“No—­call him out and kill him like a gentleman, which is a great deal better than he deserves.”

“I have no doubt you would,” said the Cardinal, gravely.  “I think your proposition reasonable, however.  If this man is really dangerous, I will look to him myself.  But I must really beg you not to do anything rash.  I have determined that this duelling shall stop, and I warn you that neither you nor any one else will escape imprisonment if you are involved in any more of these personal encounters.”

Saracinesca suppressed a smile at the Cardinal’s threat; but he perceived that he had gained his point, and was pleased accordingly.  He had, he felt sure, sown in the statesman’s mind a germ of suspicion which would before long bring forth fruit.  In those days danger was plentiful, and people could not afford to overlook it, no matter in what form it presented itself, least of all such people as the Cardinal himself, who, while sustaining an unequal combat against superior forces outside the State, felt that his every step was encompassed by perils from within.  That he had long despised Del Ferice as an idle chatterer did not prevent him from understanding that he might have been deceived, as Saracinesca suggested.  He had caused Ugo to be watched, it is true, but only from time to time, and by men whose only duty was to follow him and to see whether he frequented suspicious society.  The little nest of talkers at Gouache’s studio in the Via San Basilio was soon discovered, and proved to be harmless enough.  Del Ferice was then allowed to go on his way unobserved.  But the half-dozen words in which Saracinesca had described Ugo’s scheme for hindering Giovanni’s marriage had set the Cardinal thinking, and the Cardinal seldom wasted time in thinking in vain.  His interview with Saracinesca ended very soon, and the Prince and the statesman entered the crowded drawing-room and mixed in the throng.  It was long before they met again in private.

The Cardinal on the following day gave orders that Del Ferice’s letters were to be stopped—­by no means an uncommon proceeding in those times, nor so rare in our own day as is supposed.  The post-office was then in the hands of a private individual so far as all management was concerned, and the Cardinal’s word was law.  Del Ferice’s letters were regularly opened and examined.

The first thing that was discovered was that they frequently contained money, generally in the shape of small drafts on London signed by a Florentine banker, and that the envelopes which contained money never contained anything else.  They were all posted in Florence.  With regard to his letters, they appeared to be very innocent communications from all sorts of people, rarely referring to politics, and then only in the most general terms.  If Del Ferice had expected to have his correspondence examined, he could not have arranged matters better for his own safety.  To trace the drafts to the person who