“You are mad, Giovannino!” exclaimed the prince, hoarsely, “that is not the meaning of the words.  You have forgotten your Latin.”

“I will get you a dictionary—­or a lawyer—­whichever you prefer.”

“You are not in earnest, my boy.  Look here—­eo tamen pacto—­that means ’by this agreement’—­does it not?  I am not so rusty as you seem to think.”

“It means ‘on this understanding, however.’  Go on.  Quod si, that if—­praedicto Domino Leoni, to the aforesaid Don Leone—­ex legitimo matrimonio, from a lawful marriage—­heres nasceretur, an heir should be born—­hoc instrumentum, this deed—­shall be null, worthless and invalid.  You cannot get any other sense out of it.  I have tried for a quarter of an hour.  You and I are beggars.  Saracinesca, Torleone, Barda, and all the rest belong to San Giacinto, the direct descendant of your great-grandfather’s elder brother.  You are simple Don Leone, and I am plain Don Giovanni.  That is what it means.”

“Good God!” cried the old man in extreme horror.  “If you should be right—­”

“I am right,” replied Giovanni, very pale.

With wild eyes and trembling hands the prince spread the document upon the table and read it over again.  He turned it and went on to the end, his excitement bringing back in the moment such scholarship as he had once possessed and making every sentence as clear as the day.

“Not even San Giacinto—­not even a title!” he exclaimed desperately.  He fell back in his chair, crushed by the tremendous blow that had fallen so unexpectedly upon him in his old age.

“Not even San Giacinto,” repeated Giovanni, stupidly.  His presence of mind began to forsake him, too, and he sank down, burying his face in his hands.  As in a dream he saw his cousin installed in the very chair where his father now sat, master of the house in which he, Giovanni, had been born, like his father before him, master of the fortresses and castles, the fair villas and the broad lands, the palaces and the millions to which Giovanni had thought himself heir, lord over the wealth and inheritances of his race, dignified by countless titles and by all the consideration that falls to the lot of the great in this world.

For a long time neither spoke, for both were equally overwhelmed by the magnitude of the disaster that hung over their heads.  They looked furtively at each other, and each saw that his companion was white to the lips.  The old man was the first to break the silence.

“At all events, San Giacinto does not know how the deed stands,” he said.

“It will make it all the harder to tell him,” replied Giovanni.

“To tell him?  You would not be so mad—­”

“Do you think it would be honourable,” asked the younger man, “for us to remain in possession of what clearly does not belong to us?  I will not do it.”

“We have been in possession for more than a century.”

“That is no reason why we should continue to steal another man’s money,” said Giovanni.  “We are men.  Let us act like men.  It is bitter.  It is horrible.  But we have no other course.  After all, Corona has Astrardente.  She will give you a home.  She is rich.”