIO

by

ANTHONY HOPE

Author of The Prisoner of Zenda, etc.

With Photogravure Frontispiece by S. W. Van Schaick







New York
D. Appleton and Company
1895

Copyright, 1895,
By Anthony Hope.

Copyright, 1895,
By D. Appleton and Company.




    _TO THE HONOURABLE SIR HENRY HAWKINS._


    _MY DEAR SIR HENRY_:

    _It gives me very great pleasure to be allowed to dedicate this book
    to you. I hope you will accept it as a token of thanks for much
    kindness, of your former Marshal's pleasant memory of his service,
    and of sincere respect for a clear-sighted, firm, and compassionate
    Judge._

    _Your affectionate cousin,_

    _A. H. H._

_London, August, 1895._




[Illustration: _Behold! She is free._ (Chapter V.)]




CONTENTS.



    CHAPTER                                                       PAGE

        I.--HOW COUNT ANTONIO TOOK TO THE HILLS                      1

       II.--COUNT ANTONIO AND THE TRAITOR PRINCE                    39

      III.--COUNT ANTONIO AND THE PRINCE OF MANTIVOGLIA             71

       IV.--COUNT ANTONIO AND THE WIZARD'S DRUG                    116

        V.--COUNT ANTONIO AND THE SACRED BONES                     158

       VI.--COUNT ANTONIO AND THE HERMIT OF THE VAULT              202

      VII.--COUNT ANTONIO AND THE LADY OF RILANO                   245

     VIII.--THE MANNER OF COUNT ANTONIO'S RETURN                   290




THE CHRONICLES OF COUNT ANTONIO.




CHAPTER I.

HOW COUNT ANTONIO TOOK TO THE HILLS.


Countless are the stories told of the sayings that Count Antonio spoke
and of the deeds that he did when he dwelt an outlaw in the hills. For
tales and legends gather round his name thick as the berries hang on a
bush, and with the passage of every succeeding year it grows harder to
discern where truth lies and where the love of wonder, working together
with the sway of a great man's memory, has wrought the embroidery of its
fancy on the plain robe of fact. Yet, amid all that is of uncertain
knowledge and so must rest, this much at least should be known and
remembered for the honour of a noble family, how it fell out that Count
Antonio, a man of high lineage, forsook the service of his Prince,
disdained the obligation of his rank, set law at naught, and did what
seemed indeed in his own eyes to be good but was held by many to be
nothing other than the work of a rebel and a brigand. Yet, although it
is by these names that men often speak of him, they love his memory; and
I also, Ambrose the Franciscan, having gathered diligently all that I
could come by in the archives of the city or from the lips of aged folk,
have learned to love it in some sort. Thus I am minded to write, before
the time that I must carry what I know with me to the grave, the full
and whole truth concerning Antonio's flight from the city and the Court,
seeking in my heart, as I write, excuse for him, and finding in the
record, if little else, yet a tale that lovers must read in pride and
sorrow, and, if this be not too high a hope, that princes may study for
profit and for warning.

Now it was in the tenth year of the reign of Duke Valentine over the
city of Firmola, its territories and dependent towns, that Count Antonio
of Monte Velluto--having with him a youthful cousin of his, whom he
loved greatly, and whom, by reason of his small stature and of a boyish
gaiety he had, men called Tommasino--came from his own house on the hill
that fronts the great gate of the city, to the palace of the Duke, with
intent to ask His Highness's sanction for his marriage with the Lady
Lucia. This lady, being then seventeen years of age, loved Antonio, and
he her, and troth had been privily plighted between them for many
months; and such was the strength and power of the love they bore the
one to the other, that even to this day the old mock at young lovers who
show themselves overfond, crying, "'Tis Lucia and Antonio!"

But since the Lady Lucia was an orphan, Antonio came now to the Duke,
who enjoyed ward-ship over her, and setting out his passion and how that
his estate was sufficient and his family such as the Duke knew, prayed
leave of His Highness to wed her. But the Duke, a crafty and subtle
prince, knowing Antonio's temper and the favour in which he was held by
the people, counted not to augment his state and revenues by the gift of
a bride so richly dowered, but chose rather to give her to a favourite
of his, a man in whose devotion he could surely trust and whose
disposition was to serve his master in all things fair and foul, open or
secret. Such an one the Duke found in the Lord Robert de Beauregard, a
gentleman of Provence, who had quitted his own country, having been
drawn into some tumult there, and, having taken service with the Duke,
had risen to a great place in his esteem and confidence. Therefore, when
Antonio preferred his request, the Duke, with many a courteous regretful
phrase, made him aware that the lady stood promised to Robert by the
irrevocable sanctity of his princely pledge.

"So forget, I pray you, my good cousin Antonio," said he, "forget, as
young men lightly can, this desire of yours, and it shall be my charge
to find you a bride full as fair as the Lady Lucia."

But Antonio's face went red from brow to chin, as he answered: "My
gracious lord, I love the lady, and she me, and neither can wed another.
As for my Lord Robert, your Highness knows well that she loves him not."

"A girl's love!" smiled the Duke. "A girl's love! It rains and shines,
and shines and rains, Antonio."

"It has shone on me since she knew a man when she looked on him," said
Antonio.

And Tommasino, who stood by, recking as little of the Duke as of the
Duke's deerhound which he was patting the while, broke in, saying
carelessly, "And this Robert, my lord, is not the man for a pretty girl
to love. He is a sour fellow."

"I thank you for your counsel, my lord Tommasino," smiled the Duke. "Yet
I love him." Whereat Tommasino lifted his brows and patted the hound
again. "It is enough," added the Duke. "I have promised, Antonio. It is
enough."

"Yes, it is enough," said Antonio; and he and Tommasino, having bowed
low, withdrew from the presence of the Duke. But when he got clear
outside of the Duke's cabinet, Antonio laid his hand on Tommasino's
shoulder, saying, "It is not well that Robert have her."

"It is mighty ill," said Tommasino.

And then they walked in silence to the city gate, and, in silence
still, climbed the rugged hill where Antonio's house stood.

But the Duke sent for Robert de Beauregard into his cabinet and said to
him: "If you be wise, friend Robert, little grass shall grow under your
feet this side your marriage. This Antonio says not much; but I have
known him outrun his tongue with deeds."

"If the lady were as eager as I, the matter would not halt," said Robert
with a laugh. "But she weeps and spits fire at me, and cries for
Antonio."

"She will be cured after the wedding," said the Duke. "But see that she
be well guarded, Robert; let a company of your men watch her. I have
known the bride to be missing on a marriage day ere now."

"If he can touch her, he may wed her," cried Robert. "The pikemen are
close about her house, and she can neither go in nor come forth without
their knowledge."

"It is well," said the Duke. "Yet delay not. They are stubborn men,
these Counts of Monte Velluto."

Now had the Lady Lucia been of a spirit as haughty as her lover's, it
may be that she would have refused to wed Robert de Beauregard. But she
was afraid. When Antonio was with her, she had clung to him, and he
loved her the more for her timidity. With him gone and forbidden to come
near her, she dared not resist the Duke's will nor brave his
displeasure; so that a week before the day which the Duke had appointed
for the wedding, she sent to Antonio, bidding him abandon a hope that
was vain and set himself to forget a most unhappy lady.

"Robert shall not have her," said Antonio, putting the letter in his
belt.

"Then the time is short," said Tommasino.

They were walking together on the terrace before Antonio's house, whence
they looked on the city across the river. Antonio cast his eye on the
river and on the wall of the Duke's garden that ran along it; fair
trees, shrubs, and flowers lined the top of the wall, and the water
gleamed in the sunshine.

"It is strange," said Antonio, musing, "that one maiden can darken for a
man all the world that God lights with his sun. Yet since so it is,
Tommasino, a man can be but a man; and being a man, he is a poor man, if
he stand by while another takes his love."

"And that other a stranger, and, as I swear, a cut-throat," added
Tommasino.

When they had dined and evening began to come on, Antonio made his
servants saddle the best horses in his stable--though, indeed, the
choice was small, for Antonio was not rich as a man of his rank counts
riches--and the two rode down the hill towards the city. But, as they
went, Antonio turned once and again in his saddle and gazed long at the
old gray house, the round tower, and the narrow gate.

"Why look behind, and not forward?" asked Tommasino.

"Because there is a foreboding in me," answered Antonio, "that it will
be long before that gate again I pass through. Were there a hope of
persu