She was lingering in the upper hall just outside the door, dressed in a girdled gown of blue, and a bonnetlike headdress. Her dark eyes gleamed like stars—they were filled with tears.
"Lisa!" I called her, in a voice I could not keep steady. "Lisa, child, I have come to say—to say—"
"Farewell?" she tried to finish for me, and her face dropped down into hands. I could not but catch her in my arms, and kiss her wet cheeks.
"Don't cry," I begged her. "Don't, my dear. Listen, while I swear to come back, to hurry back—"
"We shall not meet again," Lisa sobbed.
"I will come back," I insisted. "Since this second machine remains here, it will take us eventually into the age from whence I came, and then—"
"Us," she repeated, trying to understand.
"I will rescue you from this century, and this fantastic world and chain of sorrows," I promised.
Guaracco cleared his throat. We looked up, and moved apart, for his head was thrusting itself around the edge of the door.
"Lisa," he said, "I leave certain preparations in your hands. At this time tomorrow, bring; into the room with the machine a slaughtered calf—"
Turning from the girl, as Guaracco continued to talk, I hurried into the room and closed the door behind me. I saw that the power of the machine was turned on, the light gleaming blue-gray through the lens, the misty screen sprung up in the framework. Once passed, it was 1939 beyond… .
And then I saw that Guaracco was removing the last of his clothes.
"What does this mean?" I demanded of him.
He confronted me, a naked figure of baskety leanness.
"I have decided to make the journey through time instead of you."
"But I—" The words broke on my astonished lips.
"No arguments," said Guaracco. "It is too late." And he sprang into the midst of the framework, and through the veil of fog.
For a moment I saw him beyond in the room, as fragile as a man of soap-bubbles, less than a ghost. I gazed, waiting for him to fade away completely. But his substance thickened again, took back its color. I saw the pink of his skin, the red of his beard, the gleam of his abashed eyes. He staggered on the floor, as on the deck of a ship. He was still in his own age. The reflector was a failure.
I laughed triumphantly and almost jauntily, and half sprang at him. But he slumped down on a chair, still naked. So much gloom had fallen around and upon him that part of my anger left me. My clenched fists relaxed, my denouncement stuck in my throat. He had tried to trick me, to shove himself into my own age at my expense—but it had not worked. I only paraphrased Robert Burns.
"The best-laid plans of mice and men," I taunted, "go oft astray."
He looked up and stared at me for a full minute—yes, at least sixty seconds—before making any reply.
"I can understand your feelings," he muttered then, as humbly as a child caught in a jam closet. "Once more, I thought, I had tricked my way ahead of you. But I reap the reward of my sinful vanity."
I was amazed. This was nothing like Guaracco. "Do not tell me," I jeered, "that you repent."
His hand wrung the point of his beard. "Is it not permitted the proudest and foulest wrongdoer to say that he has done ill?" His head bowed almost upon his bare, scrawny knees. "Leo, let me make my poor excuses. My heart was full of zeal for what I should behold and learn, five centuries in the future. It would be to me what heaven is to the true churchman. And now, without even a glimpse—"
At last he rose. He held out a trembling hand. He seemed suddenly grown old and frail.
"Do not laugh or reproach. I have been deceitful, but let me make amends. We shall be true scientists and philosophers together. Will you not forgive, and take me as your friend?"
I could not exult over so patently broken an adversary, and his manner of earnest humility disarmed me. I took his hand. At once he straightened up, and his voice and bearing captured some of the old sprightliness.
"That is better, Cousin Leo—for we are kinsmen in taste and direction, at least. What wonders shall we not wreak together! The world will hear of us!"
As he spoke, a commotion and the sound of an excited voice came from below us. I, being dressed, ran down in place of Guaracco.
Sandro Botticelli stood facing Lisa. He was mud-spattered and panting, as from swift riding, and his plump, pleasant face full of grave concern.
"Leo," he said at once, "I risk my career, perhaps my life, in warning you. Fly, and at once!"
"At once?" I echoed, scowling in amazement. "Why?"
He gestured excitedly. "Do not bandy words, man," he scolded me. "Begone, I say! Lorenzo has signed a writ for your arrest. You are a doomed man."
My mouth fell open, it seemed to me, a good twelve inches.
"It is because of what happened at Volterra," Botticelli plunged on. "That town was sacked because of you. Lorenzo wanted alum, for your flying machine."
"Aye, and I got alum—"
"But you did not make a flying machine with it. Criticism has flamed up over the treatment of the Volterrans, and Lorenzo needs a scapegoat. When Guaracco informed him that you had used it deceitfully, for another purpose—"
"Guaracco!" I roared.
I saw his plan now, to usurp my place at the time reflector, leaving me to imprisonment, perhaps death, on a trumped-up charge. I took a step toward the stairs, for I wanted that scoundrel's blood.
But Botticelli came hurrying after me, and caught my arm.
"I hear galloping hoofs, Leo! The officers are coming. Run, I tell you! Run!"
At that moment the door burst open and two officers rushed in.
CHAPTER XV Santi Pelagrini
Deliberately I gazed at the men who had entered so unceremoniously.
"You are officers?" I demanded. "You are to arrest me? Where is your warrant?"
"Here it is."
The chief of them drew his sword. I was unarmed, having laid aside even my dagger for the attempt to pass through time. Resistance was useless, and I spoke only to save poor Botticelli from possible punishment for riding to warn me.
"You will get no reward, after all," I addressed him with simulated spitefulness. "These gentlemen will take me to Lorenzo, not you. It's well for you that they came. Your effort to arrest me might have wound up in your getting hurt. I advise you to stick to paint daubing, Ser Sandro, and not to play catchpoll again."
He stared at me in pained surprise, then in grateful understanding. I walked out, closely guarded by the patrol, and was mounted upon a spare horse. Then we started—but away from Florence.
"Did not the Magnificent send you to seize me?" I demanded of the leader. "Take me before him, that my case may be heard."
They did not reply to that, or to other demands. We went southeast, mile after mile, leaving the good main road for shorter and rougher stretches. Once again I asked where we were going and what my fate would be, and once again I was unanswered. We stopped that night at a little house where a grape grower gave us bread and cheese and wine, and subsequently shelter. I slept in front of the fireplace, with the men standing watch over me in turn.
By mid-morning of the next day, we rode into the seaport of Rimini, and straight to the stone wharfs. The leader of our party sent a messenger to call ashore the captain of a small lateen-rigged ship riding close in at anchor. He talked aside with this captain, and gave him an official-looking document. Then I was taken from my horse and led forward.
"Go with this ship master," ordered the chief officer.
I protested loudly, and one of the officers gave me a rough shove. Next instant I had knocked him down, and the instant after that the others had swarmed upon me, throwing me to the stones of the wharf and pinioning me.
Before I was put into a skiff to go to the vessel, irons were procured—broad, heavy cuffs, connected by a single link and fastened with coarse locks, and clamped upon my wrists. There was no further sense in resistance. I was rowed out, hoisted to the half-deck, and placed in a closetlike compartment off the captain's cabin. We sailed at noon.