Part 11

"Janus!" she cried--all her soul shining in her eyes; and then, in her own soft, Italian tongue:

"How should my heart not know thee!"

VIII

Caterina Veneta, Queen of Cyprus, stood on a high balcony of the summer palace in the Casal of Potamia, one beautiful June morning at early dawn, waving farewell to the cavalcade of nobles who were winding up the pass that led to the great forests where the patricians of the island were wont to pursue their favorite pastime. Janus was among them, leading in the chase as in every art that demanded agility and prowess--lithe, strong and beautiful in her eyes as in the first days of their short romance.

It was the one hour of the torrid day when the air was fragrant with the breath of flowers and tingling with the freshness of the sea; and in the sparkle of the morning, with sunshine in her heart and love-light in her eyes, she was very fair to look upon.

The scene had been exhilarating, full of color and motion--laughter and repartee mingling with the adieux of the knights and seigneurs to their ladies, the notes of the hunting-horns, the snorts of impatient steeds, the short expectant bark of the dogs, as the Master of the hounds, the young Count of Jaffa, with his great army of hunters and attendants, moved before the cavalcade into the heart of the forest. A fantastic train it was, with the picturesque costumes of the riders, the tinted tails of their horses and dogs flashing an orange trail in the sunshine, a touch of coquetry much in vogue among the young Cyprian nobles of the day.

Caterina had watched the start with pride in her husband's grace and courtly bearing, his beautiful strong youth and the devotion of his chosen group of friends: and the winning charm of his manner, as he looked back with a parting act of homage, brought a flush of pleasure to her cheek. She stood for a moment, her eyes growing deep with delicious memories, as she recalled the romance of their first meeting.

But she was conscious of a little pain at her heart, as she waited, following him with her eyes until the cavalcade was lost to view under the plumy shadows of the distant cypress-trees. Was it thus that kings should spend long summer days when there were rumors of discontent in the air--rumors definite enough to have reached the palace circle in mysterious undertones, quickly repressed when she turned to ask their meaning? Should Janus not have given up his pleasure to stay and examine into the cause which he had laughed away as a mere nothing--a jest of some discontented courtier of one of the old Greek families who had been in Cyprus before the days of the Lusignans; and all the more if they were always alert for fancied slights?

"If he is discontented and it is a mere nothing, why should he not be summoned to state his grievance?" she had persisted, with a trace of pleading in her attitude that fretted the King. She was not to concern herself with questions of state or popular discontent suggesting unpleasantly the ruling spirit of Helenà Paléologue, his father's wife; and he had not brought a girl-bride from Venice to watch his method of holding the reins!

His annoyance had been very real under his laughing exterior, as he kissed the tips of her slender fingers in knightly fashion and assured her that there was nothing to trouble her dainty head about: she should keep her rose-leaf beauty dewy fresh for him, without brooding over the possible meaning of ancient discontented nobles who belonged to an earlier régime.

A passing thought came over him while he made his laughing protest, of the four conspirators who had just been put to the cruel death which Cyprus reserved for her traitors; but their little game was happily over, and he dismissed the memory with a slight shrug of his graceful shoulders. "Was there ever a kingdom without malcontents?" he had asked, turning to his wife. "Was everyone satisfied throughout the length and breadth of Venetia?"

She did not know, for she had been a mere child in her Venetian home, without thought for the things of state which few Venetian women dreamed of discussing--still less of influencing. But now, that she was left alone for a few days, she let her thought dwell upon the question. Was life more strenuous in Venice, or better ordered? As she recalled the ways of her father, the Senator Marco Cornaro, and of the other statesmen of his circle, she could not but recognize the fact that the nobles of Venice made the work of the Government their first concern. She would ask her Secretary-Cousin, Aluisi Bernardini; she felt sure that his knowledge and judgment were to be trusted on Venetian matters, although Janus had already told her with unconcealed disdain that Bernardini's opinion was valueless on Cyprian questions, which were new to him--and far too complicated.

It was not until recently that some dim perception of this complexity had begun to dawn upon her, athwart the sunshine of her life as bride and queen. When she had first landed on this fabled island she had been too much under the influence of the glamour with which her dreams had invested Cyprus during the years of her betrothal for any serious study of conditions, or questions of right and wrong. She had been taught that kings rule by Divine Right, and no question of succession troubled her confidence of the people's choice of Janus as their sovereign. For her there were no disputes to consider, for the troubled state of Cyprus, but too well known in the Council Chambers of the Republic, had never been revealed to her. Janus was the only son of the late King, his father, tenderly beloved by him, supported by the Sultan who was Suzerain of Cyprus, and eagerly welcomed by the people of his realm. These were truths it had been considered wise for her to know, and they had been duly declared to her by her monitors of Venice.

But there were others--conflicting truths--among them the facts of his birth and of his contest with Carlotta--with which they had diplomatically left her to come in contact when there could be no withdrawal, but which time must unerringly reveal to her, and with no gentle hand.

The period of rejoicings for the Royal Marriage had been long and brilliant, as was the custom of the time, and the Coronation-fêtes, the journeyings from city to city of the realm, that she might make acquaintance with her land and people, had brought them far into the early spring. But when the excitement of these days was over, she slowly grew aware of something sinister beneath the smiling surface, and the studied brilliancy of the atmosphere about her made her fear a conspiracy to keep her in childish ignorance of what was passing within the kingdom. But surely, if she were not equal to comprehending these things, she must bend herself to the task and try to grow!

It was of this that the young Queen was thinking as her husband rode forth with his suite of gay, young nobles to the chase, and she summoned Aluisi to her presence.

Already a blast of heat was rising over the land and the rasping cries of the cicala fretted their talk; and Caterina bade him follow her down into the voto--the vast, cool, underground chambers which, for the patricians of Cyprus, made life possible during this heated term, between the freshness of the morning and the comfort of the evening shadows.

The talk was long and serious.

"There was never a court without some discontent," he answered lightly to her questioning; "fair Madame, my cousin and Queen."

The mingling of protection and affection in his attitude towards her was so natural in the older man who had known her as the petted child and cousin of their house through the years of intimacy in Venice, that she had never allowed him to change it when they talked alone together, and it was only in the presence of the court that he taught himself to remember her queenly estate.

"Nay, Aluisi," she answered, earnestly, "thou art in league with the King--it was his very answer."

"It is but truth, in league with truth, most gracious Majesty," he retorted playfully. "Nay--but no league at all; only two liege men speaking truth; therefore the oneness of speech."

He had employed the stilted fooling of the period to cover his confusion and to gain time; for the matter was of moment and it had taken him unaware--he did not know how to answer her.

"Nay, nay, Aluisi--I am distressed; there is some great trouble; I command thy knowledge."

He had never heard her use the word before, and it became her well.

"Fair cousin, it is not new," he answered deferentially, but pausing to choose his words, for it was no time to fill her soul with alarms. "It is, I hear them say, some question of a mutiny in Cerines."

"It will mean an uprising?--danger for the King?"

"Nay, have no fear; it was quelled at once."