caught on Peppe's face a grin of sly amusement.

"My name," he said at last, "is Francesco." And then, to prevent that
she should further question him--"But tell me, Madonna," he inquired,
"how comes a lady of your station here, alone with that poor fraction of
a man?" And he indicated the grinning Peppe.

"My people are yonder in the woods, where we have halted for a little
space. I am on my way to my uncle's court, from the Convent of Santa
Sofia, and for my escort I have Messer Romeo Gonzaga and twenty spears.
So that, you see, I am well protected, without counting Ser Peppe here
and the saintly Fra Domenico, my confessor."

There was a pause, ended at length by Francesco.

"You will be the younger niece of his Highness of Urbino?" said he.

"Not so, Messer Francesco," she answered readily. "I am the elder."

At that his brows grew of a sudden dark.

"Can you be she whom they would wed to Gian Maria?" he exclaimed, at
which the fool pricked up his ears, whilst she looked at the Count with a
gaze that plainly showed how far she was from understanding him.

"You said?" she asked.

"Why, nothing," he answered, with a sigh, and in that moment a man's
voice came ringing through the wood.