Part 59

"Thou wilt have it a beacon-fire," Eloisà interposed again; "it is in truth more romantic than a blaze some wanderer may have lighted to do duty for his camp."

But no one answered her, they were all humming about Dama Ecciva, interrupting each other with excited questions; for Dama Ecciva had been, if possible, more mysterious and tantalizing than ever since these rumors had been afloat--which was a sign that she could tell something if she would. "So, my pretty friends!" she answered with a silvery laugh, "for once it entereth your thought that there be matters about which we--the Maids of honor of Her Majesty--are not worthy to hear!"

"I make exception of the Dama Margherita, to whom Her Majesty is honey-sweet!" she added, as her glance rested on Eloisà; and growing hot as she dwelt upon the thought, she went on--"she hath a manner quite insufferable--she, who hath not more right than I to rule this court. If one were to put the question to our knights--'an Iblin or a de Montferrat?' would it make a pretty tourney for a Cyprian holiday?"

She laughed a mocking, malicious laugh; then suddenly stretched out one slender hand and made a descriptive motion as of tossing her glove into the centre of a distant circle--her eyelids narrowing until they seemed almost to close--a strange light escaping from them--her breath coming with slow pants, as if from suffocation--the hand dropped at her side betraying her passion by convulsive movements trembling through the tinted finger-tips.

In the bizarre Cyprian costume which many of the ancient Greek patricians still retained, she seemed of a different mold from the young Venetian gentlewomen of the court of Caterina--like some fantastic fury, half-elf, half-woman.

"The Melusina!" Eloisà whispered, shuddering: "thou mindest me of her. I like thee not in this strange mood!" while the others drew away from her with a faint cry of protest.

But Ecciva's momentary mood of passion passed as quickly as it came; and she answered her companions with a tantalizing, sparkling smile, rallying them on their seriousness, and flashing whimsicalities around the circle like some splendid, inconsequent fire-fly.

Her dark hair, woven with coins and trinkets, fell in innumerable long slender braids behind, from under a coronet of jessamine blossoms strung together upon strips of palm, which clasped the clustering waves of hair closer about her face--pure and colorless as old ivory. Her robe, of green brocade, richly embroidered with gold, fell over full pantaloons of scarlet satin which were tightly bound about the slender ankles by jewelled bands, displaying to advantage the tiny feet, clad in boots of soft, yellow kid, fantastically wrought with gold threads; the robe parted over a bodice of yellow, open at the throat, around which chains of gold and jewels were wound in undue profusion.

"It is thou, perchance, Ecciva, who knowest not how to win the favor of Dama Margherita," ventured one maiden, bolder than the rest; "for with us hath she ever been most gracious. And for Her Majesty, the Queen----"

But a sudden impulse had come to Ecciva to cover herself with glory by making her companions sharers in the news of which she had gotten knowledge by a fashion peculiarly her own.

"Nay: leave the Queen to the Dama Margherita for this one blissful morning," she interrupted without ceremony: "for I have news--verily; and they may return ere it be told. Which of you knoweth aught of the Holy Sister Violante--she of the down-held lids and silent ways--who slipped into the court the night of that great signal fire upon the mountain, behind the citadel?"

She scanned the eager faces triumphantly, but no one had anything to tell.

"For verily the Sister Violante maketh part of this strange mystery," she proceeded after a moment of impressive silence. "She and the great signal fire--of which no one knew aught!--so innocent were all the gentlemen of the court--and the Bernardini most of all! But they are parts of one romance; and the Violante came to influence Her Majesty; the Violante, with her devout ways, wearing the habit of a holy sisterhood to which her gracious Majesty is wont to give undue reverence--being not apt to penetrate an intrigue--too fair a saint, by far!--The Sister Violante came to win Her Majesty to acquiesce in some strange bidding from Rhodes; or perchance from the Sultan himself."

"How knowest thou, Ecciva?" They crowded around her thrilling with pleasant excitement--the craving for which was unduly whetted by the splendor and aimlessness of the life of this Eastern court--for a romance with such a beginning might have an indefinitely delightful termination; and Dama Ecciva had some strange knack of always knowing more than others of any savory morsel of gossip of which there might be hints in the air.

She looked at them nonchalantly, well-pleased at any sort of dominance, but never confessing it by her attitude.

"Have I not eyes?" she questioned, with tantalizing slowness; "and ears?--Are they to grow dull for lack of usage?"

"Nay; tell us, Ecciva."

She drew nearer and lowered her voice mysteriously. "That Tristan de Giblet--he who would have killed the King the night that he climbed the city-walls and fled to Rhodes--we know the tale----"

"Aye, aye; we know it. And then?"--they pleaded impatiently.

But Dama Ecciva was not to be swerved from the irritating composure which pleased her mood for the moment:

"And one of us--hath any one seen Alicia de Giblet? She hath not been among us since that night of the signal fire."

"She hath been ill, in the Château de Giblet this month past," several voices responded at once.

"Perchance, sweet maids;--or in some other less splendid castle where dungeons are of more account than the fine banquet hall of the de Giblet! And because Alicia is sister to this Messer Tristan--I have done much thinking of late--it is time for the Bernardini to return. Let us give over talk."

"Alicia de Giblet was sister to that traitor!" one of them exclaimed indignantly; "and we never dreamed it! But she was gentilissima; poverina! Ah, the pity of it!"

"But how came she ill, 'because of it,' as thou sayest, Ecciva?" Eloisà questioned, wishing ever to have a reason for her beliefs; "it was long since!"

"The night of the King's flight was long since--verily--before his coronation. Carlotta was Queen, then;--there have been wars and death and woe enough since then! But this night of the signal fire is but a month agone--and that night came Tristan de Giblet to talk with his sister, who let him into the Palazzo Reale. The daring of the man! We are not cowards--we Cyprians!"

"Ecciva!--how canst thou verily be sure!"

She touched her eyes again, mysteriously.