"Lisa!" I shouted as I ran through room after room. "Lisa, where are you?"
"Leo!"
It was muffled, little louder than a whisper, but I, having come into the kitchen, traced the direction of her voice. She was beneath me. In the floor showed a great cleated hatchway. She must be in the cellar, among Guaracco's stacked weapons. Seizing the iron ring that served as handle for the door, I heaved it up. Light gleamed from below.
There was no ladder or other way down, but I swung myself into the hold, landing upright on the earthen cellar floor. She was there, seated like a stone figure upon a great chest that must be full of ammunition. Beyond were the stairs that led to the front of the house. Her eyes sought mine in the lantern light.
"Leo," she murmured, as softly as the sigh of wind heard far away. "You have come back."
"Fly away from here!" I gasped at her. "These devil's machines and weapons shall be destroyed within the minute. And we are leaving Florence forever— before Guaracco finds us. Or Lorenzo does either."
"But I must stay," she protested, as though she reminded me of the obvious. "I was told to wait."
"Told by Guaracco!" I cried hotly, for it now was manifest to me that he had bound her to her place by hypnotism, stronger than shackles.
"Guaracco, yes." Her head dipped a little in agreement. "He said that all would be well. A new Florence would be built, with no oppression."
"Lies, lies!" I cried passionately. "He tried to form himself a devil's kingdom here, erected on spilt blood and corpses." I caught her hand. "Come, Lisa!"
I got her to her feet, but it was like lifting a straw dummy.
"I was told to wait, Leo," she said.
My hands seized her shoulders, and I tried to shake her into consciousness.
"Lisa, do you love me? Or is that only an illusion, too, turned on and off by Guaracco like the spigot of a wine cask?"
"Love you, yes." She was definite enough.
"Then come, I say." I backed toward the stairs, drawing her along with me. She looked ahead, and saw something. Her eyes widened, her mouth opened to cry out.
"Leo—danger!"
She tore from my grasp and scurried around me so that she was between me and the stairs. I turned on my heel only swiftly enough to see what she had seen.
Guaracco had descended upon me and his hand was lifted, holding something that gleamed. I heard the bark of an explosion, saw a sudden ghostly puff of smoke. And Lisa sagged against me, into my arms. Her eyes were suddenly bright and wakeful again, and her mouth tremblingly smiled. I eased her slackening body to the floor. I knew that she was dead.
"Do not move, Leo!" warned Guaracco hastily. Still at the foot of the stairs, he leveled his weapon at me pointblank. "This fires six shots! It is one of the guns I made according to the science I gleaned from you."
It was, indeed, a revolver. His thumb had drawn up the hammer, and the muzzle stared me between the eyes. I gathered for a spring, but paused. I did not fear to die, but I feared that Guaracco might live.
"You have failed," were the first words I spoke to him.
"Failed?"
His eyes flickered down toward Lisa. With his rebellion crumpled around his head, he could still smile in triumph.
"Failed," I said again. "Lisa was under your spell, but she broke it to save my life. She loved me. Her love was more than your dirty conjuring tricks."
"True, true," he admitted smoothly. "And I am glad, after all, that she did save your life. Leo, there is still time and opportunity for us to help each other."
I curled my lip in contempt, but he went on:
"Many have died today. Why should we? If you do not understand, Leo, look at what else I bring."
His free left hand extended toward me, and between thumb and finger flashed a globule of rosy-silver light.
It is a pearl," he intoned in a new voice. "The pearl of sleep, Leo. Look upon it!"
I looked. 1 felt my senses sway, but held them firm. It was only a pearl. The light did not wax or blur or brighten. I was resisting his spell. It was only a pearl that Guaracco held, trying to spellbind me with it. But I stared, and would not let it have power over me.
"You are going to sleep, Leo," Guaracco was intoning. "To sleep—and all is well between us."
I gazed, my mind at work. A way opened to revenge and victory, if I were cunning. Slowly, stiffly, simulating a trance, I made a step toward him. He thought himself the winner.
"Leo, Leo, I am your friend," he tried to din into me. "I am Guaracco, who adopted you as his cousin, made you great and wealthy. And you will be grateful and help Guaracco. You will tell Lorenzo de Medici that Guaracco, too, fought to put down this conspiracy. Those who can testify otherwise are dead."
It would have worked had he been able truly to impose his will. I let him deceive himself, and took another step. We were almost within arm's reach of each other. The leveled revolver was bigger and brighter to my gaze than the pearl. I kept my face gravenly rapt, my eyes staring, but I was awake and resolute. Would he suspect?
"Once we are believed, we can still work together, Leo," Guaracco was insisting. "Plan again, and better and bigger. We may yet rule the world!"
I threw myself upon him.
He pulled the trigger, but my right hand was upon the revolver. Pain bit my thumb, that had thrust itself between breech and hammer, and the firing pin drove deep into the base of the nail. A moment more and I wrenched it away and flung it behind me. It exploded with the shock, and the bullet sang into the beam overhead. A moment later we had both drawn swords.
"You triple traitor!" howled Guaracco, parrying my first lunge. "Come then, if you will have death this way!"
I made no reply, but deflected his riposte—the trick he had learned from me. His chest was exposed to a return riposte, but I knew the mail that defended it, and swept my blade in a quick arc. He got his brow out of the way with millimeters to spare.
Falling back, he tried to clutch at another pistol, one of a heap in an open box, but I nicked at his outflung hand, and got home. He whimpered. Two of his fingers soared away, and blood fountained forth.
"Wait, Leo!" he changed his tune at once. "I must not die, if you expect to live and—"
I did not expect to live, and made him no answer. His sword was up, and I beat it momentarily aside and slashed at his face. Quickly he parried, but only half-broke the force of the blow. His cheek was laid open, and his beard suddenly gleamed a deeper red.
"The time reflector," he yammered at me, on sudden inspiration. "Only I can show you how to rebuild, improve, get back to your own age!"
He should have saved his breath, for he was panting and choking. His thrusts were unsteady, easy to foil. My digging lunge at his belly, while it did not pierce the chain mail, drove most of the wind out of him. It drove out the fight, too. He tried to retreat to the stairs, but misjudged and brought his back against the plank-faced wall. He threw down his sword and lifted his hands.
"Mercy!" he begged. "I surrender! Leo!"
His unwounded right palm spread itself against a stout timber. I darted my point at it, all my weight behind. A tremulous, unmanned howl from Guaracco—his hand was spiked to the wood by my blade, like a big pale spider on a bodkin.
Then I let go my hilt and stepped back. I spared no eye to my enemy's plight, nor ear to his prayers.
Lisa lay still and misty pale, but there was no blood on her calm face. I closed her eyes, straightened her body and folded her hands upon her quiet breast. In her last instant of life her mouth had fallen into the little close-lipped smile I had known. Kneeling almost to earth, I kissed her once, and her face was still warm.